The Goethe-Institut has fallen on hard times; its budget for this year is being cut another 7 million Euros to just over 100 million Euros to support 128 institutes in 79 countries. Many voices have been raised expressing concern and criticism for the Institute and its programs. This week the neo-fascist weekly Junge Freiheit weighs in on the subject, and has harsh criticism for the Institute’s focus on contemporary and popular German culture: too much Grass and Fassbinder, not enough Goethe and Fontane. Still, I can say that Fassbinder at his pinnacle in the 1970s did much more to increase the awareness and prestige of postwar German culture in the US than all of the Goethe Institutes combined. The focus now will be to increase the Goethe Institute’s presence in China and the Middle East while scaling back in Europe:
Die gute Nachricht: Der Sparzwang beschleunigt die Umstrukturierung, über die Goethe seit 2003 (!) nachdenkt. Bei der Gründung 1951 war es noch darum gegangen, in aller Welt für Deutschland als friedliche, freundliche Kulturnation zu werben. Seit der Wende 1989 wurden die Aktivitäten in Osteuropa verstärkt. Und nun, im Zeitalter der Globalisierung, sind weitere Weltregionen ins Zentrum gerückt: der arabisch-islamische Raum ebenso wie die aufstrebenden Mächte Indien oder China.
The Goethe Institue has seven branches in the US and I do hope that the budget cutbacks will not affect them. Today there is such little awareness of German language and culture in the US that the Goethe Institue has become just about the last outpost, and it would be a shame if any branches were closed. I am very familiar with the Institute’s programs in New York and Boston and the staffs there do some excellent work: there are numerous films and concerts as well as a book club and a philosophy discussion group. Could they do more? Yes. The Institutes need to become more integrated in the local cultural scenes of the cities where they operate. For example, the New York Goethe Institute missed a golden opportunity this spring when a revival of the Brecht/Weill Threepenny Opera opened on Broadway. Instead of promoting the World Cup in Germany, the institute could have put on a series of events around the musical and historical context of the play.
While the Goethe Institute provides a valuable and much needed expression of German "soft power", I wonder if the Amerika-Haus ouposts in Germany serve much useful purpose. I’m sure there are committed and dedicated people working there, but let’s face it – American culture is dominant in the marketplace in any event. Josef Joffe, the publisher of Die Zeit, has a provocative piece in today’s New York Times Magazine: The Perils of Soft Power. He writes about the dominance of American culture in Germany:
"America’s soft power isn’t just pop and schlock; its cultural clout is both high and low. It is grunge and Google, Madonna and MoMA, Hollywood and Harvard. If two-thirds of the movie marquees carry an American title in Europe (even in France), dominance is even greater when it comes to translated books. The figure for Germany in 2003 was 419 versus 3,732; that is, for every German book translated into English, nine English-language books were translated into German. It used to be the other way around. A hundred years ago, Humboldt University in Berlin was the model for the rest of the world. Tokyo, Johns Hopkins, Stanford and the University of Chicago were founded in conscious imitation of the German university and its novel fusion of teaching and research. Today Europe’s universities have lost their luster, and as they talk reform, they talk American. Indeed, America is one huge global "demonstration effect," as the sociologists call it. The Soviet Union’s cultural presence in Prague, Budapest and Warsaw vanished into thin air the moment the last Russian soldier departed. American culture, however, needs no gun to travel."
American cultural hegemony, Joffe believes, has led to a Nietzschean Ressentiment on the part of Geraman intellectuals and media pundits. Joffe’s advice? The Germans need to imitate and improve on American culture. I strongly disagree: the Fassbinder phenomenon showed that an authentic German cinema could compete on the world stage. We need more of that in every field: today the painters in the New Leipzig School are showing the way.
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Well you’re sitting in the belly of the beast but.. Harvard? Aachen. Hollywood? Hongkong. And so on. Don’t believe the hype, still a good song for old men 🙂
As to the Goethe Institute, yes you’re right. Or why is there still no global German newschannel. They claim their public broadcasters are the best and none of it is getting out.
I think Joffee misunderstands “Soft Power”. He probably uses the term because it sounds sexy.
The dominance of American culture is just dominance, but not power.
Power is the ability to impose one’s will on others:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_%28sociology%29
Think Again: Soft Power
“Power is the ability to alter the behavior of others to get what you want. There are basically three ways to do that: coercion (sticks), payments (carrots), and attraction (soft power). British historian Niall Ferguson described soft power as “non-traditional forces such as cultural and commercial goods”—and then promptly dismissed it on the grounds that “it’s, well, soft.” Of course, the fact that a foreigner drinks Coca-Cola or wears a Michael Jordan T-shirt does not in itself mean that America has power over him. This view confuses resources with behavior. Whether power resources produce a favorable outcome depends upon the context. This reality is not unique to soft-power resources: Having a larger tank army may produce military victory if a battle is fought in the desert, but not if it is fought in swampy jungles such as Vietnam.”
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=3393&page=0
Joffee writes: “America’s soft power isn’t just pop and schlock; its cultural clout is both high and low. It is grunge and Google, Madonna and MoMA, Hollywood and Harvard.”
Using Google and listening to Madonna helps those companies to earn money, but it does not help US policy.