InstitutsMontage

The expansion and contraction of empires has contributed to creating today’s globalized world to an extent unequaled by any other modern structural phenomenon. European expansion after 1500 subjected large regions to imperial rule and transformed almost the entire world economically and culturally. As former colonies gained independence from their mother countries around 1800 in America and in the mid-twentieth century in Asia and Africa,  new worlds of states emerged and at the same time new kinds of imperialism were generated, not least that of the United States, whose rise and crises have shaped world politics to the present day.

But the history of these imperial cycles is a history of violence and war, although modern empires have been established not only through military conquest. The skillful exploitation of local power differentials and the more or less deliberate cooperation of political, social and ethnic groups on the periphery made it possible for imperial rule, in which few control many, to take hold in the first place. Empires would be impossible to maintain however without the threat and at least exemplary use of force. Violence seems to be the very quintessence of imperial power exercised on the periphery.

Violence played a special role in European settlement colonies, where, without state control, it could culminate in de facto, albeit unplanned, genocide.

Under the working title of Wars of Empire, which, in contrast to the more familiar concept of ‘colonial wars’, aims to expand the horizon for studying violent conflicts beyond the era of direct European colonial rule in the Third World, the Hamburg Institute for Social Research has for several years pursued comparative analysis of the use of military force in the expansion and contraction of modern empires. Using case studies from several empires and from different continents, the Institute’s lecture series shows the thematic scope and timeliness of its focus on wars of empire, also bringing to light aspects of one of the most important problems related to the history of violence in the modern world.

10 October 2011

Dierk Walter: Von Tenochtitlan nach Afghanistan: Die Logik des Imperialkrieges
[From Tenochtitlan to Afghanistan: The Logic of Wars of Empire]

7 November 2011

Wolfgang Knöbl: Imperiale Herrschaft und Gewalt
[Imperial Domination and Violence]

5 December 2011

Tanja Bührer: Afrikanisierung der Gewalt? Afrikanische Akteure und die Kriegführung in Deutsch-Ostafrika (1885-1914)
[The Africanization of Violence? African Actors and Warfare in German East Africa (1885-1914)]

9 January 2012

Andreas Stucki: Koloniale Konzentrationslager? Spanische Aufstandsbekämpfung in Kuba, 1868-98
[Colonial Concentration Camps? Spanish Counterinsurgency in Cuba, 1868–1898]

6 February 2012

Bernd Greiner: "Eating Soup with a Knife". Amerikas Aufstandsbekämpfung von Vietnam bis Afghanistan
["Eating Soup with a Knife": America’s Counterinsurgency from Vietnam to Afghanistan]

The historical process in which Germany confronted and came to terms with its Nazi past is universally regarded as exemplary. The fundamental emotional structure of this process is based on the desire to identify with the victims, and tends to define appropriate forms of memory and commemoration now and for the future. Memories linked to identification with victims create strong bonds, both in Germany and evidently around the world, and are often associated with a collective promise, but the theoretical and identificatory premises of this promise are rarely questioned. The global appropriation of the Holocaust that has occurred in the past 20 years has been accompanied by a disturbing competition among victims, diametrically opposing processes of remembering, transnational appropriation and transfer, and normalization and standardization tendencies. These developments mark new and by no means conflict-free challenges to global remembrance practices that are oriented around the concept of human rights.

7 March 2011

Ulrike Jureit: Unbehagen an der Erinnerung? Die Besichtigung eines Gesellschaftszustandes
[Uneasiness Over Memories? Thoughts on a State in Society]

4 April 2011

Claudia Weber: Verstörende Erinnerung. Der Stalinismus und das Gedächtnis Europas
[Disturbing Memories: Stalinism and Europe’s Collective Memory]

2 May 2011

Mischa Gabowitsch: Verbrechen erinnern. Eine deutsch-russische Transfergeschichte
[Remembering Crimes Against Humanity: A German-Russian Story of Transferal]

6 June 2011

Angela Kühner: Die Anderen der Erinnerung. Geschichtsaneignung in der Einwanderungsgesellschaft
[The Others of Memory: Appropriating History in Immigrant Society]

4 July 2011

Fatima Kastner: Globale Erinnerungskultur: Zwischen Kosmopolitismus und Partikularismus
[Global Cultures of Memory: Between Cosmopolitism and Particularism]

The concept of the "center" is multifaceted and ambiguous. Despite uncertain definitions, however, the center is viewed as comprising two-thirds of Germany’s population and perceived as its foundation, a foundation upon which the welfare state and its system of social solidarity is based. This center is now threatened by recent budget cuts and the transition from a state designed to care for its citizens to one that supplies only limited forms of assistance. Typically associated with bourgeois ways of life, this center is also linked to family and role models that are now undergoing fundamental transformations. With conflicts over status and jobs on the rise, individuals who define themselves as part of the center increasingly emphasize the distance between themselves and those viewed as "lower" in status, especially by referring to differences in culture, education, and lifestyle.

The center is also associated with ideas about political standpoints. Except for the German political party "Die Linke", which has a different self-understanding, all parties currently represented in the German Bundestag consider themselves part of the political center. What makes this position so attractive for Germany’s parties and how do they attempt to distance themselves from extremist organizations?

In addition to these social and political meanings, the center also refers to geopolitical ideas. In a transnational European context, this raises the issue of how European partners with their divergent backgrounds as nation-states will operate within the European center, especially with an eye to the current global financial crisis.

All lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institute for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 p.m. (doors open at 7:30 p.m.), Admission: free

4 October 2010

Jens Hacke: Politische Bürgerlichkeit. Gibt es eine Ideologie der Mitte?
[The Political Bourgeoisie: Is There an Ideology of the Center?]

1 November 2010

Karin Jurczyk: Familie als Mitte, Familie in der Mitte? Gesellschaftliche Verschiebungen
[The Family As the Center, The Family In the Center? Shifts in Society]

6 December 2010

Berthold Vogel: Der Abschied von der Mitte, die wir kannten? Neue Konturen der Arbeitswelt, veränderte For-men des Wohlfahrtsstaates
[An End to the Center as We Knew It? Changes in the World of Work and the Welfare State]

10 January 2011

Ulrich Bielefeld: Mitten in Europa. Varianten und Konflikte europäischer Selbstthematisierungen
[In the Center of Europe: Alternative Modes and Conflicts of European Self-conceptualization]

7 February 2011

Wolfgang Kraushaar: Zur Topographie der Mitte
[On the Topography of the Center]

With the end of neoliberalism, concerns about social issues now rank high on the public agenda. There is a huge need for social services, but so far it is unclear who can be expected to fill this gap. The welfare state continues to withdraw from functions that were once its responsibility. The family has become a term that now applies to a broad spectrum of quite diverse relationships. Individuals increasingly demand the right to lead their own lives. What are the impacts of this fundamental liberalization of relationships on how people live their lives together? How do children grow up today? How are the aged cared for? Who is indeed even capable of caring for another person? The phrase “the politics of care” refers to a complex web of institutions, behaviors, and values that are supposed to prevent society from dissolving into a sea of individuals who, despite their concern for the whole, are capable only of thinking, feeling, and acting from the vantage point of their own needs. This perspective focuses on a system of claims, on the procedures of socialization, and on concepts of commonality that communicate a sense of both solidarity and obligation to the members of a society. The politics of care asserts the need to link concern for oneself with concern for "significant others" and to recognize this act of linkage as a way of shaping relationships.

All Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

12 April 2010

Heinz Bude: Selbständigkeit und Sorge
[Independence and Care]

3 May 2010

Janosch Schobin: Sorgende Freunde? Fragen an eine andere Lebensform
[Friends Who Care? Examining an Alternative Way of Life]

7 June 2010

Berthold Vogel: Wer trägt die Sorge für das Ganze? Anmerkungen zur Zukunft sozialer Staatlichkeit
[Who Cares for the Whole? Notes on the Future of the Social State]

5 July 2010

Ann Kathrin Scheerer: Krippe und Krippendiskussion: Ambivalenzen und Alarmaffekte
[Day-care and Discussions: Ambivalence and Alarm Affects]

For historians, the Cold War essentially began after it had come to an end, in 1989 after the Austro-Hungarian border opened and the Berlin Wall came down and in the early 1990s, when the Soviet Union split apart and with it the Warsaw Pact. Since then, archives in Eastern Europe have become accessible to researchers that, were it up to those who established them, would have remained closed forever, except to a chosen few individuals. For a time, there was talk of an “archival revolution”. At least in Russia, this phase is definitely over. But its impacts are nonetheless considerable; archives in the West also came under pressure and some collections were opened earlier or to a greater extent than was otherwise expected.

These new historical sources created the impetus to raise new issues about the past and changed the perspective on the entire Cold War era. Indeed, the two decades since 1989 have effected a change in paradigm in research on contemporary history. Just two examples might be cited here: whereas academic interest was focused almost entirely on the Eastern and Western blocs, today other states in the South and North attract the attention they warrant. And the former fixation on diplomacy and the military has increasingly given way to heightened interest in the social and societal history of the Cold War. The lectures in this series will take up seven case studies to explore these shifts in historiography.

All Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

5 October 2009

Bernd Stöver: Das Ende des Kalten Krieges in Osteuropa und der Zusammenbruch der UdSSR
[The End of the Cold War in Eastern Europe and the Collapse of the USSR]

2 November 2009

Bernd Greiner: Stand die Welt an der Schwelle zum Atomkrieg? Neues zur Kuba-Krise
[Was the World on the Brink of Nuclear War? New Perspectives on the Cuba Crisis]

7 December 2009

Christian Th. Müller: Von Beschützern und Besatzern. Amerikanische und sowjetische Truppen in der deutschen Provinz 1955 bis 1989
[On Protectors and Occupiers: American and Soviet Troops in Provincial Germany, 1955 to 1989]

11 January 2010

Tim B. Müller: Intellektuelle Gegenentwürfe zum Kalten Krieg
[Alternative Intellectual Concepts on the Cold War]

1 February 2010

Claudia Weber: Und alle Fragen offen? Katyn und die Folgen der russischen „Archivrevolution“ nach 1990
[And all Questions Left Unanswered? Katyn and the Impacts of the Post-1990 Russian “Archival Revolution”]

15 February 2010

Martin Schaad: "Dann geh doch rüber." Über die Mauer in den Osten
[“Then Just Jump over to the Other Side”: About the Wall in the East]

1 March 2010

Bettina Greiner: Die ersten Opfer des Kalten Krieges? Deutsche Häftlinge in sowjetischen Speziallagern
[The First Victims of the Cold War? German Prisoners in Soviet Special Camps]

Since ratification of the EU constitution was halted, European unification has slowed, but the process of accession continues despite ongoing controversy and more and more areas of the economy and politics become subject to EU norms. For nearly sixty years, a growing number of states have join a process in which at first parts of trade markets, then specific areas of policy-making and even national self-understandings became “Europeanized”. This new series of Monday lectures will explore whether a truly European society has emerged, if so, how this society is described in different contexts, and to what extent it can claim legitimacy.

Do new bonds form as EU citizens increasingly formulate expectations and demands on the basis of comparisons across the borders of the Union and notions of belonging become less and less unambiguous and one-dimensional? Are there signs that transnational concepts of solidarity are developing to counterbalance the inequalities of the internal market? Is a Europe-wide public sphere taking shape, despite the multiplicity of EU languages?

The lectures in this series will examine whether new structures and conflict configurations impede the formation of a European society or, on the contrary, are its precondition and hallmark.

All Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

4 May 2009

Nikola Tietze: Einheitsstreben und kultureller Pluralismus in Europa
[The Drive for Unity and Cultural Pluralism in Europe]

11 May 2009

Maurizio Bach: Politische Integration und gesellschaftliche Desintegration in Europa
[Political Integration and Societal Disintegration in Europe]

8 June 2009

Steffen Mau: Ungleichheit und Solidarität in Europa
[Inequality and Solidarity in Europe]

15 June 2009

Ulrich Bielefeld: Europa - eine besondere Gesellschaftsformation?
[Europe — a Special Societal Formation?]

6 July 2009

Étienne Balibar: Idee Europa – Identität, Zivilisation, Verfassung
[Political Europe: Unity without Identity?]

Social inequality is increasing dramatically, and in view of marked changes in the world of work, in the social welfare state, and in the relationships between generations, social analysis must face new challenges. Who is threatened with the possible loss of social status and material prosperity? Who is in danger of being excluded from participation in social, economic, or political life? Along which fault lines do new social divides emerge? That all these questions no longer pertain to the fringes of society alone—at least this assessment would seem to be undisputed. In the face of persistent unemployment, increasing slippage from what were formerly secure positions of affluence and social status, and financially depleted social security systems, such questions have become issues for society’s majority.

The nineteenth InstitutsMontage series investigates the symptoms of social division. Various social groups and classes come under scrutiny: those that are excluded from prosperity and those that fear its loss. Experience with social ruptures is addressed, as well as the structural phenomena that lead to them. The contributions to this lecture series aim to subject the institutions of the social welfare state, the organization of its services, and the design of its infrastructure to an in-depth examination.

All Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

13 October 2008

Heinz Bude: Inklusion und Exklusion. Die Ausgeschlossenen in Deutschland
[Inclusion and Exclusion: The Excluded in Germany]

3 November 2008

Stephan Lessenich: Die Neuerfindung des Sozialen. Zur Politischen Soziologie der Aktivgesellschaft
[Reinventing the Social: The Political Sociology of the Active Society]

1 December 2008

Hans-Jürgen Andreß: Armut trotz Reichtum. Eine neue gesellschaftliche Spaltungslinie
[Poverty in spite of Wealth: A New Divide in Society]

12 January 2009

Jürgen Oßenbrügge: Benachteiligte Quartiere. Prozesse räumlicher Segregation
[Disadvantaged Neighborhoods: Processes of Spatial Segregation]

2 February 2009

Berthold Vogel: Wohlstandskonflikte. Die soziale Frage, die aus der Mitte kommt
[Prosperity Conflicts: Social Issues from Society’s Middle]

Global trade, international and transnational cooperation in research, and worldwide communication are generally interpreted as signs of an emerging world society. The normative regulation, management, and control of these phenomena, however, are still perceived as issues that nation-states must deal with individually or within the context of interstate relations. Does it make sense to seek signs of social and legal processes of self-organization in global contexts that transcend the nation-states? Are legal norms becoming established autonomously on a global level? Is the nation-state losing its monopoly on formulating and generating legal norms and are transnational regimes of constitutional law emerging as part of a parallel development? These issues will be discussed from various perspectives within the social sciences and legal theory.

All Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

7 January 2008

Ulrich Bielefeld: Nation und Weltgesellschaft
[The Nation and World Society]

4 February 2008

Michael Zürn: Recht und Legitimität in der postnationalen Konstellation
[Law and Legitimacy in a Postnational Constellation]

3 March 2008

Gerd Hankel: Funktion und Bedeutung internationaler Strafgerichte
[Function and Significance of International Criminal Courts]

7 April 2008

Catherine Colliot-Thélène: Das Rechtssubjekt in der Weltgesellschaft
[Legal Personhood in World Society]

5 May 2008

Bernd Greiner: Politik ohne Grenzen
[Politics without Borders]

2 June 2008

Marcelo Neves: Transversale Rechtsvernetzung und Asymmetrien der Rechtsformen in der Weltgesellschaft
[Transveral Legal Networking and Asymmetries of Legal Forms in World Society]

7 July 2008

Fatima Kastner: Rechtsmutationen in der Weltgesellschaft. Beobachtungen globaler normativer Strukturbildungsprozesse
[Legal Mutations in World Society]

Opening a copy of Jürgen Habermas’s Theory of Communicative Action and Niklas Luhmann’s Die Gesellschaft der Gesellschaft [The Society of Society] from the back, one notes that the former includes only a name index, whereas the latter offers only a subject index. And those who go on to read both works will discover that these two indexing modes mark how the two volumes differ in their aspirations. What should the book be about: relating to the far-reaching thought of others by synthesizing and seeking connections; or pursuing an analytical approach to issues, such that theoretical traditions must become a paper trail of historically constrained perspectives?

One could dramatize the theoretical implications of such differences, but it is equally possible to declare that they are merely a question of taste. Those who would avoid both extremes have no choice but to assert that—if one aims to do more than retrace the history of ideas—any engagement with individual theoreticians is only of interest with respect to issues and problems that these thinkers taught us to perceive in a certain fashion for the first time and if we continue to regard those issues as significant. Conversely, we only consider a specific way of relating to issues and problems to be significant because we have learned—by virtue of highly individual perspectives shaped by specific historical contexts—to see them in a certain way; perhaps, indeed, to see them at all.

The lecture series “What about…?” examines the work of diverse theoreticians of the social sciences to discuss whether and to what extent sharing in their perspectives on social issues and problems is possible, desirable, or even necessary. This is not an arbitrary selection of names inasmuch as no lecture series with a similar program could do without these individuals; it is arbitrary inasmuch as the names of many others whose work is obviously just as worthy of discussion, including numerous classic thinkers par excellence, might have been added. Only two criteria were applied to the selection process: all the authors included here lived in the nineteenth and twentieth century, and none are still alive today.

All Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

5 February 2007

Heinz Bude: Wie weiter mit Karl Marx?
[What about Karl Marx?]

5 March 2007

Ulrich Bielefeld: Wie weiter mit Max Weber?
[What about Max Weber?]

2 April 2007

Jan Philipp Reemtsma: Wie weiter mit Sigmund Freud?
[What about Sigmund Freud?]

7 May 2007

Beatrice Heuser: Wie weiter mit Carl von Clausewitz?
[What about Carl von Clausewitz?]

4 June 2007

Matthias Koenig: Wie weiter mit Émile Durkheim?
[What about Émile Durkheim?]

2 July 2007

Wolfgang Bonß: Wie weiter mit Theodor W. Adorno?
[What about Theodor W. Adorno?]

1 October 2007

Peter Schöttler: Wie weiter mit Marc Bloch?
[What about Marc Bloch?]

8 October 2007

Rahel Jaeggi: Wie weiter mit Hannah Arendt?
[What about Hannah Arendt?]

5 November 2007

Armin Nassehi: Wie weiter mit Niklas Luhmann?
[What about Niklas Luhmann?]

3 December 2007

Philipp Sarasin: Wie weiter mit Michel Foucault?
[What about Michel Foucault?]

Currently, numerous German politicians are engaged in a debate about how much plurality in the country’s schools is compatible with the education system’s task of educating future citizens. Moreover, in the daily interactions of school students and teachers, divergent notions of belonging come together and identities are shaped or stabilized. Thus, in Germany, as a destination country for immigrants, imparting knowledge and acquiring familiarity with the rules of social life are processes that are inevitably linked to the issue of how society deals with a broad spectrum of socio-economic milieus and an equally diverse set of cultural backgrounds, religious convictions, or linguistic identities.

The plurality that constitutes a challenge for schools is at the same time a fundamental element of European self-understanding. While the preamble to the draft Constitution for Europe refers to the European Union as “united in diversity”, the member states in fact formulate directives and regulations that call into question national concepts of unity. European institutions’ language policies are one example of how pluralization processes as part of the unification of Europe can potentially come into conflict with the integration needs of the nation-states. Concepts of the nation often fail to correspond with the realities of pluralistic populations as well as with the pluralistic ideals that have shaped European legal principles. Although these concepts of the nation follow other imperatives, they play a considerable role in defining immigration and integration policies. Thus, in the Federal Republic of Germany, the development of national self-understanding is a decisive factor in regulating pluralistic social relations.

All Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

6 November 2006

Frank-Olaf Radtke: Intelligenter Umgang mit Heterogenität? Zur Mikropolitik der Schule in der Einwanderungssituation
[Dealing Intelligently with Heterogeneity? On the Micropolitics of School and the Realities of Immigration in Germany]

4 December 2006

Nikola Tietze: Der Nationalstaat im Strudel des Pluralismus: europäische Sprachen- und Minderheitensemantiken
[The Nation-State in the Maelstrom of Pluralism: European Semantics of Language and Minorities]

8 January 2007

Ulrich Bielefeld: Von der ethnischen zur demographischen Nation
[From the Ethnic Nation-State to the Demographic Nation]

In current debates about social reforms in Germany, social technocrats and virtuosos of prejudice set the tone. The message both groups convey to a rather nervous public audience is quite similar: that the machinery of prosperity can be set in motion again quickly, as soon as the experts have discovered the right remedy for what ails German society. But the gap between the haves and the have-nots in the world of employment, irreversible demographic developments, and the enormous fiscal problems that both state and private agents of social welfare face all add up to confirm the same assessment: today’s challenges to social policy call for solutions that are considerably more far-reaching than either the rhetoric of “let’s roll up our sleeves and get to work” or recourse to the usual tools of the tax or social security trade. What is needed is a fundamental re-conceptualization and re-alignment of social policy.

To this end, we must begin by re-examining the social sphere from a number of different perspectives. These perspectives are defined by such issues as the reasons where and why state involvement is necessary in this realm, how civil society is organized, and the relevance of the principle of subsidiarity in social life. Today more than ever, we are called upon to renew our commitment to “defending society” (Foucault), by re-defining the welfare state as a form of administering social affairs, but also by submitting the social functions of non-state actors to critical scrutiny, or by probing the capacity of families to fulfill social needs.

Based on questions investigated in recent research at the Institute, this lecture series aims to address these challenging issues and sketch possible perspectives for future policies that will renew and sustain the social web of German society.

All Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

3 April 2005

Berthold Vogel: Die Staatsbedürftigkeit der Gesellschaft
[Why Society Needs the State]

8 May 2005

Jörn Pyhel: Gewerkschaften als Ordnungsfaktor
[Unions as a Factor in the Social Order]

12 June 2006

Heinz Bude: Gerechtigkeit durch Subsidiarität
[Justice through Subsidiarity]

• Since the end of the Cold War, the prerequisites for historical study of this era have changed in a numerous ways. With the passage of time, a new perspective, one that is no longer shaped by the hostilities of the period, can more easily be adopted. Moreover, new historical documents and sources have become available; uncovering and interpreting the information they contain will presumable preoccupy researchers for many years to come. Finally, the issues raised by those studying the period have also begun to shift, from a historiographical fixation on the history of diplomacy and military affairs, to a broader societal history of the Cold War, which addresses the inner dynamics and processes of change within the states involved in the conflict. For example, some recently completed studies have revealed how international politics left its mark on the supposedly non-political world of sports, influencing everything from the allocation of financial aid to the daily life of athletes.
  
  From fall 2005 to spring 2006, the lectures in this InstitutsMontag series will offer further examples of new perspectives on a familiar topic, including the results of work conducted by a group of scholars at the Hamburg Institute for Social Research (HIS) during the past four years.
  
  Lectures in German
  Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
  Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

10 October 2005

Bernd Greiner: Nicht Aufhören Können. Die Vietnampolitik Richard Nixons als Paradigma des Kalten Krieges
["Not Being Able to Stop": Richard Nixon’s Vietnam Policy as a Paradigm for the Cold War]

7 November 2005

Klaus Naumann: Streitkräfte unter Hochspannung - Die Bundeswehr des Kalten Krieges
[Armed Forces under High Pressure: The Bundeswehr of the Cold War Era]

5 December 2005

Dierk Walter: Welcher Krieg? Die britischen Streitkräfte zwischen Kaltem Krieg, globalem Krieg und Kolonialkrieg, 1945-1970
[What War? The British Armed Forces between Cold War, Global War, and Colonial War, 1945–1970]

9 January 2006

Uta Andrea Balbier: Kalter Krieg auf der Aschenbahn: Die Rolle des Sports in der deutsch-deutschen Systemkonkurrenz
[Cold War on the Cinder Track: The Role of Sports in Rivalry between the Two German Political Systems]

6 February 2006

Jan Philipp Reemtsma: Die Spaltung der Welt im Werk Arno Schmidts
[The Schism of the World in the Works of Arno Schmidt]

6 March 2006

Inge Marszolek: Symbolische Inszenierungen und Repräsentationen des Kalten Krieges
[Symbolic Performances and Representations in the Cold War]

In the history of the Federal Republic of Germany, the Rote Armee Fraktion (RAF, Red Army Faction) posed a challenge to the German democracy that by far exceeded the effects of any other organization. The issue of how to react to the RAF’s declaration of war against the West German state threatened the constitutional order and Germany’s self-understanding. The speakers in this series of lectures will not only probe the history of the RAF but also consider parallel organizations that emerged in other industrial nations in a similar context—the radicalization of the student movement in the course of international protests against the war being waged by the US in Vietnam. Comparative analysis of the RAF and groups such as the
Brigate Rosse in Italy, the Weathermen in the USA, the Rengo Sekiguren in Japan may be useful in delineating and comprehending the history of organizations in West Germany and around the world.

The Hamburger Edition, the publishing house of the Hamburg Institute for Social Research, has recently published two volumes that are closely connected to the topics considered in the lecture series:
Wolfgang Kraushaar, Die Bombe im Jüdischen Gemeindehaus [The Bomb in the Jewish Community Center]
Wolfgang Kraushaar, Karin Wieland, and Jan Philipp Reemtsma, Rudi Dutschke Andreas Baader und die RAF [Rudi Dutschke Andreas Baader and the RAF]

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

7 March 2005

Wolfgang Kraushaar: Im Schatten der RAF. Zur Entstehung der Revolutionären Zellen
[In the Shadow of the RAF: The Formation of the Revolutionäre Zellen]

4 April 2005

Claudia Derichs: Die japanische Rote Armee im internationalen Kontext
[The Japanese Red Army in an International Context]

2 May 2005

Dorothea Hauser: Deutschland, Italien und Japan: Die ehemaligen Achsenmächte und der Terrorismus der siebziger Jahre
[Germany, Italy, and Japan: The Former Axis Powers and Terrorism in the 1970s]

6 June 2005

Jan Philipp Reemtsma: Was heißt "die Geschichte der RAF verstehen"?
[What Does Understanding the History of the RAF Mean?]

In this series, manifestations of anti-Semitism at the beginning of the twenty-first century will be described and their historical, empirical, and theoretical contexts examined, in order to reveal changes and continuities. Can we discern distinctive characteristics that are typical of change or do such traits merely conceal all-too familiar codes? Has there been a shift from national anti-Semitism to a post-national mode of anti-Semitism? These and other related issues will be explored in this series of lectures.

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

1 November 2004

Klaus Holz: Neuer Antisemitismus? Wandel und Kontinuität der Judenfeindschaft in Europa
[New Anti-Semitism? Change and Continuity in European Hostility towards Jews]

6 December 2004

Werner Konitzer: Antisemitismus und Moral
[Anti-Semitism and Morals]

10 January 2005

Julijana Ranc: Juden, Tschekisten, Ungläubige - postsowjetische Ressentiments auf deutsch
[Jews, Chekists, Infidels–Post-Soviet Prejudices in German]

7 February 2005

Ulrich Bielefeld: Der gegenwärtige Antisemitismus: Tendenzen und Interpretationen
[Anti-Semitism Today: Tendencies and Interpretations]

After 1945, anti-Semitism became a phenomenon that is bound up with awareness of the reality of the Holocaust. Since 1948, there is also the reality of the existence of the state of Israel. Anti-Semitism had thus become more than an attitude that could be functionalized politically; socially and politically, it was more or less a taboo. Nearly sixty years later, anti-Semitism has again become a virulent issue; new groups disseminate it, and the taboo seems to be weakening. It even appears possible that anti-Semitism might re-assume social and political functions in post-sovereign national societies. Analyzing previous manifestations and observing current developments of the phenomenon is essential. This lecture series aims to describe and evaluate contemporary anti-Semitism and determine its continuities and variations.

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

1 March 2004

Michel Wieviorka: Die Erneuerung des Antisemitismus. Der französische Fall
[The Renewal of Anti-Semitism in France Today]

5 April 2004

Juliane Wetzel: Antisemitismus in Europa
[Antisemitism in Europe]

3 May 2004

Michael Wildt: Volksgemeinschaft und Antisemitismus. Zur Gewalt gegen Juden in Deutschland 1930 bis 1939
[Volkgemeinschaft and Anti-Semitism: Violence against Jews in Germany, 1930–1939]

7 June 2004

Peter Pulzer: Kontinuität oder Neuentwicklung? Der gegenwärtige politische Antisemitismus
[Continuity or New Development: Contemporary Political Anti-Semitism]

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

3 November 2003

Heinz Bude: Die Heroen des Anfangs. Die Gründergeneration der westdeutschen Nachkriegssoziologie
[The First Heroes: The Founder Generation in Post-War West-German Sociology]

1 December 2003

Lutz Niethammer: "Ego-Histoire" in Generationenperspektive
[Ego-Histoire from a Generational Perspective]

5 January 2004

Nicolas Berg: Der Holocaust und die westdeutschen Historiker. Eine Gedächtnis- und Generationengeschichte
[The Holocaust and West-German Historians: A History of Memory and Generations]

2 February 2004

Klaus Naumann: Institution und Generation? Prägungen des Offizierkorps der Bundeswehr
[Institution and Generation–Influences on the Officers Corps of the Bundeswehr]

The speakers in this series will examine the continuities and discontinuities that characterize German Bürgertum and bourgeois attitudes in the post-1945 era. What was the contribution of bourgeois circles and values to establishing a stable democratic society in the Federal Republic of Germany? Moreover, they will investigate the values and social forms of the bourgeoisie after 1989 and their role in what is now a post-socialist state in East Germany. Did they have and do they continue to have an impact on the transformation of society there?

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

7 April 2003

Klaus Naumann: Schlachtfeld & Geselligkeit - Die ständische Bürgerlichkeit des Bundeswehroffiziers
[Battlefield & Socializing: Bundeswehr Officers and Bourgeois Attitudes]

5 May 2003

Manfred Hettling: Wie aktuell ist die bürgerliche Tradition?
[How Up-To-Date is Bourgeois Tradition?]

7 July 2003

Heinz Bude: Bürgertumsgenerationen
[Generations of Bürger]

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

4 November 2002

Heinz Bude: Mehrheitspolitik in der Gesellschaft der Individuen
[Majority Politics in the Society of Individuals]

2 December 2002

Wolfgang Kraushaar: Politik der Auslassungen
[The Politics of Omission]

6 January 2003

Ulrich Bielefeld: Verdeckte Panik
[Subsurface Panic]

3 February 2003

Dietmar Loch: Denationalisierung und (Rechts-)Populismus in Europa
[Denationalization and (Right-Wing)Populism in Europe]

3 March 2003

Thomas Meyer: Mediokratie. Auswirkungen des Mediensystems auf Demokratie und Politik
[Mediocracy: The Media System’s Effects on Democracy and Politics]

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

4 March 2002

Michael Wildt: Unheiliges Land. Eindrücke aus Israel
[Unholy Land: Impressions from Israel]

8 April 2002

Ulrich Bielefeld: Identitätspolitik - Wie bilden sich politische Kollektive heute?
[The Politics of Identity–How Are Political Collectives Formed Today?]

6 May 2002

Wolfgang Kraushaar: "Woodstock Nation" - Zur Codierung einer Gegenkultur
["Woodstock Nation": Reflections on the Codes of a Counter-Culture]

1 June 2002

Heinz Bude: Die Überflüssigen als virtuelle Klasse
[The Superfluous as a Virtual Class]

1 July 2002

Nikola Tietze: Zwischen Ideologie und Utopie: Kabylisch in der Immigration
[Between Ideology and Utopia: Kabyle in Immigrant Communities]

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

5 November 2001

Jan Philipp Reemtsma: Kriegsverbrechen und Gesellschaftsanalyse
War Crimes and Societal Analysis]

3 December 2001

Bernd Greiner: Der Angriff auf Pearl Harbour oder: Amerikas Weg in die permanente Hochrüstung
[The Attack on Pearl Harbor or America’s Path to Permanent Rearmament]

7 January 2002

Ulrike Jureit: Kein Krieg im herkömmlichen Sinne. Die Ausstellung "Verbrechen der Wehrmacht. Dimensionen des Vernichtungskrieges 1941-1944"
[Not a War in the Usual Sense: The Exhibition Crimes of the German Wehrmacht: Dimensions of a War of Annihilation, 1941–1944]

4 February 2002

Peter Klein: Zwischen den Fronten. Die Zivilbevölkerung und der Krieg der Wehrmacht gegen die Partisanen in der SU
[Between the Fronts: The Civilian Population and the Wehrmacht’s War against Partisans in the Soviet Union]

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

2 April 2001

Nikola Tietze: Muslimische Erfahrungen - Selbstbilder zwischen Tradition und Emanzipation
[Muslim Experience–Self-Images between Tradition and Emancipation]

7 May 2001

Anja Lemke: Seit ein Gespräch wir sind, an dem wir würgen...". Zum Dialog zwischen Martin Heidegger und Paul Celan
[“Since We Are a Conversation That Makes Us Choke…” On the Dialog between Martin Heidegger and Paul Celan]

11 June 2001

Gaby Zipfel: Schlachtfeld Frauenkörper. Sexuelle Gewalt in Kriegen
[Women’s Bodies as Battlefields: Sexual Violence in War]

2 July 2001

Werner Konitzer: Grenzen der Moral: Gibt es ein rechtes Maß der Erinnerung?
[The Limits of Morals: Is There an Appropriate Degree of Memory?]

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

8 January 2001

Bernd Greiner: Der kurze Sommer der Anarchie. Zur Rolle der amerikanischen Presse während des Vietnamkrieges
[The Short Summer of Anarchy: The Role of the American Press during the Vietnam War]

5 February 2001

Wolfgang Kraushaar: 1968 und die Massenmedien
[1968 and the Mass Media]

5 March 2001

Klaus Naumann: Das nervöse Jahrzehnt. Krieg, Medien und Erinnerung am Beginn der Berliner Republik
[The Nervous Decade: War, the Media, and Memory at the Beginning of the Berlin Republic]

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

9 October 2000

Heinz Bude: Wissen, Geld und Macht. Die politische Ökonomie des neuen Kapitalismus
[Knowledge, Money, and Power: The Political Economy of New Capitalism]

6 November 2000

Ulrich Bielefeld: Ethnizität und Gewalt. Zur Existentialisierung kollektiver Identifikationen
[Ethnicity and Violence: The Existentialization of Collective Identifications]

4 December 2000

Jan Philipp Reemtsma: Zivilisation - Selbstkritik und Selbstzerstörung
[Civilization–Self-Criticism and Self-Destruction]

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

6 March 2000

Gudrun Schwarz: “I Am Looking Forward to the Assignment, Which I Hope Will Take Me to the East”: German Women in World War II

3 April 2000

Bernd Greiner: “I Am Looking Forward to the Assignment, Which I Hope Will Take Me to the East”: German Women in World War II
[“You'll Never Walk Alone”: American Reactions to War Crimes in Vietnam]

8 May 2000

Natalija Bašić: Über den Sinn von Gewalt. Biographische Erfahrungen ehemaliger Kombattanten der post-jugoslawischen Kriege
[On the Sense of Using Violence: The Experiences of Former Combatants in the Post-Yugoslavian Wars]

5 June 2000

Cornelia Berens: Arbeit am Trauma. Lagererfahrung und Literatur
[Working on Trauma: Concentrations Camps and Literature]

3 July 2000

Reinhard Müller: Georg Lukács in der Lubjanka
[Georg Lukács in the Lubjanka]

Lectures in German
Venue: Hamburg Institut for Social Research, Mittelweg 36, 20148 Hamburg
Time: 8 pm (doors open at 7:30 pm), Admission: free

4 October 1999

Michael Wildt: Generation des Unbedingten. Eine Kollektivbiographie des Reichssicherheitshauptamtes
[Generation of the Unbound: A Collective Biography of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt]

1 November 1999

Klaus Naumann: Altes Personal, neue Politik? Die Sicherheitselite der frühen Bundesrepublik
[Old Personnel, New Politics? The Security Elite of the Early Federal Republic of Germany]

6 December 1999

Ulrich Bielefeld: Ein normales Leben. Ernst von Salomon und die Bundesrepublik Deutschland
[A Normal Life: Ernst von Salomon and the Federal Republic of Germany after 1945]

7 February 2000

Bernd Ulrich: Gibt es ein Bürgertum nach 1945? Aspekte einer alten Debatte
[Was There a Bourgeoisie after 1945? Aspects of an Old Debate]

28 February 2000

Wolfgang Kraushaar: 1968: Die Anti-Elite als Avantgarde
[1968: The Anti-Elite as Avant-garde]