Remembering Germany's Past; Reflecting on the Present
It’s a standard move in the last 10 days – has it really been only ten days? — to say that we’re at an inflection point in history, perhaps most profoundly in the United States, but also in other parts of the world. Many are saying that we’ve not seen anything like this in the United States; some are predicting that this could be the of our democracy, however flawed it’s been. I’ll leave it to others more knowledgeable than I about these things to make this judgment, though I do think that even if this is a decisive moment we should acknowledge the underlying factors that have brought us to this moment.
As historian Reinhart Koselleck once noted: “The processual character of modern history cannot be comprehended other than through the reciprocal explanation of events through structures, and vice versa.” Structural economic, social and political conditions shape events. But on some junctures, events, such a political revolutions or major wars, can profoundly shape structures. The rare occasion when an event gains structural significance constitutes a historical inflection point.
David Motadel in The Guardian, Are we at a turning point in world history?
Yes, Trump is attempting to force some profound changes in our government, our culture, and our society. And, yes, his having gained the position to make this attempt depends on developments that have denied many people the power to live a life anywhere close to the so-called American dream. We’re experiencing an abrupt flood – a flooding of the zone — but it’s power grows out of a set of circumstances many years in the making.
As I bounce back and forth between the reading that distracts me from the awful news of the day and the dread provoked by my reading of that news, I find myself remembering a visit to Germany in the summer of 2022. The vacation plans that my wife and I had carefully made were disrupted by her contracting Covid. I managed to avoid the disease that time. She was confined to our hotel room – the hotel management even took away her room key and tasked me with delivering her food in the hotel room. That was bad. But one day between meals I ventured out into the city. Here’s an entry from my journal:
Today I went to the Historisches Museum Frankfurt. I spent most of my time there in a special exhibit on Frankfurt and the Nazis. It was a really interesting exhibit discussing how the Nazis were able to come to power so quickly. One point I found very interesting is how the Nazi party “punched above their weight” early on – even while their numbers were still small, they focused on making a big splash on the street with lots of protests and increasingly violent activity. They also remade the street culture, putting their symbols everywhere and also making a point to wear their Nazi regalia.
I had always associated the Autobahn with Hitler and the Nazis, I suppose because I read somewhere that Eisenhower was very impressed by how efficiently the German army could move army vehicles from one place to another. However, I learned in this exhibit that the concept of the autobahn emerged early in the 1920s, and concrete plans for an initial part of it were completed before 1930. However, the Nazis realized early on that one way of building up their image with the people would be to take that project on as their own. So they did it, and the succeeded in making people see the autobahn system as an example of what they could do for the country.
I confess that I don’t remember now many of the details of the exhibit. As I read today what I wrote about it then, I’m struck by the way that Trump and others in his camp are exaggerating his dominance in our country. Yes, he won the popular vote (though he got the votes of fewer than half of those who voted) and the electoral college, but he did not get a decisive mandate. But I’m also struck by the way that he’s claiming responsibility for so many things that were done by those who came before him, and also working to create a public space in which even his most extreme supporters are free to swagger. I’m thinking of the small group of Proud Boys marching through the streets on the day of Trump’s inauguration. “Whose streets? Our streets!” In all of this, Trump and his followers are attempting to construct a narrative that will shape our understanding of where we’ve been, where we are, and where we’re going. They are working with the support of online media like Facebook and X and of many of our country’s corporate leaders. Many, though not all, of the legacy media companies are acquiescing to if not explicitly supporting these efforts. The challenge we face today is the challenge of responding to the flood, to the turmoil, in a way that keeps us from going over the precipice that led Germany into World War II and the Holocaust. And responding to that challenge depends on our finding a way to counter the lies that threaten the community on which that response depends.