Which Alternative? Lessons from Germany's Past for a Europe in Tumult

Description

In the past decade, Europe has drifted in and out of crises. The Eurozone crisis, the refugee crisis, and the resurgence of the far right have shaken the confidence of some of the most committed defenders of the European political project. Germany has found itself at the center of many of these issues, and its presence has often reinvigorated long-harbored global anxieties about German political power. Germany’s past, however, can teach us a great deal about both the potential and the limits of this current continental search for political alternatives. This talk will offer a set of theses on the recent influx of minorities, the faltering of the European Union, and the gradual transformation of Germany’s political landscape, including the rise of a New Right.
Jennifer Allen is an assistant professor of modern German history at Yale University. She is working on a book titled Sustainable Utopias: Art, Political Culture, and Historical Practice in Late Twentieth-Century Germany, which charts Germany’s postwar efforts to revitalize the concept of utopia. She argues that, contrary to popular accounts, German interest in radical social alternatives had not diminished by the late twentieth century. Rather, Germans pursued the radical democratization of politics and culture through a series of modest grassroots projects. They not only envisioned a new German utopia but attempted to enact their vision, reclaiming utopian hope from the dustbin of historical ideas. In addition to the themes of utopia and anti-utopianism, Allen’s research explores the theories and practices of memory; counterculture and grassroots activism; and the politics of cultural preservation during and after the Cold War. Her work has been supported by the Volkswagen and Mellon Foundations; the American Academy in Berlin; the Institut für Zeitgeschichte; DAAD; the Institute for International, Comparative and Area Studies at UC San Diego; and the Institutes for European Studies and International Studies at UC Berkeley. Allen received her Ph.D. in history from UC Berkeley in 2015. She is currently the Berthold Leibinger Fellow at the American Academy in Berlin and a visiting researcher at the Dahlem Humanities Center at the Free University in Berlin.