Freedom Cannot Be Taken for Granted
In the fall of 1989, I studied at the Karl-Marx-University in Leipzig. As a student of theology, I was able to participate in the demonstrations on the street as well …
Regional Institution-Building in Asia: Are There Any Lessons from Europe?
For many in the international media and among casual observers of Asia, regional institution-building may appear a mundane subject. Strengthening existing regional institutions, or establishing a more substantive one, is …
Post-Unification German Studies: Momentum Gained or Lost?
Carl Bildt, until recently Sweden’s foreign minister, told Thomas Friedman of the New York Times in 2003: “For a generation Americans and Europeans shared the same date: 1945. A whole …
Germany’s Foreign Policy of Reconciliation
Now available in paperback, AGI Society, Culture & Politics Director Dr. Lily Gardner Feldman’s book, “Germany’s Foreign Policy of Reconciliation: From Enmity to Amity,” highlights Germany as a model for …
Can Germany Reconcile the Western Balkans?
In April 2013, Serbia and Kosovo signed an agreement that enabled a rapprochement between the two sides, including an understanding that they will not block each other’s bid for European …
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Support Our WorkToward Historical Reconciliation in East Asia: Emergence and Expansion of Transnational Networks
Pragmatic Necessity to Grapple with History Problems East Asian countries are now facing a situation often called the “Asian paradox,” in which deepening economic interdependence coexists with historical and territorial …
The Day the Berlin Wall Really Fell
Contrary to popular lore, the Berlin Wall did not fall on November 9, 1989. Nor did it fall in Berlin. It fell on October 9 some 120 miles away, in …
The Katyn Massacre: Half a Century of Lies and the Search for Truth
Borrowing institutionally from the German-Polish case, Polish-Russian reconciliation had been making small, tentative steps until the crisis in and over Ukraine. There is some effort to continue civil society interaction, …
Mars vs. Mercury: Germany, America, and the Global Order
Germany and America: Two Reluctant Pivotal Powers Germany and the United States rank as the two most influential and powerful Western liberal nations in a world challenged by the rise …
2009 and 2014: Reflections
Time flies. I am struck by how recent the events of the twentieth anniversary of the Mauerfall feel. A rainy, but magical, memory. At first blush, 2009 seems a more …
After the Wall: Survivors’ Expectations
There were many expectations when the Wall came down. Not least among them that Holocaust survivors living in Eastern Europe would finally receive payments from Germany for their suffering. But …
November 1989
Like December 7, 1941, November 22, 1963, and September 11, 2001, November 9, 1989, is one of those dates remembered in freeze frame. But it’s the rare exception that most …
