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Society

Our societies are changing on both sides of the Atlantic thanks to demographic change, immigration and integration, and regional differences—among other factors. Greater understanding about our cultures, an open exchange about emerging issues, and fostering dialogue between different groups can help German and American societies build stronger internal and external connections and awareness.
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Episode 34: Berlin Wall: The View from the West

Images of the fall of the Berlin Wall dominate the public consciousness when thinking about the end of the Cold War. Photos of jubilant Germans standing atop the symbol of …

Apply for the 2021 DAAD/AGI Research Fellowship Program

The DAAD/AGI Research Fellowship Program, funded by a generous grant from the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD), is designed to bring both senior and junior scholars and specialists working on key issues of central importance to the …

Hard part is just beginning

Chancellor Helmut Kohl was fond of recalling how, before choosing 3 October 1990 as the official date for German reunification, he first checked with the weather bureau. He wanted a …

The Central Council of Jews in Germany: A Success Story Against All Odds

The Central Council of Jews in Germany (Zentralrat der Juden in Deutschland) turned seventy this summer. Founded in Frankfurt in July 1950, the Central Council represents the interest of the …

German Reunification: New Possibilities, New Perspectives, and Our Future Now In Our Hands

The “Wende” and finally the termination of the GDR turned the world upside down for the people in eastern Germany. On the one hand, it changed their daily lives in …

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Looking Back at German Reunification Thirty Years Later

Germans have long contrasted the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 with the much more sober formal reunification of East and West Germany in October 1990. The fall …

The Berlin Republic at Thirty: Neither Bonn or Weimar

Rene Fritz Alleman, a Swiss journalist, wrote a book with a famous title at the beginning of West Germany’s history in 1956, Bonn ist nicht Weimar. As the Federal Republic …

Munich’s Lessons for U.S. Airports

Most airport travel in the United States is less than pleasant. A typical experience may include long waits in drab and uninviting corridors, a greasy pre-flight fast food meal, and …

We Could Schaffen Das, But We Won’t

EU migration policy reform still stalled five years after peak of crisis The crisis that hit Europe in 2015 has never gone away. This summer, Germans reflected on the fifth …

The Linke’s Search for Leadership – and Direction

Otto von Bismarck is once reported to have said “Faust complains of having two souls in his breast. I have a whole squabbling crowd.” So it is with any leader …

QAnon Goes Global

“Please, Mr. President, make Germany great again.” It’s not every day that demonstrators in Germany plea for America’s president to come to their aid. But the August 29 anti-lockdown protest …