Reflections from the BGDF 2021
When the past enters the present: the need for empathy

By Dr. Jan-Jonathan Bock

How does the past enter the present, and how ought historical events and experiences to influence the ways in which we structure our contemporary social, political and economic realities?

Those were the central questions accompanying discussions at the British-German Democracy Forum at Cumberland Lodge. Both Britain and Germany face difficult questions about the past and the responsibilities that arise from a critical engagement with, to name a few, colonial injustices, the slave trade, the oppression of indigenous peoples, genocide, warfare, and the violent imposition of politico-economic structures, aspirations, beliefs and values.

Disentangling historical responsibilities and legacies is a complex task that can be approached fruitfully by bringing together perspectives from different countries. Since both Britain and Germany are mature democratic societies, an increasingly vocally-articulated demand to change attitudes towards the past – or what Germans call Vergangenheitsbewältigung – cannot be brushed aside. The debate must be had.
A conversation involving voices from both contexts has the potential to generate reconciliatory engagements with the past. Germany has experience with confronting the Holocaust, including clashes involving the silent parents’ and grandparents’ generations after 1945, on the one hand, and young people demanding apologies and societal correction in the 1960s, on the other. Whereas debates about colonialism have only recently emerged as relevant in Germany, students and activists in Britain have kickstarted difficult conversations about public spaces, museums and university curricula that inspire their German counterparts.

Discussions throughout the Forum unearthed a strong desire to (re)present the views of those that have hitherto been silenced or ignored. This became particularly apparent in one panel that discussed a new digital museum project on British colonialism. A presentation outlining the project showcased a recording from its oral history collection. In an interview filmed in Kenya, a now elderly man talks about his experience during the Mau-Mau uprising against British colonial authorities in the 1950s. His account is harrowing. He talks vividly about the violence and hatred inflicted upon Black people seeking to overthrow an oppressive regime.

In the subsequent discussion amongst participants of the British-German Democracy Forum, some asked how the virtual museum project planned to contextualise the man's account. Would there be accompanying archival research to frame personal recollections? How would individual testimonies be situated within the broader history of colonial encounters? And would there be fact-checking to avoid criticism that the museum was not diligent or accurate – since such accusations could undermine its ambition to elevate the voices of the silenced and educate the public about Empire?

Supporters of the museum project responded with frustration to these suggestions. One person criticised that questions regarding the historical veracity of recollections would only be levelled at Black people; if White people had recalled injustice, no one would doubt that their experience ought to be presented without additional framing. “No one questioned Anne Frank’s account!”, one member of the breakout group exclaimed, breaking a taboo for many of the German participants. The atmosphere became tense as someone explained that many people had dismissed Anne Frank’s diaries as fabricated. Historical framing and background research made her story powerful and convincing – and permitted her diaries to enter the canon of Holocaust history. Others argued against this, suggesting that demands for framing and fact-checking were moves to protract and delay, denying Black victims of injustice recognition.

Over the course of the discussion, and this was replicated in conversations throughout the Forum, two approaches emerged. One foregrounds recognition and respect, rejecting calls for further probing and critical questioning so as to, finally, give a voice to those who never had one. This is a broad-strokes approach, highlighting an urgent need for change and justice, and rallying allies, frustrated with perceived attempts to slow things down and discuss more. If some details are missing, this can be amended later. The direction of travel is the right one, progress needs to be made. As one participant put it, “Even if the Kenyan man’s account really is his neighbour’s story and he tells it on his behalf, or if his memory is distorted by traumatic events, it doesn’t matter. It’s how he addresses trauma.”

The other major approach that emerged was more cautious, questioning a simplistic victim/oppressor binary and highlighting the need for nuance; its supporters suggest that individuals always retain agency, even under oppression and faced with significant power imbalances, and this complexity needs to be considered in analyses of colonial encounters. Oral histories ought to be contextualised and the same rigid standards of fact-checking ought to apply. Accuracy matters.

Is the second approach a conscious effort to protract reconciliation? Those accused of dither and delay rejected this characterisation and, instead, explained that they wanted reconciliatory efforts to be persuasive because of their thoroughness. Without diligence society will not follow suit.

One participant suggested that the two attitudes expressed a division into activists and scholars, operating with different routines and expectations regarding the speed of change in the production and dissemination of new narratives. Of course, such definitions, if entirely binary, are too simplistic if they fail to consider intersectionality, but they might capture an important point. Future conversations ought to explore how the two approaches can become complimentary rather than lead to confrontation. Empathy might bridge this gap. Empathy, on the part of those who are activist-minded, with the mechanisms to which scholars are used in the production of knowledge; and empathy, on the part of scholars, with the impatient frustration in the face of injustice and ignorance experienced by activists who want society to acknowledge wrongs and tackle their legacies.

Values are in flux, and everything is being negotiated. These are disorienting times for many. What sometimes seemed absent during discussions at the Forum was a willingness to acknowledge that all participants share the goal of engaging with the past differently to improve society; in that, conversations mirrored the divisions that characterise society at large. In disorienting times, trajectories of change might differ – and yet, lasting social change is best achieved by allies.