German-American relations have become interesting again. U.S. President Donald Trump’s lukewarm policy toward Europe has ensured that the relationship between Berlin and Washington is once again regarded as an important field of scholarship within global politics. And yet it was only a few years ago that German-American relations seemed to take second place to transatlantic relations in general, and the European Union (EU)–USA relationship in particular. The advent of Donald Trump as US President in January 2017 has made all the difference. Trump’s difficult personal relationship with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and his denigration of everything the Western world – including the USA itself – has stood for since 1949, have given a new significance to German-American relations in practice and theory. This volume offers an empirical and conceptual analysis of German-American relations in the 21st century and highlights the serious and perhaps unprecedented challenges the two countries face at present. The authors discuss a number of aspects of the current, much more fragile state of German-American relations from different perspectives. This book was originally published as a special issue of the journal German Politics.

Germany and the United States entered the post-9/11 era as allies, but they will leave it as partners of convenience—or even possibly as rivals. The first comprehensive examination of the German-American relationship written since the invasion of Iraq, Parting Ways is indispensable for those seeking to chart the future course of the transatlantic alliance. In early 2003, it became apparent that many nations, including close allies of the United States, would not participate in the U.S.-led coalition against Iraq. Despite the high-profile tension between the United States and France, some of the most bitter opposition came from Germany, marking the end not only of the German-American "special relationship," but also of the broader transatlantic relationship's preeminence in Western strategic thought. Drawing on extensive research and personal interviews with decisionmakers and informed observers in both the United States and Germany, Stephen F. Szabo frames the clash between Gerhard Schröder and George W. Bush over U.S. policy in Iraq in the context of the larger changes shaping the relationship between the two countries. Szabo considers such longer-term factors as the decreasing strategic importance of the U.S.-German relationship for each nation in the post-cold war era, the emergence of a new German identity within Germany itself, and a U.S. foreign policy led by what is arguably the most ideological administration of the post-World War II era.

Ambiguous Relations addresses for the first time the complex relationship between American Jews and Germany over the fifty years following the end of World War II, and examines American Jewry's ambiguous attitude toward Germany that continues despite sociological and generational changes within the community. Shlomo Shafir recounts attempts by American Jews to influence U.S. policy toward Germany after the war and traces these efforts through President Reagan's infamous visit to Bitburg and beyond. He shows how Jewish demands for justice were hampered not only by America's changing attitude toward West Germany as a post-war European power but also by the distraction of anti-communist hysteria in this country.

While Germans, the largest immigration group in the United States, contributed to the shaping of American society and left their mark on many areas from religion and education to food, farming, political and intellectual life, Americans have been instrumental in shaping German democracy after World War II. Both sides can claim to be part of each other's history, and yet the question arises whether this claim indicates more than a historical interlude in the forming of the Atlantic civilization. In this volume some of the leading historians, social scientists and literary scholars from both sides of the Atlantic have come together to investigate, for the first time in a broad interdisciplinary collaboration, the nexus of these interactions in view of current and future challenges to German-American relations.

Unprecedented in scope and critical perspective, American and the Germans presents an analysis of the history of the Germans in America and of the turbulent relations between Germany and the United States. The two volumes bring together research in such diverse fields as ethnic studies, political science, linguistics, and literature, as well as American and German History. Contributors are leading American and German scholars, such as Kathleen Neils Conzen, Joshua A. Fishman, Peter Gay, Harold Jantz, Günter Moltmann, Steven Muller, Theo Sommer, Fritz Stern, Herbert A. Strauss, Gerhard L. Weinberg, and Don Yoder. These scholars assess the ethnicity and acculturation of German-Americans from the seventeenth century to the twentieth; the state of German language and culture in the United States; World War I as a turning point in relations between German and America; the political, economic, and cultural relations before and after World War II; and the midcentury state of affairs between the two countries. Special chapters are devoted to the Pennsylvania Germans, Jewish-German immigration after 1933, Americanism in Germany, and a critical appraisal of current research. American and the Germans presents a fascinating introduction to the subject as well as new perspectives for a more critical and comprehensive study of its many facets. It can be used as a reader in the fields of German studies, American studies, political science, European and German history, American history, ethnic studies, and German and American literature. Although each of the 49 contributions reflects the state of current scholarship, they are formulated with the uninitiated reader in mind.

Publisher Description

"Goedde finds that as American soldiers fraternized with German civilians, particularly as they formed sexual relationships with women, they developed a feminized image of Germany that contrasted sharply with their wartime image of the aggressive Nazi storm trooper. A perception of German "victimhood" emerged that was fostered by the German population and adopted by Americans.