SUCCESSFUL FAILURE ?
THE IMPACT OF THE GERMAN STUDENT MOVEMENT ON THE
FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY
In 1993, Matthias Kopp’s
film essay ‘Erfolgreich gescheitert’, broadcast on Deutsche Welle TV, cemented
the dual view of the impact of the German Student Movement on the Federal
Republic of Germany. The Movement was shown to have succeeded because it has –
in spite of its anti-American stance - secured West Germany’s orientation
towards the West; it has promoted sexual liberation, a tolerant multicultural
society, equality, a sense of hope, and a thriving subculture. The German
Student Movement was shown to have failed because it was remarkably ineffective
regarding any change in the political system, the economy, or the workplace.
Moreover, it was and is associated with allegedly disastrous antiauthoritarian
education practices, with terrorism, and with drug abuse.
The term ‘successful
failure’ was introduced during the first of the increasingly ritual anniversary
debates on the Movement in 1988[1],
but the matter-of-fact tone in which the paradoxical verdict was delivered by
Kopp in 1993 suggested that this formula, which allowed former adversaries to
save face, was actually working. Each side could claim victory: the 68ers for
conquering the imagination, the conservatives for conquering reality.
In 1998, the uneasy co-existence was shattered by a plethora of new books, essays and
editorials. The battle for ‘kulturelle Hegemonie’ and
‘Deutungshoheit’ in the Federal Republic erupted again in full force, with the
added spice that whilst for the first time historians attempted to argue that
1968 had indeed become history, a new government was elected whose ministers
had their roots in 1968 and, according to some political observers, threatened
to put the utopian dream back on the agenda.
In a recent article,
Reinhard Mohr analyses the demise of the German Left, and its loosening grip on
the political and cultural hegemony in Germany.[2]
He argues that the historical advantage of the Left, bolstered by the notion
that it was responsible for a second founding of the Bonn Republic[3]
and a fundamental liberalisation and democratisation (a view put forward by
Jürgen Habermas in 1988), has disappeared. And even though the Right have their
own identity crisis[4], the position
of the 68ers as ‘founding fathers wider Willen’ is gradually eroding. Their
copyright on ‘progressiveness’ has elapsed.
The most obvious reason
for this shift in perception is that the 1960s have become a distant and
increasingly incomprehensible era, one that fewer and fewer people can remember
clearly. We may vaguely feel that the era was of cultural significance in terms
of the fundamental shift in popular culture and the changing attitude to state
authority[5],
but its political significance is far more difficult to determine, particularly
after the collapse of communism in the early 1990s which ended the model of
antagonism which the war and post war generations had internalized so well.
Today, the gulf between the 68ers and the modern observer seems almost
unbridgeable. Looking back thirty years, Tariq Ali wrote:
To those reading about it today, that world might appear to be like a
submerged continent. However, it is difficult for us to believe that we live
now in a world where hope is gone for ever and self-contemplation and
self-interest have replaced the belief in a world of equality. Humanity still
possesses all the facilities to effect such a change, but the system that has
triumphed in the last years of this century would rather render our very being
null and void than give up its privileges.[6]
However, there are still many voices that claim that the German Student Movement was successful[7], or at least that it had a significant impact on German society[8]. Helmuth Kiesel, a literary historian, argues that the movement’s true achievement lies in helping to realise the modern pluralistic society which had always been intended by the fathers of the Basic Law:
Sie hat die traditionalistischen Drapierungen der BRD und ihrer
Gesellschaft, Talare und Uniformen, Konvention und Reglements, moralische
Gebote und strafgesetzliche Verbote, so weit wie möglich abgeschafft und hat
dadurch deutlich werden lassen, was zwischen 1945 und 1949 auf den Weg gebracht
worden war: ein demokratischer Staat mit einer autonomen und pluralistischen
Zivil- und Bürgergemeinschaft, getragen von einer Bevölkerung, die sich
mehrheitlich keineswegs nach alten Zeiten sehnte, sondern mehrheitlich
demokratisch und modern sein wollte.[9]
Lutz Schulenburg maintains that 1968
marks the beginning of an era of revolutionary rebellion against a capitalist
system and consumer society which ignore the real needs and desires of the
individual. In his view, what the Student Movement has taught all subsequent
movements is that spontaneity and grassroot democracy, however frustrating and
slow, are the basis of an alternative political culture:
Die Lehre
von ‘68’ könnte also lauten: Die Avantgarde marschiert am Schluß, die
Spontaneität garantiert die Wucht und Breite einer Bewegung, sie garantiert
keine Ewigkeit, aber sie ist das einzige Moment, um Individuen massenhaft aus
ihrer Passivität befreien zu helfen; die Organisation ist dem Fortschritt der
Gesamtbewegung nachgeordnet und ist weder eine festumrissene Institution noch
eine höhere Stufe des Kampfes, sondern einzig ein Instrument praktischer
Notwendigkeiten. Spontaneität und Vermittlung gehören für ein Denken, das
sozialrevolutionär sein will, zusammen, und das so forcierte Praxisverständnis
ist ein Prüffeld dafür, ob das Denken tatsächlich revolutionär ist. Zu den
unveräußerlichen Elementen gehören die Transparenz von Entscheidungen, das
Schwinden von Unterordnung, die Beratung und das Prinzip der Delegation von
Aufgaben und Befugnissen.[10]
The Student Movement’s most dedicated
scholar is Wolfgang Kraushaar of the Hamburger Institut für Sozialforschung,
who is best known for his ‘Protestchronik’ and ‘Frankfurter Schule und
Studentenbewegung’. He believes the successes outweigh the failures: the students may have
failed in their radical attempts to change society, but they were successful in
their emancipation from their parents, in sensitising society to the Nazi past,
and in their demands for an expansion of education, for sexual self
determination, women’s emancipation, and democratisation of some institutions.
While the movement has had negative side effects, it has demonstrated that a
minority can make a significant difference:
Das Jahr 1968 hat in der Bundesrepublik
alles verändert. Die APO hatte zu einem wahren Sturmlauf auf die Institutionen
angesetzt – auf Schulen, Universitäten, Gerichte, Behörden, Gefängnisse,
Psychiatrien, Parteien und Parlamente. Kaum eine der nach ihrer Legitimität
befragten Einrichtungen ist von dieser Offensive verschont geblieben. Aus einem
Überschuß an utopischen Energien wurde – nachdem die Einübung ebenso überholter
wie unangemessener Revolutionsrhetoriken verpufft war – die Kraft für lange
überfällige Reformen freigesetzt. Auch wenn die APO in ihren unmittelbaren
politischen Zielsetzungen fast überall gescheitert ist, so hat sie die
Einstellungen, Haltungen und Mentalitäten doch nachhaltig verändert. Das, was
Menschen in ihrer Subjektivität ausmacht, ist erst durch sie in den Mittelpunkt
des öffentlichen Interesses gerückt worden. Der tradierte Politikbegriff ist um
entscheidende Dimensionen erweitert worden. Politisches Handeln ist nicht
länger mehr obrigkeitsstaatlich geprägt und auf Regierungen, Parlamente und
Parteien beschränkt. Selbstinitiative, Mündigkeit, Zivilcourage,
Nonkonformismus und kollektive Verantwortlichkeit haben einen unverzichtbaren
Stellenwert erhalten.[11]
Critics of the Student Movement,
predictably, continue to deny that it has any positive legacy at all. The 68ers
are blamed for a significant fall in standards in the schools brought about by
their antiauthoritarian ideas of education.[12]
They are seen to be responsible for the loss of ‘German virtues’ such as
diligence, order, honesty and punctuality, thus contributing to a general
weakening of the national fibre.[13]
They are accused of creating a myth, of artificially keeping themselves in the
public consciousness via ‘Ursprungslegende’, ‘Fundamentalopposition’, ‘Führer-
und opferkult’, to guarantee them the ‘Diskurshoheit’ long after their
ideological sell-by-date.[14]
Former activists like Frank Böckelmann[15] and adversaries like Günter Grass[16]
unite in questioning the consensus of the lasting impact of the student revolt.
Worst of all, the 68ers stand accused of not knowing how to answer
today’s problems: their iconoclasm, according to Reinhard Mohr, has turned into
an ideological conservatism which views social and technological changes
predominantly as a threat, while their response to the debate about how to
remember the Holocaust has been conspicuous by its absence: “Da, wo die 68er Linke ihren hoch moralischen Anfang genommen hatte – wo sie auch heute
geistig gefordert wäre – da hörte man fast nichts von ihr.”[17]
It is interesting to
note that the 68ers are simultaneously accused of having held the
Deutungshoheit too long and of not having any answers for today’s problems.
This indicates a certain romantic expectation on the part of later generations
that indeed the 68ers know ‘where it’s at’. However, any residual dependence on
them is certainly well hidden. The 68ers have become ‘strangers in a strange
land’, their icon, the magic year 1968, is, according to Armin Thurnher, “eine Chiffre der
Diffamierung im ganz normalen Generationen-Kanibalismus.”[18]
Achim Schmillen, a member of the Green Party working in Joschka Fischer’s
office, gained street cred amongst his peers by publicly announcing:
Der 68er-Mythos ist doch nur noch ein Bassin, an dessen Oberfläche
Straßenkampf, sexuelle Befreiung, Kommunegeilheiten und weitere
Errungenschaften dieser Zeit matt vom Grund heraufschimmern.[19]
New generations are jostling for
their place, and they are not always appreciative of the ‘Zukunftsverantwortung
der Linken’. Matthias Horx was one of the first to assert the emancipation of
the generations post 68[20],
but their prime spokesperson is Reinhard Mohr, who has formulated his
generation’s grudge against the 68ers as having imbued them with a rebellious
spirit whilst taking off to Tuscany and the fleshpots of tenured university
posts.[21]
What is true is that the Generation
of 1968 has received a disporportionate amount of attention, and is still seen
as the decisive generation in the history of the Federal Republic. A unique set
of circumstances, according to sociologist Heinz Bude[22],
make it distinctive, effective, and so long lasting in its identity and consciousness.
Factors that glue its members together are the birth around the end of WWII,
their moral upbringing in the ‘Nie wieder Krieg’ mould, their abhorrence at the
silence and materialism of their parents, and their willingness to engage in
collective protest. What is more, they didn’t know about the hole in the ozone
layer, which may explain their optimism and naivete which later generations
lack.[23]
The fact that some members of the 68
generation once played a catalytic function is not questioned by the
generations now in their thirties. They are simply fed up with the fact that
the 68ers are in their ‘Prominenzphase’,[24]
that they have joined the establishment and become the representatives of the
system they once tried to destroy.
The move
of the seat of government to Berlin in the summer of 1999 was most certainly
not a return to the protest tradition in that city. Rather, it freed the
younger generation from the historical baggage of the Bonn Republic. The
‘Generation Berlin’ couldn’t care less about Rudi Dutschke[25],
and tries to dissociate itself from the 68ers. Younger German MdBs recently
announced a ‚cultural revolution’ against “die staatstragenden Yesterday Heroes
der 68er”. In a polemic of
some vindictiveness, they declared their independence from the „subversiven
Grundimpetus radikalen Kritisierens bestehender Verhältnisse, der seit der
68er-Revolte in der bundesrepublikanischen Gesellschaft vorherrschend geworden
ist.“[26]
Richard Herzinger points out that
this protest is simply part of the ‘Anpassungsmechanismen’ of young party
members in power. By attacking their elders, they are compensating for their
own lack of purpose. But he feels they have missed their target, since the
68ers are no longer a homogeneous group:
Was vom Erbe der 68er Generation übrig geblieben ist,
steht längst nicht mehr für das, was die ‘Generation Berlin’ an ihnen angreift.
Die 68er sind längst selbst zum saturierten Mittelstand geworden, der den Reiz
der Bewahrung für sich entdeckt hat. […] Die 68er haben sich längst selbst von
den rebellischen Träumen ihrer Jugend verabschiedet und sich in die
verschiedensten Richtungen wie Utopienostalgiker, kulturpessimistische
Untergangsdiagnostiker und liberale Reformisten ausdifferenziert. [27]
While it is a fact that some polititians
who have taken over the key posts in the new German government are members of
the 68 generation, they do not intend to follow the agenda of the German
Student Movement. Joschka Fischer indicated this break with the past before the
general election:
Daß das politsche System und die demokratische Kultur heute weit
durchlässiger, anpassungsfähiger und offener gegenüber neuen Herausforderungen
geworden sind, als dies für das damalige System Westdeutschland galt, ist eine
bleibende Leistung des magischen Jahres 1968. Ansonsten riecht die heutige Zeit
nach großen Veränderungen und damit nach Zukunft, und das ist gut so.[28]
Even the Springer press, one of the
prime targets of the students’ protest against ‘the establishment’ felt there
was no cause for concern. On the day after the election, Die Welt commented:
Der 27.
September ist ein Tag des Siegs der 68er Generation. Mit Schröder werden zum
ersten Mal die Kämpfer der außerparlamentarischen Opposition in den höchsten
Ämtern des Staates sitzen. Der "Marsch durch die Institutionen" war
erfolgreich, die Truppe ist ganz oben angelangt. Doch Schröders Wahlsieg ist
ein Struktursieg, kein Sieg der 68er Ideologie. Die wurde still und leise
entsorgt. Doch an die Stelle eines Wandels trat in vielen Fällen eine Art
weltanschauliches Vakuum. Pragmatismus für eine Politik der Popkultur. Das gibt
dem Generationensieg etwas Hohles.[29]
The new
Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, intent on making the ‘neue Mitte’ as wide as
possible, made the most of his own affinity with the year 68, but was careful
not to give the impression that his government saw itself as following in the
footsteps of the revolution:
Der Umzug nach Berlin ist mit einem Generationswechsel
verbunden. Das gilt für die Politiker, und das gilt für die Politik. Die Generation,
die zum Ende des Jahrzehnts in den Entscheidungszentren angelangt ist, ist
zusammen mit dem Land erwachsen geworden. Wir haben es mit Biographien erlebter
– und ertrotzter – Demokratie zu tun: in der Auseinandersetzung mit autoritären
Strukturen im Westen, im Aufbegehren gegen ein diktatorisches System im Osten
Deutschlands. Diese Generation ist angekommen und muß schon wieder den
Stabwechsel zur nächsten vorbereiten.[30]
Historisation
If 1968 has become the “Gradmesser,
mit dem das Selbstverständnis der Republik überprüft werden kann“[31],
then we need to know exactly what 1968 actually stands for. This is becoming
increasingly difficult if we do not want to depend entirely
on the unreliable and partisan memory of the greying 68ers. The era has received
intense media attention, but, because of its anti-establishment attitude, its
constantly changing agenda and essentially ephemeral nature[32],
the real debates and discussions within the Student Movement (as opposed to its
media image) have until recently been very poorly documented. To help scholars,
researchers and archivists are now locating and documenting the resources
scattered around libraries and private collections. One of the first was a
small guide put together by Phillipp Gassert and Pavel A. Richter.[33]
Another resource for researchers is the recent publication of a ‘Quellenkunde’
by German archivists Thomas Becker and Ute Schröder.[34]
There is no doubt about
it – 1968 is facing historisation. Historians and sociologists feel it is time
that they look after it. Ingrid Gilcher-Holtey[35]
and her colleagues want to get away from the memories of the activists in order
to move towards a critical, analytical view of the protest movement, and hope
this can yield ‘die Erfassung der Wirkung dieser Bewegung’. Gilcher-Holtey’s
approach is superficially plausible: she argues that the German Student
Movement was a social movement, in that a large number of individuals aimed for
social change. Unfortunately, the sociologists offering their opinions in her
book do not yet possess the instruments or methods of interpretation that would
allow them to arrive at objective, specific coclusions. Ingeborg Villinger basically follows
Barbara Sichtermann’s ten-year-old argument when she pronounces: “die durch die
68er provozierte Politisierung des Alltags leitete eine Veränderung der
Wahrnehmungsperspektive ein, deren inhärente Dynamik Folgen zeigte.”[36]
What
consequences these might be is distinctly vague, unless we consider her crytic
concept of a ‘Verflüssigung der Normalität’. Kristina Schulz admits that, as
far as interpreting the impact of the German Student Movement is concerned, a
sociologist’s tools are simply not precise enough:
Die gesellschaftsverändernden Impulse der Protestbewegungen können nicht
getrennt von den anderen Faktoren sozialen Wandels bestimmt werden, was die
direkte Zuschreibung von Folgen sozialer Bewegungen erschwert.[37]
What good, then, is a
historical view of 1968? Robert Frank lists a number of myths about the German
Student Movement which a closer historical study can reveal as nonsense.[38]
One example of this is the myth that 1968 was anti-totalitarian in nature. He
argues that almost the opposite was true, both in terms of individual and
collective behaviour. But the biggest myth, according to Frank, is the
‘Gründungsmythos’ which says that 1968 was the time when a miraculous
‘Nachgründung der Bundesrepublic’ took place. Unfortunately, like several other
writers in Gilcher-Holtey’s book, he does not give any evidence for his view.
Historians haven’t got a
monopoly on the truth when it comes to the evaluation of the impact of 1968,
and even though research into the sixties promises to give us a better
understanding of the ‘deep socio-historical processes of transformation’, the
‘natural enmity’[39] between participants
and historians prevents, for the time being, a final assessment.
This is not to say that
a historical approach cannot yield any results. Andrei Markovits’ and Philip
Gorski’s study of the German Left[40]
successfully explores the metamorphoses of the left political spectrum from
orthodox marxism via sectarian anti-authoritarian movement to ecological mass
movement. Ingo Juchler’s ‘historiographische Untersuchung’ of the influence
of third world liberation movements and
theories on the US and German Student Movements pulls together a wealth of
information on this particular aspect[41],
while Sabine von Dirke’s recent study traces the aesthetic and social
challenges to the ‘hegemonic culture’ by the West German counterculture(s) from
the 1950s to the 1980s.[42]
Wolfgang Kraushaar has
recently written a review of new publications about the German Student
Movement, and included a helpful listing of the ‘Publikationsschübe’ from 1967
to the present.[43] While also
conceding that a final verdict on the impact of the movement is impossible as
long as the diagnostic uncertainty remains, he believes there are some trends
to be made out in the research:
1. Cultural interpretations of the impact of the movement have taken
over from political, economic or social interpretations. For the time being,
there is agreement about the short-term political failure and long-term
socio-cultural effects. However, these are difficult to determine.
2. Even though there is no conclusive explanation for it, the global
character of the phenomenon of 1968 is generally accepted.
3. The disparity of influences and groupings which have converged in the
68-movement is increasingly the object of research. There was no unity of
purpose on ideological or organisational level.
4. The symbolic significance of scenes, individuals and situations
appears to have played a greater role than hitherto assumed. The activists were
part of a media-led and informal self-stylisation. This has led to the
increased use of terms like ‘myth’, ‚idol’ and ‚icon’.
5. The metatheoretical
coordinates for a discussion of the movement which existed in the first fifteen
years after the events are no longer uncontested. New, postmodern
interpretations compete with the old ones, but they have until now not been
able to gain the upper hand. This increases the uncertainty about the
categorical framework within which a valid analysis could be reached. [44]
For his own part, Kraushaar is satisfied that the 68-movement was not
only one of the strongest political challenges of the Federal Republic, but
that it caused a socio-cultural ‚Bruch’ which had a fundamental impact. Announcing
his latest book[45], he
observes:
Die Frage steht im Raum, ob eine grundlegende
Veränderung der Mentalitäten, Lebenstile und Lebensentwürfe, die Ausbildung zivilgesellschaftlicher
Normen, die Fundamentalliberalisierung der neuen Mittelschichten [...] ohne die
von der antiautoritären Bewegung freigesetzten Schubkraft überhaupt denkbar
gewesen wären.
The significant word in this rather hopeful collection of suggested
effects is ‘denkbar’. Kraushaar implies that the socio-cultural changes and
value shifts which have undeniably taken place after 68 could not even have
been contemplated without the 68ers who first created the impetus for change.
Kraushaar’s view is echoed by another surviving and politically
uncompromised 68er, Peter Schneider. The author of Lenz (1973) has over the
last decade produced a number of seminal essays on German identity, German
unification and, most recently, the growing xenophobia in Germany.[46]
In a ‚defense of the 68ers against the wire-fence-generation’, Schneider
writes:
[…] ich rufe es euch, unseren lebensneidischen
Krittlern und Sargträgern zu: Nicht einmal ihr würdet in der Gesellschaft leben
wollen, die ihr hättet, wenn es unseren Aufbruch nicht gegeben hätte – nicht
die Eroberung der Körper durch die neue Musik, die Erweiterung der sexuellen
Grenzen, das Aufbegehren der Frauen! Dass dieser Kampf auch zu barbarischen
Verirrungen geführt hat, muss ich hier nicht noch einmal beschreien, nur
orthodoxe Dummköpfe bestreiten es, dass sie massenhaft und vielleicht für immer
mit der Kultur des Gehorsams gebrochen haben.[47]
A wealth of coffee-table books,
biographies and cultural histories combine to send the message: this was the most exciting period in West
German history, on a par with the ‘Roaring Twenties’ in the Weimar Republic. We
want to know more about this period because we may feel that our present is too
safe and predictable, or because we can escape from reality in the accounts of
the 60s: in them we find abandon, freedom, iconoclasm, challenge and intensity.
There is something about the unfulfilled promise which leaves us wondering what
might have been. In the legend and literary representations of the German Student
Movement, we find preserved the experience of liberation which we might need
again like the frozen genes of an extinct species.[48]
Taking stock, however,
the question must be whether the ‘long march through the institutions’[49]
actually had any verifiable impact on the Federal Republic. If so, was it
successful in terms that the marchers can agree on, and in terms that we today
could agree on? In other words, we need to decide whether we want to take the
students by their word and judge their impact by what they openly campaigned
for[50],
or whether we believe that their impact has to be seen in their collateral
influence, which could be measured by examining collective memory, media
attention, public discourse, and political constellation. Both strategies depend
on whether we believe the 68ers, who have, until recently, held the monopoly on
the interpretation on the German Student Movement, and whether we can
disentangle myth and reality. It is fascinating to see how easy it is to
redefine an entire era. We have seen this phenomenon in the re-branding of the
SPD as a counter-cultural force in the 1972 election[51],
in the re-evaluation of Rudi Dutschke from ‘rebel rouser’ to moral icon, and
the latest incarnation of ‘68 as ‘training ground’ for our new, level-headed
political leaders.
Like the Greens, the
students set out to do more than they could actually achieve, and in the
process, they lost what cannot be regained: their youth, their innocence, their
idealism and their utopian dream. This loss, in my opinion, has influenced the
political and cultural climate for the last 30 years. The experiences of the
German Student Movement led to a much more sober and focussed protest by the
feminist movement, the green movement and the peace movement. None of these
movements were on the agenda in 1968, not even the support for Willy Brandt,
his Ostpolitik, and eventually unification. The mobilisation of ‘Otto
Normalverbraucher’ to vote for the Social Democrats for the first time after
the war may have had something to do with the Zeitgeist, but, as far as the students were concerned, the SPD
wasn’t any more likely to rock the boat than the CDU, a fact that had become
clear for all to see when the SPD helped to pass the emergency laws in May
1968.
Judged by their own
ideals, demands, plans and aspirations, the students have failed miserably. The
economic system they despised now rules supreme, the one-dimensionality of
mankind continues apace on television and the internet. The slogan of the
‘successful failure’ with regard to the aims, aspirations and utopian dreams of
the German Student Movement appears to be little more than well-rehearsed
apologetics. By accepting this compromise, we don’t need to decide, we don’t
need to destroy the dream, and we don’t need to answer the questions the
students asked either. The students often quoted Hermann Hesse’s dictum that in
order to achieve the possible, one has to demand the impossible. At the
beginning of the new millennium, we Germans are barely bold enough to attempt
the possible - the programme of change promised by the red-green coalition: the
creation of a truly ‘civil society’, has run out of steam in the face of
reality.
But,
of course, the ‘struggle’ isn’t over yet, and the alternative to the 68ers in
their Prominenzphase isn’t exactly preferable. Does that
mean that the ‚historic mission’ of the 68ers is fulfilled? The Spiegel
believes that there is still more to do:
Vielleicht müssen die 68er erst zu Großvätern
werden, um mit ihren Enkeln eine neue gesellschaftliche Synthese einzugehen,
die sich zuweilen schon andeutet – zwischen den klugen Kindern der Postmoderne
und den desillusionierten Vätern der Revolte, die immer noch neugierig sind auf
eine Zukunft, die sie nicht von früher kennen.[52]
So what can
we say?
1:
The impact of the German Student Movement on the Federal Republic is a matter
of interpretation, a struggle for ‘Interpretationshoheit’ between the 68er
generation, their critics, and the generations that followed. It is also a game
with very few permanent players.
2:
The impact of the German Student Movement is being re-evaluated because
generations post 68 seek to gain influence and power in the Berlin Republic.
3:
The impact of the German Student Movement is played down by the ‘losers’ in the
shift to more liberal, more transparent and more democratic practices in the
Federal Republic. This includes, paradoxically, a number of former activists
and participants of the movement.
4:
The impact of the German Student Movement is talked up by those who stand to
gain from the cultural shift. This includes, paradoxically, conservative
voices, scaremongers, people who didn’t have anything to do with the events
while they were happening, and those who simply wish that the German Student
Movement had been successful.
5: The intense debate about the impact has
itself changed the impact – the German Student Movement is accorded a mythical
status and significance because it still holds the interest of the media and,
because of its diverse nature, has become a rich field for academic research.
While we are trying to analyse the impact, we contribute to the impact.
6:
All the nostalgic accounts of the German Student Movement capture the mood of
the time, and preserve it. That in itself is an important legacy and
demonstrates the impact on the public psyche, in that we may wish for a return
of that intensity, even though its actualisation would be impractical and
embarrassing in the present climate.
Since the conception of this article
in Spring 2000, a chain of events occurred that has brought the antagonism
between the two opposing interpretations of the German Student Movement’s
impact on German life to the fore again, in quite an unexpected manner.
In January 2001, Bettina Röhl,
daughter of Ulrike Meinhof, posted an accusation on her website stating that
Joschka Fischer, the foreign minister and vice-chancellor of the Federal
Republic of Germany, had committed serious crimes as a militant ‘sponti’ during
and in the aftermath of the German Student Movement.[53]
He was accused of beating up a policeman at a demonstration and, more
seriously, of supporting the RAF. The timing of these ‘revelations’ (Fischer’s
past is resonably well documented in biographies both sympathetic and
unsympathetic) was crucial: the CDU opposition could hope to deflect public
attention from their own party finance scandal, and put the Schröder government
under pressure.
The ensuing debate – held publicly
and with surprising ferocity considering that the events in question took place
almost 30 years ago – brought all the old antagonists into the ring again. Not
a day went without new accusations, eagerly debated both in the sensationalist
as well as the serious press.[54]
While British voices analysed events with a certain detachment (Lord Weidenfeld
felt that the debate showed that Germany had learned from the past and that the
debate itself was a good thing for democracy[55];
the Guardian described it as being ultimately about the moral use of force[56]),
the debate in the German media (especially Focus and Bild) hit hysterical
levels, but seems to have run out of steam by the end of February. The majority
of the population looks on in mild amusement, and wishes Fischer to remain in
office, seeing him as a man who has learned from his experiences and accepting
that his ‘historical baggage’ is actually a positive attribute in the bland
political landscape.
As to the ‘serious debate’ about the
alleged catastrophic impact of the German Student Movement on German society,
as demanded by some observers, it hasn’t yielded anything new. The discussion,
a minor Kulturkampf between proponents of ‘Leitkultur’ and ‘Subkultur’, is
still dominated by the continuing struggle for Deutungshoheit and cultural
hegemony – is the capitalist reality allowed to destroy the idealistic legacy
of the 68ers? Apparently not. Not only has the campaign of the CDU run out of
steam – Angela Merkel’s demand in the Bundestag that Schröder, Fischer and
Trittin should once and for all renounce their 68 past[57]
was generally considered ill-informed and hypocritical. Ms Röhl’s publisher
dumped her forthcoming book (they also publish Fischer’s autobiography), and
even Roland Koch’s attempt to put Fischer on trial in Frankfurt (the scene of
the alleged crimes) for ‘uneidliche Falschaussage’ is seen as an obvious ploy
motivated by party-political interests.
What has been termed by Die Zeit as
‘dritte Vergangenheitsbewältigung’ never really took place, not because there
is nothing to come to terms with (Fischer did apologise for his violent acts
and stressed that he had moved away from militant action by the mid-seventies),
but because the 68ers once again closed ranks. In their view, 68 must be
preserved as necessary part of our past, and the lessons learnt must be carried
into our present in order to fend off the alternative: a meaningless, purely
materialistic existence, which Rudi Dutschke once described as “Man kann gut
konsumieren und trotzdem vor sich hin vegetieren”.
The new discussion has shown that
Germans are mostly realistic about the limitations of the German Student
Movement. At the same time, the debate, which may flare up again if new
allegations are put forward in the run-up to the general election in 2002, has
demonstrated that 1968 is far from history – it is still a presence in our
political, social and cultural reality. The myth of 1968 is showing further
cracks, but the chiffre 1968 continues to be “eine
Münze im Kampf um das politische Selbstverständnis dieser Republik.“[58]
© Dr Ingo Cornils, 22 November 2002
[1] See Wilhelm Bittorf, “Träume im Kopf,
Sturm auf den Straßen“, Der Spiegel 14-21, 1988; Ronald Fraser, 1968. A student
generation in revolt, London 1988; Barbara Sichtermann, “1968 als Symbol”, in:
Lothar Baier et.al., Die Früchte der Revolte. Über die Veränderung der
politischen Kultur durch die Studentenbewegung, Berlin 1988; Knut Nevermann,
“Die naive Rebellion”, Süddeutsche Zeitung, 9.4.88; Hermann Rudolf, “Halb
Treibsatz, halb Rohrkrepierer”, in: Süddeutsche Zeitung, 9.7.88
[2] Reinhard Mohr, “Von der Revolte zur
Denkstarre”, in: Der Spiegel 48/1999, pp.164-174
[3] see Claus Leggewie, “Der Mythos des
Neuanfangs. Gründungsetappen der Bundesrepublik Deutschland“, ©1995,
http://nakayama.org/polylogos/philosophers/arendt/arendt-mythos.html
[4] nicknamed ‘Der Marsch aus den
Institutionen’, as opposed to the students’ ‚Marsch durch die Institutionen’
[5] for an overview of the era – excluding Germany - see Arthur Marwick, The Sixties, Oxford 1998
[6] Tariq Ali
/ Susan Watson, 1968. Marching in the Streets, London 1998, p.13
[7] see Michael
Ruetz, Sichtbare Zeit, Frankfurt 1995, p.209; and Rolf Uesseler, Die
68er: “Macht kaputt, was euch kaputt macht”, München 1998, p.354
[8] Hermann Glaser believes that it led
to the political victory of the SPD/FDP coalition in 1969 (Kleine
Kulturgeschichte der Bundesrepublik Deutschland 1945-1989, Munich 1991); Marcel
Reich-Ranicki feels that it forced society to deal with the Nazis in our midst
(Mein Leben, Stuttgart 1999, p.461)
[9] Helmuth Kiesel, „Literatur um 1968.
Politischer Protest und postmoderner Impuls“, in: Protest! Literatur um 1968,
Marbacher Kataloge 51, Marbach 1998, pp 627/628
[10] Lutz Schulenburg (ed.), Das Leben ändern,
die Welt verändern!, Hamburg 1998, p.9
[11] Wolfgang Kraushaar, Das Jahr, das alles
verändert hat, München 1998, p.323
[12]
One of the most vocal exponents of this view is Dietrich Schwanitz, author of
bestsellers like ‘Der Campus’, ‘Bildung’ and ‘Der Zirkel’. In a recent
interview, Schwanitz claims that the anti-authoritarian movement caused a
politisation of the German education system, which allowed more and more
students to enter Gymnasien and universities without expecting them to work to
the traditional standards. (“Wenn
das Blöde Kult wird”, in: Stormarner Tageblatt, 1 July 2000, p.6)
[13] see Ingo
Cornils, “The German Student Movement. Legend and Legacy”, in: Debatte. Review
of Contemporary German Affairs, Vol.4 / No.2, 1996, pp.36-62.
For a longer discussion of the attempt
by the ‘New Right’ to vilify the 68ers see Michael Schneider, “Volkspädagogik”
von rechts: Ernst Nolte, die Bemühungen um die “Historisierung” des
Nationalsozialismus und die “selbstbewußte Nation”, Bonn 1995 (electronic ed.:
Bonn: Bibliothek der Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, 1998)
[14] Richard Herzinger, “Die Kulturrevolutionäre
von 1968 - Garanten der liberalen Kultur in Deutschland?”,
http://www.oeko-net.de/kommune/kommune12-96/AHERZING.htm
[15] Frank Böckelmann, “Offene Türen
eingerannt”, in: Claus-M. Wolfschlag (ed.), Bye-bye ’68, Graz 1998, pp.76/77
[16] The latest German winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, himself an active participant at the time, dutifully covers the German Student Movement in Mein Jahrhundert (Göttingen 1999). His anchor for the years 66-68 is a failed revolutionary turned academic, who fled the action in the city to study in peace in quiet Freiburg. The implication is that today’s 68ers may not have been the revolutionaries we are supposed to take them for, and that they didn’t know what they were doing. Grass acknowledges that it was an intense time, but the verdict at the end is devastating when a young student tells her professor: “Von Ihnen kommt sowieso nicht mehr.” p.252
[17] Reinhard Mohr, “Von der Revolte zur
Denkstarre”, in: Der Spiegel 48/1999, pp.173/174
[18] Armin Thurnher, “Die Schrift leben”, in: Der Standard, 11/4/1998, p.35
[19] Achim Schmillen, “Wir sind besser als die
Alten!”, in: Die Zeit, 7.3.1997
[20] Matthias Horx, Aufstand im
Schlaraffenland, München 1989. Horx credits the ‚real 68ers’ with imbuing the following generation with
the courage to stand up to their parents, to experiment with drugs and sex, and
to discuss every aspect of life extensively and openly. However, he draws a
distinction between the ‘klassischen 68er’ with their focus on abstract
theorising, and his own generation, which practiced ‘Politik in der ersten
Person’ within a network of subcultures and held a desire to be even more
radical than their heroes. (pp. 15-19)
[21] Reinhard Mohr, Zaungäste. Die Generation,
die nach der Revolte kam, Frankfurt 1992; see also Kursbuch 121, Berlin 1995:
Der Generationenbruch, esp. Eckart Britsch, “Jede Jugend ist die dümmste”,
pp.159-165
[22] Heinz Bude, Das Altern einer Generation.
Die Jahrgänge 1938-1948, Frankfurt 1995
[23] Daniel Cohn-Bendit / Reinhard Mohr, 1968.
Die letzte Revolution, die noch nichts vom Ozonloch wußte, Berlin 1988
[24] At least in terms of age group. Karl Heinz Heinemann/Thomas Jaitner
(eds.), Ein langer Marsch. ’68 und die Folgen, Köln 1993; and Oskar Negt,
Achtundsechzig. Politische Intellektuelle und die Macht, Göttingen 1995; argue
that the ‚real 68ers’ do their ‚Maulwurfsarbeit’ in less prominent places.
[25] The Körber Foundation (Hamburg)
recently held a school competition ‘Aufbegehren, Handeln, Verändern. Protest in
der Geschichte’ and invited winners to Berlin for a conference and a discussion
with Rudi Dutschke’s widow, Gretchen Dutschke:
“Was ist
von damals geblieben?”, will Schülerin Sandra wissen. “Oh, das wollte ich von
euch wissen.” “Ich glaube, dass gar nichts erhalten ist,” sinniert ein Schüler.
Keiner widerspricht. Die schmerzliche Erkenntnis tritt ausgerechnet in der so
heiß umkämpften TU Berlin zutage: Die 18-Jährigen von heute wissen nicht, dass
viele Dinge, die ihnen und ihren Eltern selbstverständlich sind, damals erst
buchstäblich losgetreten wurden.
Matthias Schmook, “Zeitreise – Schüler trafen
Gretchen Dutschke”, in: Hamburger Abendblatt, 10/2/2000, p.17
[26] At the launch of their new political magazine ‚Berliner Republik‘ in Berlin, October 1999
[27] Richard Herzinger,
“Berliner Mief”, in: Die Zeit, 39/1999; see also: Stiftung für die Rechte
zukünftiger Generationen (ed.), Die Achtundsechziger: Warum wir Jungen sie
nicht mehr brauchen, Freiburg 1998. The message is that the ‘great
ideals’ have either been realised or died long ago.
[28] Joschka Fischer, “Ein magisches Jahr”,
in: Spiegel special, 9/1998
[29] Matthias Döpfner, ‚Der Sieg der
Achtundsechziger’, in: Die Welt, 28/9/1998. The paper’s fascination with the 68ers is due
to its new editor, Thomas Schmid, a former student activist. In various
articles the paper now acknowledges that 1968 did indeed have an impact, in
that the 68er generation is controlling the state (‘Sieg der
Achtundsechziger’), is responsible for the ‘morally justified’ NATO
intervention in Kosovo (‘Der Krieg der Achtundsechziger’, 31/7/1999) and is
responsible for a redefinition of the relationship between Europe and the USA
(‘Die Achtundsechziger als neue Atlantiker’, 30/3/1999).
[30] Gerhard Schröder, “Meine Berliner
Republik”, in: Der Stern 36/1999
[31] Wolfgang Kraushaar, „1968. Das Jahr der
Rebellion“, in: Der Spiegel 13/1999
[32]
compare Margaret Atack, May 68
in French Fiction and Film, Oxford 1999, p3:
There is […] a ‘hall of mirrors’ aspect to the lived experience of May. The event is lived as completely outside normal experience. It is unique, other, and immediate. It is therefore, by definition, ephemeral, a fact registered in the number of books gathering and preserving documents, the collection of photographs, the special issues with photographs and quotations. The inscriptions would be effaced, the actions would not be repeated.
[33] Phillipp Gassert / Pavel A.
Richter, 1968 in West Germany. A Guide to Sources and Literature of the
Extra-Parliamentary Opposition, (The German Historical Institute Reference
Guide No.9), Washington 1998
Richter is completing a PhD on the
extra-parliamentary opposition in West Germany, and Gassert is co-editor of the
proceedings of a conference exploring ‘the events and significance of the
momentous year 1968’, organised by the German Historical Institute in Berlin in
1996:
Carole Fink / Philipp Gassert, Detlef Junker,
1968: The World Transformed, Cambridge University Press 1998
[34] Thomas Becker/Ute Schröder, Die
Studentenproteste der 60er Jahre. Archivführer – Chronik - Bibliographie,
Böhlau, Köln 2000
[35] Ingrid
Gilcher-Holtey (ed.), 1968. Vom Ereignis zum Gegenstand der
Geschichtswissenschaft, Göttingen 1998; see also David Farber, The Sixties:
From Memory to History, University of North Carolina Press, 1994
[36] Ingeborg
Villinger “Stelle sich jemand vor, wir hätten gesiegt. Das Symbolische der 68er
Bewegung und die Folgen”, in: Gilcher-Holtey, p.251
[37] Kristina Schulz, „Macht und Mythos von
‚1968’“, in : Gilcher-Holtey, p.256
[38] Robert Frank,
“1968 – ein Mythos?”, in: Gilcher-Holtey, pp.301-307
[39] see Christoph
Classen, „Die sechziger Jahre als Suchbewegung – Ein Symposium in Kopenhagen
über soziale Kultur und politische Ideen in beiden deutschen Staaten“, in:
Potsdamer Bulletin für Zeithistorische Studien, No.13, 13 July 1998, p.46
[40] Andrei Markovits / Philip Gorski,
The German Left: Red, Green, and Beyond, OUP, New York 1993
[41] Ingo Juchler, Die Studentenbewegungen in
den Vereinigten Staaten und der Bundesrepublik Deutschland der sechziger Jahre,
Dunker&Humblot, Berlin 1996
[42] Sabine von Dirke, ‚All Power to the
Imagination!’ The West German Counterculture from the Student Movement to the
Greens, University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London 1997. von Dirke
explores an interesting aspect of the German Student Movement that goes beyond
the scope of this article, namely, inhowfar the counterculture’s alternative
politics and its aesthetic concepts and artistic practices impacted on the
dominant ‘hegemonic’ culture of the Federal Republic (pp.31-66 and 209-218)
[43] Wolfgang
Kraushaar, „Der Zeitzeuge als Feind des Historikers? Neuerscheinungen zur
68er-Bewegung“, in: Mittelweg 36, Zeitschrift des Hamburger Instituts für
Sozialforschung, No.6/99, pp.49-72
[44] ibd., pp.70/71 (translation IC)
[45] Wolfgang Kraushaar,
Neunzehnhundertachtundsechzig (1968) als Mythos, Chiffre und Zäsur, Hamburg
2000
[46] Peter Schneider, “Der Zerfall des
Zivilen”, in: Die Zeit No.32 / 2000
[47] Peter Schneider, “Ausbruch aus der
Käseglocke“, in: Der Spiegel, 21 / 2000
[48] see Ingo Cornils, “Romantic Relapse? The literary representation of the German Student Movement”, in: Chris Hall/David Rock (eds.), CUTG proceedings 1999, Bern, 2000
[49] see Ingo
Cornils, “The Struggle Continues. Rudi Dutschke’s Long March”, in: Gerard J.
DeGroot (ed.), Student Protest. The Sixties and after, London 1998, pp.100-114
[50] e.g.
Mager/Spinnarke, Was wollen die Studenten?, Frankfurt 1967; Günter Gaus’ famous
interview with Rudi Dutschke, 3 December 1967; and Hans Magnus Enzensberger’s
Interview with Rudi Dutschke, Bernd Rabehl and Christian Semler in Kursbuch 14,
Berlin 1968
[51] for example in their election
poster depicting Willy Brandt and Walter Scheel as the heros from the 1969 cult
film Easy Rider.
[52] “Die neuen Deutschen”, in: Der Spiegel,
21 / 2000
[53] see Alexander Smoltczyk, “Die letzte
Gefangene der RAF”, in: Spiegel Reporter 3/2001; Hannah Cleaver, “Germany is
shaken by daughter of Meinhof”, in: Daily Telegraph, 3 March 2001
[54] The following contributions give an
overview of the debate. Further links can be found on my webpage: http://www.german.leeds.ac.uk/gsm/gsm1.htm
Gunter Hofmann, “Joschka und Jochen. 1968, noch
einmal besichtigt – wie die Bundesrepublik beginnt, sich zu historisieren“, in:
Die Zeit, 4/2001; Michael Naumann, „Fischer in der Geschichtsfalle“, in: Die
Zeit, 4/2001; Reinhard Mohr, „Zorn auf die roten Jahre“, in: Der Spiegel,
4/2001; Wolf Biermann, „Komm mit angeln... sagte der Fischer zum Wurm.
Anmerkungen zur Vergangenheitsbewältigung von 1968“, in: Die Welt, 19 January
2001; Klaus Hartung, „Runter mit dem Zeigefinger“, in: Die Zeit, 5/2001; „Ein
Segen für dieses Land“. Interview with Daniel Cohn-Bendit, in: Der Spiegel,
5/2001; Karl Heinz Bohrer, “Fantasie, die keine war”, in: Die Zeit, 7/2001;
Hans-Jürgen Fink / Irene Jung, „Verteufeln hilft nicht.“ Interview with Joachim
Gauck, in: Hamburger Abendblatt, Wochenend Journal, 10 February 2001
[55] Lord Weidenfeld, “Mutmaßungen über
Joschka Fischer”, in: Die Welt, 25 January 2001
[56] John Hooper, “Fischer’s troubles an affair of state”, in: The Guardian, 27 February 2001
[57] “CDU wirft Fischer Verharmlosung vor”,
in: Süddeutsche Zeitung, 18 January 2001
[58] Wolfgang Kraushaar, 1968. Das Jahr, das
alles verändert hat, München 1998, p.313