Dr. Christian Haase

Press and Politics in West Germany: The papers of Marion Countess Dönhoff, 1946-2002

Marion Dönhoff Foundation, ZEIT Foundation Ebelin and Gerd Bucerius, ZEIT Publishing House

2008-2011/13

£115,00 (Total External Research Income, 2008-2011)
£50,000 (Joint Dönhoff Foundation / School Scholarship for 1 PhD-Student, 2010-2013)

Dr. Christian Haase (Project Leader), collaborators at the School of History (in alphabetical order): Prof. E. Harvey, Christian Kraiker (PhD-Student), Prof. J. Young

 

The collaborative research project aims to archive and analyze the privately held papers of Countess Marion Dönhoff, the former editor-in-chief of West Germany’s prestigious weekly DIE ZEIT. Countess Dönhoff is best known for her publications on East Prussia and the resistance against Hitler, her support for Willy Brandt’s Ostpolitik and East European dissidents as well as for her contributions to German-American relations. Henry Kissinger, Lev Kopelev, Ralf Dahrendorf and Helmut Schmidt ranked among her closest friends.

Countess Dönhoff was born in 1909 into one of East Prussia’s leading nobility families and had ties to the resistance against Hitler. In 1945, she fled from the family’s estate to West Germany and subsequently embarked on a journalistic career at DIE ZEIT. After a brief stint at David Astor’s Observer , she was promoted to head of the political department of DIE ZEIT. In 1968, she became West Germany’s first female editor-in-chief of a prestigious national paper. In 1973, the publisher ( Verleger ) Gerd Bucerius made her editor ( Herausgeber ) of the paper. Helmut Schmidt, the former chancellor of West Germany, joined her as co-editor of DIE ZEIT in 1982. She retained this position until her death in 2002. During her very distinguished and exceptionally long career at DIE ZEIT, she exchanged more than 50.000 letters with politicians, intellectuals, journalists and readers of DIE ZEIT.

1. Research Projects

The research projects focus on three aspects of West German history on which the papers promise to shed new light.

1.1. Prussia’s Aftermath: Countess Dönhoff and the Disputed Legacy of Prussia after the Second World War

Investigator: Dr. Haase

Marion Dönhoff’s publications on Germany’s past, in particular on the role of the Prussian nobility in the fight against Hitler, continue to provoke controversy. While historians agree that she was Germany’s most important publicist on the history of the German resistance against Hitler, it has been disputed to what extent she presented the 20th of July 1944 in a light that served to ‘exonerate the Prussian nobility’ (Conze). Her close friendship with Richard von Weizsäcker and Helmut Schmidt gave her views particular prominence at the centre of West Germany’s political elites. The project aims to analyze the development of her views on Germany’s and Prussia’s past that played a central role in re-orientating West German society.

1.2. The Media and the Transatlantic Crisis of the 1970s: Marion Dönhoff, DIE ZEIT and West German – US relations during Helmut Schmidt’s Chancellorship, 1974-1982

PhD-Student: Christian Kraiker, M.A.

Supervisors: Dr. Haase / Prof. Young

During the years of Helmut Schmidt’s chancellorship West German – US relations came under strain. The privileged partnership that had been reaffirmed during the presidency of Gerald Ford (1974-77) was undermined by a crisis during the Carter years (1977-81) that finally brought down the Schmidt government in 1982. The PhD wants to show that the underlying causes were more complex than has been assumed so far and that a multilayered transformation of West German – US relations took place between 1977 and 1981 in which the media played a central role. The Schmidt government was caught between global economic turmoil, domestic challenges (rise of the peace movement, the Green Party and new anti-American papers such as taz ) and international tensions (NATO double-track decision etc.). In the light of hitherto unused evidence of the Dönhoff papers, it will be argued that the policy responses of Germany’s elites contributed to a fundamental reshaping of the transatlantic partnership on the eve of the ‘second cold war’.

1.3. Women as Global Reporters and Political Travelers: Gender Perspectives on the Internationalisation of the Federal Republic

Investigators: Dr. Haase / Prof. Harvey

Marion Dönhoff is one of West Germany’ s best known ‘political journalists’. She has been remembered for her criticism of Adenauer’s foreign policy, her support for Willy Brandt’s Ostpolitik and her close cooperation with Helmut Schmidt. However, the bulk of her work, reports about foreign countries, has been largely overlooked. The project aims to uncover her role as one of West Germany’s most prolific ‘global reporters’ and ‘political travelers’. The project aims to shed new light on the contributions of female reporters, such as Marion Dönhoff or Margret Boveri, to the internationalization of West Germany after 1946. The project will also make use of Marion Dönhoff’s extensive travel photographs and diaries.

3. Preceding Project, 2005-2008

DIE ZEIT AND THE BONN REPUBLIC

ZEIT Foundation Ebelin and Gerd Bucerius, British Academy
GBP 30,000

The project builds on prior research on the history of DIE ZEIT conducted in collaboration with the University of Hamburg. (See: Christian Haase/Axel Schildt (Eds.) 2008: DIE ZEIT und die Bonner Republik: eine meinungsbildende Wochenzeitung zwischen Wiederbewaffung und Wiedervereinigung , Göttingen: Wallstein)