Claus Hofhansel - Multilateralism, German Foreign Policy and Central Europe

Multilateralism, German Foreign
Policy and Central Europe

How does the foreign policy of reunified Germany differ from the strong West German commitment to multilateralism?

Multilateralism, German Foreign Policy and Central Europe focuses on German relations with the Czech Republic and Poland in order to investigate the changes and continuities in German foreign policy following the Cold War. After a theoretical introduction and an overview of multilateralism in German foreign policy, the book analyzes the high politics of German foreign policy towards Czechoslovakia/the Czech Republic and Poland, focusing on the main diplomatic agreements negotiated after 1945. The following two chapters address the legacy of the past in contemporary CzechGerman and PolishGerman relations, including compensation for victims of the Nazi regime and the rights of ethnic German minorities. Then the book shifts its emphasis to the future of German relations with its eastern neighbors, and to the subject of European Union enlargement in particular.

This scholarly volume will interest all students and researchers of German foreign policy and Central European politics.

Claus Hofhansel is Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Department of Political Science at Rhode Island College. He is also an affiliate at the Center for European Studies at Harvard University.

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Third Rome, revolution, Communism and after

Peter J.S. Duncan

2 European Integration and the Postmodern Condition

Governance, democracy, identity Peter van Ham

3 Nationalism in Italian Politics

The stories of the Northern League, 19802000

Damian Tambini

4 International Intervention in the Balkans since 1995

Edited by Peter Siani-Davies

5 Widening the European Union

The politics of institutional change and reform

Edited by Bernard Steunenberg

6 Institutional Challenges in the European Union

Edited by Madeleine Hosli, Adrian van Deemen and Mika Widgrn

7 Europe Unbound

Enlarging and reshaping the boundaries of the European Union Edited by Jan Zielonka

8 Ethnic Cleansing in the Balkans

Nationalism and the destruction of tradition

Cathie Carmichael

9 Democracy and Enlargement in Post-Communist Europe

The democratisation of the general public in fifteen Central and Eastern European countries, 19911998 Christian W. Haerpfer

10 Private Sector Involvement in the Euro

The power of ideas

Stefan Collignon and Daniela Schwarzer

11 Europe

A Nietzschean perspective Stefan Elbe

12 The European Union and e-Voting

Addressing the European Parliament ' s internet voting challenge

Edited by Alexander H. Trechsel and Fernando Mendez

13 European Union Council Presidencies

A comparative perspective Edited by Ole Elgstrm

14 European Governance and Supranational Institutions

Making states comply Jonas Tallberg

15 European Union, NATO and Russia

Martin Smith and Graham Timmins

16 Business, the State and Economic Policy

The case of Italy G. Grant Amyot

17 Europeanization and Transnational States

Comparing Nordic central governments

Bengt Jacobsson, Per Lgreid and Ove K. Pedersen

18 European Union Enlargement

A comparative history Edited by Wolfram Kaiser and Jrgen Elvert

19 Gibraltar

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20 Gender Politics and Society in Spain

Monica Threlfall, Christine Cousins and Celia Valiente

21 European Union Negotiatons

Processes, networks and negotiations Edited by Ole Elgstrm and Christer Jnsson

22 Evaluating Euro-Mediterranean Relations

Stephen C. Calleya

23 The Changing Face of European Identity

A seven-nation study of (supra)national attachments

Edited by Richard Robyn

24 Governing Europe

Discourse, governmentality and European integration William Walters and Jens Henrik Haahr

25 Territory and Terror

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26 Multilateralism, German Foreign Policy and Central Europe

Claus Hofhansel

Claus Hofhansel

First published 2005
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group

This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.

To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge ' s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.

2005 Claus Hofhansel

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Hofhansel, Claus.

Multilateralism, German foreign policy, and Central Europe/Claus Hofhansel.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

1. Germany Foreign economic relations Poland. 2. Poland Foreign economic relations Germany. 3. Czech Republic Foreign economic relations Germany. 4. Germany foreign economic relations Czech Republic. 5. European Union Europe, Eastern. 6. World War, 19391945 Reparations. 7. Europe Economic integration. I. Title.
HF1546.15.P7M85 2005
327.430437dc22 2004019118

ISBN 0-203-79929-1 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 041536406X (Print Edition)

This book began almost a decade ago as a conference paper on GermanCzech relations. Since then GermanCzech and GermanPolish relations as well as my manuscript have seen a number of ups and downs. Certainly GermanCzech relations are in better shape today than they were in the mid-1990s. In writing this book I have incurred a number of debts. A research grant by the American Political Science Association and two Rhode Island College research grants enabled me to travel to Europe and conduct interviews. Jeffrey Anderson and Peter Dombrowski offered advice on parts of the manuscript as did a number of conference participants and anonymous reviewers. My wife Alexandra endured my anxieties and numerous requests to read drafts. About halfway through this journey Franziska entered our lives and became the most pleasant distraction from completing this project.

Post-World War II (West) German foreign policy was distinctive in two ways. First, Germany showed great reluctance to use force abroad. In the 1990s this antimilitarist posture partially eroded, but only partially, as German military personnel participated in a variety of missions outside of the traditional NATO area. Furthermore, even though German pilots flew missions in the bombing campaign against Yugoslavia in 1999, German forces took part in a multilateral effort. This reflexive support for an exaggerated multilateralism is the second, and arguably most important, distinctive characteristic of German foreign policy and the focus of this book. More specifically, this book will analyze German policy toward Czechoslovakia/the Czech Republic and Poland in a set of case studies involving the history of diplomatic negotiations between Germany and its two eastern neighbors from the 1960s until the 1990s, disputes over the compensation of Czech and Polish victims of Nazi crimes, the rights of ethnic Germans in Poland and the Czech Republic, and the German position in the EU enlargement negotiations.