The German Historical Institute at 30: The Founding of a Historical Institute at the Intersection of Scholarship and Politics

On the occasion of its 30th anniversary, the GHI is presenting a panel discussion, featuring four historians, on the founding of the German Historical Institute, which opened its doors in 1987. Hartmut Lehmann, the GHI’s first director, will offer his recollections on the opportunities and challenges involved in establishing the new Institute; Doris Bergen (University of Toronto), will share her experiences and insights as someone who has frequently cooperated with the GHI; Jacob Eder (Friedrich Schiller University Jena), author of Holocaust Angst (2016), will shed light on the place of the GHI in the transatlantic memory politics of the 1980s; Scott Krause (ZZF Potsdam & UNC Chapel Hill), who is working on a history of the Institute’s founding, will outline the findings of his recent examination of the newly declassified files from the German Ministry of Research and Technology as well as Helmut Kohl’s chancellery.

Before the panel discussion, a new video celebrating the GHI’s 30 years of working with historians on both sides of the Atlantic will be shown along with a display highlighting some of the many publications supported by the Institute.