Overview

Among postwar political leaders, West German Chancellor Willy Brandt played one of the most significant roles in reconciling Germans with other Europeans and in creating the international framework that enabled peaceful reunification in 1990. Based on extensive archival research, this book provides a comprehensive analysis of Brandt's Ostpolitik from its inception until the end of the Cold War through the lens of reconciliation. Here, Benedikt Schoenborn gives us a Brandt who passionately insisted on a gradual reduction of Cold War hostility and a lasting European peace, while remaining strategically and intellectually adaptable in a way that exemplified the 'imaginativeness of history'.

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9781789207002

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This is a valuable addition to the literature on Willy Brandt and Ostpolitik. Schoenborn demonstrates that the spectre of the Nazi past was always present, and that reconciliation was a much more ambitious aim than detente. * Gottfried Niedhart, University of Mannheim Schoenborn draws on insights from political science and sociology to convincingly demonstrate how important a conceptual tool reconciliation is for understanding Brandt's Ostpolitik. At the same time, he illuminates the fascinating ways that human interactions and cultural forces played out in the realm of diplomacy. * Christian Bailey, Purchase College

This is a valuable addition to the literature on Willy Brandt and Ostpolitik. Schoenborn demonstrates that the spectre of the Nazi past was always present, and that reconciliation was a much more ambitious aim than detente. Gottfried Niedhart, University of Mannheim

Author Information

Benedikt Schoenborn is an Associate Professor at Tampere University in Finland. His publications include the award-winning book La mesentente apprivoisee: de Gaulle et les Allemands, 1963-1969 (Paris 2007), and, with J.M. Hanhimaki and B. Zanchetta, Transatlantic Relations since 1945: An Introduction (London 2012).

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