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Is the Communist ideology in China giving way to nationalism? Is there a new patriotism in Germany? In view of globalisation and migration is the significance of nation and identity changing? A panel at the Frankfurt Book Fair seeks answers to these questions.

When President Bill Clinton visited the University in Beijing the audience consisted of selected members of the Communist party. The intention was to conjure up an “anti-US wind” by means of provocative questions. That this was mainly stage-managed became quite clear after the speech when some of the questioners were asked whether they would consider studying in the USA. The answer: Yes! Of course!

It is the Chinese artist Chen Danqing who reminds the panel of the Goethe-Institut at the Frankfurt Book Fair of this incident in the nineties. And what about nationalism and patriotism in China today, in this awakening global power that has meanwhile become the third largest national economy in the world? Do other countries have to fear a Chinese nationalism? These were the questions focussed on in the discussion.

Chaired by Feng Xiahou – specialist in German studies, Professor of Linguistics and trailblazer of the Sino-German academic exchange – the Chinese journalist Xu Zhiyuan and the artist Chen analysed the development in China.

The president of the Goethe-Institut Klaus-Dieter Lehmann explained what patriotism means in present-day Germany and underlined the change in terms such as nation and identity: due to the dissolution of the bipolar world order and the rapid growth of the world population, due to the trend towards mega-cities, due to migration and new communication technology existing societies were changing both socially and culturally, said Lehmann “New internal frontiers and parallel worlds are modifying the national borderlines in the interior.”

Opportunistic nationalism?

Xu Zhiyuan seems like the prototype of a young intellectual. As a journalist he analyses the dramatic economic and societal transformation process in his home country and China’s international relations: “The national consciousness of the younger generation in China is characterised to a great extent by an identification crisis, a feeling that is strengthened by historical misrepresentation. Present-day China looks strong on the outside, but inside it is definitely vulnerable.”

Chen Danqing puts it even more explicitly: “The Westerners need not take seriously the nationalistic utterances of the Chinese in recent years. The Chinese never embrace any kind of –ism.” Chen is one of the most famous Chinese painters, culture and arts critics. He lived for a long time in the USA and took American citizenship. In the year 2000 he returned to China.

For him patriotism, nationalism and a “collective hyperactivity” in China are the result of the occupation and oppression of his country. In addition to this, he said there was a deep-seated feeling of inferiority rooted in the era from the mid-fifties to the seventies when China was isolated and backward. “Most Chinese don’t know the connection between nation and internationality. As an ideological alternative the Party has recently started to propagate nationalism, which it stirs up together with the citizens”

The Chinese were not a nation that clings to a creed, he said, but a nation of flexibility. The achievements of reform and opening emanated from neither patriotism nor nationalism, but from opportunism.

And Germany?

After National-Socialism, national consciousness was frowned upon for a long time – and rightly so. However, at the latest during the football world championship the Germans experienced, almost to their own surprise, a cheerful and open-minded patriotism. In film, in literature and in the fine arts, too, the discussion of German topics has become far less inhibited than in the post-war decades.

Alleviating deadlock in processes

The significance of nation and cultural identity had changed considerable due to European integration and due to the world-wide migration movements, said Lehmann. Whereas in the past cultural identity had been regarded as dissociation and as a threat by neighbouring countries, it now stood for dialogue ability and enrichment. The European project brought with it a new quality: while the national states still remained as a constituent element in the European Union, new responsibilities and transnational, non-governmental relations were developing. “The European project is a process of change.”

Germany had meanwhile also become an immigration land, according to the president of the Goethe-Institut. “Here the integration ability must be further improved, but for a long time now there have been writers, musicians, film-makers and artists of non-German origin, who quite naturally regard themselves as part of German culture. Our co-habitation is a cultural achievement. Nations will only survive if they do not seal themselves off.”

With regard to the Goethe-Institut Lehmann summed up: “It is clear to me that a cultural dialogue is not enough to overcome prejudices or dissociation tendencies, but without it no progress is to be made. It can help to pose creative alternatives to fixed notions, to alleviate a deadlock in processes or to be self-critical towards oneself.”