{"id":59,"date":"2018-11-20T16:00:22","date_gmt":"2018-11-20T16:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/web.colby.edu\/presence\/?page_id=59"},"modified":"2019-01-15T20:59:33","modified_gmt":"2019-01-15T20:59:33","slug":"the-presence-of-the-past-in-angela-merkels-political-discourse","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/presence\/the-presence-of-the-past-in-angela-merkels-political-discourse\/","title":{"rendered":"2\/11: The Presence of the Past in Angela Merkel\u2019s Political Discourse"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jennifer Yoder, Robert E. Diamond Professor of Government and Global Studies (Colby College)<\/strong><\/p>\n

When Angela Merkel assumed the German chancellorship in 2005, there was little indication that she would emerge as a leader adept at memory politics. The unassuming physicist was a relative newcomer to politics, lacking media savvy and skill at public speaking. During the early years of her leadership, she was criticized for her cautious style and her indecision, eventually inspiring a new German verb, merkeln<\/em>, or to dither. Furthermore, Merkel is an East German, the first East German to be chancellor, and she was born in 1954, whereas her predecessors Gerhard Schroeder and Helmut Kohl were born in 1944 and 1930, respectively. These regional and generational background factors likely contribute to Merkel possessing very different individual memories than her predecessors. As someone socialized in the German Democratic Republic (GDR), we would expect that her knowledge of the Nazi period and the Holocaust was shaped by the antifascist, anti-imperialist ideology of the East German communist regime rather than by the processes of Geschichtsaufarbeitung<\/em> (working through the past) and reconciliation with former enemy countries that typically shaped the memory politics of her predecessors.<\/p>\n

In my lecture for the Presence of the Past series, I will explore how and why Chancellor Merkel has invoked the German past, particularly when addressing Germany\u2019s role in Europe and the world. I will suggest that Merkel has drawn upon several pasts \u2013 from different points in time and from different configurations of Germany \u2013 to present an integrated collective memory for a unified Germany. What is more, she has referenced the past to justify particular policy positions and, occasionally, a particular vision for Germany\u2019s role in European and global affairs.<\/p>\n

At Colby since 1996, Jen Yoder is jointly appointed in the government department and the global studies program. Her courses focus on European politics, including this semester\u2019s \u201cMemory and Politics.\u201d Yoder\u2019s research addresses various aspects of post-unification German politics and identity. Her ongoing research project on European memory explores the memory divides that have emerged in recent years between new\/eastern and old\/western members of the European Union.<\/p>\n