I just returned from a week in Berlin—a lively city teeming with people. There is a whiff of spring in the air and the outdoor cafes have begun to crowd the sidewalks with the European buzz that Berliners uniquely create.
But along with good cheer is a damp residue from this past year’s revelations by Mr. Snowden that the American government has been eavesdropping on conversations between German officials including listening to the phone of Chancellor Angela Merkel. A post-NSA hangover has left German intellectuals reeling and ordinary citizens confused and angry. Even the biggest supporters of Atlantic relations have found themselves challenged to defend a kind of surveillance and intrusion so antithetical to modern day Germany.
My trip was an opportunity to practice public diplomacy, which involved meeting with national security experts, academics, and a large contingent of students from multiple countries spending a semester in Berlin. It reinforced for me the importance of face-to-face contact and person-to-person dialogue to listen to the point of view of others.
Virtual diplomacy is great; E-exchanges are useful. But nothing beats sitting around a table, handing a physical business card to a new colleague, and chatting at coffee breaks about family and friends. Emotional setbacks in relationships have real consequences and they are best dealt with in human settings as opposed to on line.
The U.S.-German relationship is at a critical inflection point. We need one another to confront the situation in Ukraine and to find common ground so that American-European-Russian relations do not lead all of us down a dangerous path.
In addition to Ukraine, our countries face common challenges around energy, finance, trade and the growing influence of China. We have multinational trade deals at stake, like the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and monetary policies with impact on one another’s fiscal stability. Not to mention climate change, terrorism, and the problems posed by failing states around the globe.
In the end, I think US-German relations can weather the storm. Pragmatism tends to prevail in both countries. A crisis often brings partners closer together, and for us, decades of close relations. But this relationship, like all relationships, takes commitment on both sides and a willingness to meet, talk, debate, discuss and disclose on the public side to deepen diplomacy.
This is the fourth in a series of posts on life, culture, and politics in the U.S. and E.U. by Robert Entman, who spent 2012 as a Humboldt Research Prize Scholar at Freie Universität in Berlin. Read more posts here.
Naturally Berlin, Madrid and Paris have more history than any US city. It’s not fair to compare them to DC, Philadelphia, New York or Boston, our most history-conscious cities. Still, the reverence for the old expresses itself in public life and policymaking in Europe.
Policy provides more resources for preservation of historical memory while also supporting modern culture. Two examples:
1. Wine
The integration of wine into typically more relaxed and lengthier meals, offers one illustration of Europeans’ ability to live in closer continuity with the past. And like so many other things, the production of wine is heavily regulated, in part because of Europeans’ insistence on honoring that continuity.
Example: In 1395, Duke Philip the Bold issued regulations governing wine quality in Burgundy. It might strike Americans as oppressive, but winemakers in, say, Puligny Montrachet with rare exceptions must specialize in the chardonnay grape, and must follow many detailed government mandates on how the grapes must be handled to be certified as genuine Puligny. The French know that this grape reaches its apogee in the soil and microclimates of the Burgundy region, where vineyards go back at least to the fourth century AD. When you drink a bottle of Puligny you know you will get a chardonnay that to some degree reflects its particular terroir now as it did back when knights and dukes ran things.
Small differences in the way the three cities typically present wine in restaurants further express historical and cultural differences. In Berlin and generally in Germany, wine lists are heavy on German wines; this limits choices of reds since white riesling is the grape that makes the best wines in the cold climate there. If you order a glass of wine, it will come with an etched line marking 10 or 12 ml, and waiters pour to that precise line. Never saw a glass with a line in Spain or France.
One historical quirk of Berlin: when you go out to eat you essentially have to pay for bottled water. Nobody drinks tap water. Supposedly Berliners got used to drinking bottled water after WWII when the infrastructure was in ruins and tap water was dangerous. Some might see this as an example of hidebound Europeans sticking with a dumb and expensive tradition for no good reason. Most restaurants have a deal with one or another brand of bottled water; presumably the water sales add significantly to profit margins. Given the generally reasonable cost of the food, that seemed fair to me.
In Paris on the other hand, asking for tap water is typical, and they usually bring it to the table in a decanter or bottle. On restaurant wine lists and in wine stores too, the French focus is on lesser French chateaux and off-year vintages, presumably because these establishments can’t compete with the astronomical costs of the most famous Bordeaux and Burgundy wines, for which prices are set on an international market. These days, for instance, even a young bottle of Chateau Lafite can set you back over $1,000 at the store. Thank globalization. A little bit of historical continuity is lost to all but the wealthiest French folks and tourists.
2. Memorialization
Reminders of the Nazi past are omnipresent in Berlin. As one among many examples, there are small brass stumbling blocks throughout Berlin. Slightly raised from other cobblestones, they are designed to ever-so-slightly trip pedestrians, who then look down and can see the name, dates and fate of a Jew who once lived or had a business at the building where they’re standing.
Consider also the striking Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. The Memorial is located in the heart of the new Berlin, bordering the American embassy and the Tiergarten (Berlin’s Central Park), near the Brandenburg Gate. So Berliners will frequently see it, register it if only unconsciously and thus potentially think about its meaning. The location and design of the Memorial engendered decades of public debate and controversy, a process that itself exemplified healthy democracy. Although much smaller than the Holocaust museums in DC and Jerusalem, I found the museum that’s integrated into the Memorial as thought-provoking and powerful.
Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Berlin.
Compare what the Germans have done to ensure accurate and persistent memories of their past misdeeds with US actions to commemorate and keep alive memories of the US’s own holocausts involving Native Americans and African Americans, not to Vietnam and Indochina. As far as I know, there is no public reminder in DC that might cause a typical citizen to reflect on how the American government’s policies and, arguably, war crimes in Vietnam caused untold and indefensible suffering there, not just among Americans. Our Vietnam War memorial is a great and justly popular tourist site, but it focuses memories only on our losses.
Reims Cathedral son et lumiere show (not as kitschy as expected, actually helps you see and understand the extraordinary craftsmanship). This is the cathedral where French kings came to be coronated.
Yet, policies that make history a daily presence for citizens—including the bad or horrific history, not just the glories like France’s wine—might just make for a better future.
A lot of homeless people sleep in Paris metro stations. Our stop was St. Ambroise.
This is the third in a series of posts on life, culture, and politics in the U.S. and E.U. by Robert Entman, who spent 2012 as a Humboldt Research Prize Scholar at Freie Universität in Berlin. Read more posts here.
After spending a year in Europe, it seems to me the number one bad thing about America is the automobile.
Our over-investments and huge tax subsidies to private autos with roots in economic and geological conditions of 100 years ago is the most powerful force for what’s bad in America: its eagerness to go to war; its disproportionate contribution to the climate change crisis; the outsize political power of reactionary oil moguls; the ugly suburban sprawl; and the domination of the chain stores and malls that largely destroy town centers and smaller business.
Living a year in Europe without a car was a financial blessing and a pleasure on many dimensions. When mass transit is taken as a natural component of a civilized infrastructure, people live better. This was especially on display in Berlin. Subway trains reliably come every 3-6 minutes; the average wait was 3-4 minutes, and the longest wait times off-peak were perhaps 8-12 minutes. If I’m not mistaken, that’s closer to the average wait time on the DC Metro outside rush hour.
Trains are clean, reliable and rarely crowded (unlike in Paris where the frequent trains seem almost always crowded and uncomfortable). The bus service is similarly superb. One of the things that made Berlin pleasant and in some ways village-like to live in, despite being a large city, was the paucity of car traffic even downtown. I saw traffic jams on the freeway at times, but on the major city streets traffic generally flowed well and just wasn’t heavy at any time of day. It’s got to be due in substantial part to the mass transit.
And let’s not forget intercity train service. Here’s a comparison: DC to Durham, NC, about 260 miles, and a roughly similar distance from Cologne, Germany to Paris. The Amtrak train is scheduled for 6.5 hours but is routinely two hours late: 8.5 hours. There’s one train a day. It is pretty cheap, about $45. Driving a car takes 4.5 hours, costs maybe $100. But hardly anyone who can afford to avoid the train will subject himself to 6.5-8.5 (or more) hours on a dirty, noisy, bumpy, uncertain train ride rather than a 4.5 hour car ride (or a roughly 3 hour door-to-door airplane+taxi trip @ maybe $300). There is also an intercity bus service that’s cheap, but not always reliable or safe, and nowhere near as comfortable as a good train.
I think most people who’ve been to Europe agree that taking the train there is basically fun. As I recall, there are at least 12 fast trains a day between Cologne and Paris, and it takes about 3.3 hours. Cost varies a lot but can be as low as $60. Second class areas are quieter and more comfortable than first class on Amtrak, in my opinion. Certainly the ride is smoother and the ambient noise level must be 50% lower.
The 60% on-time train rate between DC and NC arises because freight trains have the right of way, forcing Amtrak trains to pull to the side and wait, and wait, and wait. That’s because the US refuses to invest seriously in train infrastructure—i.e. constructing a track just for passenger trains—while enormously subsidizing auto infrastructure.
Yes, the US is much more thinly populated than Europe and that makes all the difference to the economics of intercity trains. US metro areas that sprawl out endlessly compared to relatively dense, compact European urban areas have similar implications for the accounting of obvious, direct costs. But has anyone actually tried to estimate all the costs of maintaining our commitment to automobiles? Including the greenhouse emissions, the trillions of dollars on oil-driven military policies, the value of time spent daily by Americans on frustrating, heart-attack-inducing stop and go commuting?
