Germany in the world

Germany In The World – The book is an ambitiously wide-ranging history of Germany that emphasizes influences and migrations over five centuries. The author begins in 1500, when Nuremberg was the hub of printing and publishing, and ends with Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s recent grudging move to increase military expenditure to aid Ukraine against Russia. The author makes a good case for how German people and ideas have been central to global events, whether positively or negatively. He emphasizes the Germans’ networks of learning and skilled labor, such as in printing; the rise of the university system, disciplines such as psychology and philology; the “invention of modern self” and the concept of “world literature.” But he also delves into the hideous militarism that spurred two world wars, virulent antisemitism, and the Holocaust. The author argues that the age of exploration was spurred by northern European lumber and pitch to make ships; by German mapmakers, gunners, and miners in Spanish America; and by printing presses that published the explorers’ accounts. At the same time, Protestant universities in Wittenberg and Heidelberg served as models for humanist learning. Germans led the way as writers, poets, and intellectuals, and their migrations created thriving German communities across the globe. Yet the 20th century would become the German century for horrific reasons, as the author fairly delineates. He moves fluidly into the postwar German economic miracle, progressive politics, terrorism, and ultimate reunification, yet another geopolitical spasm of global consequences. Angela Merkel’s acceptance of Syrian refugees proved another startling move, but the nation’s tendency to cozy up to Russia and China for exports has created new problems. Regardless, there’s no getting around Germany’s pivotal place in the world, and the author ably demonstrates how and why that position has been maintained, for better and worse. A compelling exploration of “German history viewed through a global lens.” The Weekender