Autonomie. Autonomy. Greek autonomía, independent, free, self-determining; acting based on free will.
Autonomy has a negative connotation in the German culture. Those who demand their autonomy are often seen as being uncooperative, as wanting to be totally free, not connected, not tied to or related to others.
To be autonomous in Germany sounds like not being connected to the whole, not belonging, rejecting it. The term autonomy is often used in a political context. Alarm bells go off in the German head when groups demand more autonomy. A well-known radical group on the left refers to themselves as the Autonomen.
On the other hand, institutions such as universities often seek more autonomy from state regulation. In that sense autonomy stands for independence, self-reliance, and transparency. There is a very fine line in the German culture between autonomy and independence.
The Germans believe that when you serve another person – dienen – you have to accept the value system of that person. He who serves, has to do things, has to act in a way, which he might otherwise fully reject. Even more, the person serving is obligated to do his very best.
Germans do not consider this a relief, not as a transfer of moral responsibility from the one serving to the one being served. On the contrary, it represents a burden for them, knowing from the very start that they will invariably come into conflict with their conscience.
On the other hand, when Germans are willing to serve a good purpose, a cause they believe in, they are freely submitting to a belief, taking a moral stand, agreeing with a set of arguments. They can formulate those arguments in a way which fits their values. If one can no longer support the cause, there is no obligation to continue contributing time and effort.
Psychologically this means that serving a good cause, whether through action, financial assistance or communicating a message, means serving one’s own value system. One is obligating oneself freely. Independence and self-determination are protected.
Why do Germans have such difficulty with dienen, serving?
Perhaps it has to do with the fact that Germans in many ways live mitsich – with themselves, and insich – in themselves, in the sense of how they live, where they live. Their surroundings are very much a part of their personality, their self-understanding.
Unexpected visitors, regulations or limitations on their private lives are quickly interpreted as almost personal attacks. A boss calling unexpectedly, friends dropping by for a visit, colleagues giving unsolicited advice concerning their private lives make Germans feel uncomfortable.
To serve well, though, means to push to the side one’s own values, beliefs, ways of living. The better one can do that, the better one can serve. And that is the difficult part for Germans.
Germans prefer far more beraten, to advise, or to complete a task. Beraten involves addressing a topic, subject, or problem. It is impersonal, independent of one‘s values, lifestyle, or belief system.
German non-governmental organizations – NGOs – are confronted by the dilemma that they need to function well as organizations, but do not want to give their members the impression that they work for an organization.
Internal power struggles are poisonous for small, low-budget organizations. Members need to know that they are serving a higher purpose and not an organizational structure, much less specific people within that structure.
For Germans, their work, what they accomplish day in and day out, is very much a part of their personal identity. On the one side this makes it difficult for them to maintain distance from their work.
On the other, however, it enables them to work very conscientiously and independently. The German logic is: “Do you want to understand who I am? Look at my work.“
The Germans often consider Americans as a people to be either uninformed or uninterested in their own history, and equally uninformed about the recent history of given situations, allowing them to make decisions only based on the present. Americans appear to not think things through, not thoroughly. They can appear to Germans as Dünnbrettbohrer, literally people who only drill through the thinnest of boards.
From the German perspective their perception is not false. It’s what is behind the German cliché that Die Amerikaner gehen mit dem Kopf durch die Wand, that Americans try to go through the wall with their heads, meaning forcing solutions in situations which they have not fully understood.
But are Americans really so un- or a-historical? Partly, yes. I think of the region in which I grew up and the people there, me included. Philadelphia. Many of the most dramatic events of the American Revolutionary War against England took place in and around Philadelphia. Independence Hall in downtown Philadelphia is very well known and visited every summer by countless Americans and guests from other countries.
It is where the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution were drafted, debated, passed and signed. Philadelphia was the capital of the insurrection, Independence Hall the meeting point of the conspirators.
Several critical battles took place in the area. On September 11, 1777 British troops defeated the colonists under George Washington at the Battle of Brandywine. Two weeks later, on September 26, Philadelphia was conceded to the British under General Charles Cornwallis.
On that day Washington and his troops counterattacked in Germantown, roughly five miles north of Philadelphia, against just under ten thousand British soldiers. It was an attack by night, from four different directions, with the hope of forcing a quick surrender. Because communications among four groups broke down, and due to shortages of munitions, the attack failed. Washington and his men were pushed back to White Marsh.
There, between December 5th and 8th, British troops pursued and attacked the revolutionaries several times. General Howe had hoped to end the war before the winter had set in. Washington‘s men held, though. The redcoats pulled back into Philadelphia. Washington and his troops moved into nearby Valley Forge.
But how many natives of the Philadelphia area are familiar with these events? I certainly did not hear of them during grammar and high school. I don’t recall any school trips to the battlegrounds or to a museum. Nor did my parents interest us six children in them. Nor have I ever seen a documentary film on television about those battles in and around Philadelphia, my home region.
Why? Perhaps because the United States and England (UK) have been close allies in two world wars. Perhaps we Americans don‘t like reliving bad old times. Perhaps because the events, regardless of how momentous, go back to the 18th century, long before any of my ancestors immigrated to the U.S. from Ireland, Scotland and primarily from Germany. That part of American history was not a part of their history.
If Americans indeed have a less developed sense of history than the Germans, maybe because change in American history and culture is so ever-present. Maybe Americans, in comparison to Germans, are more tolerant of – open and willing – to embrace change, to drive change.
The momentous decision in and of itself to immigrate to America, to leave the homeland behind, makes almost every other decision in life seem far less dramatic. Change is less intimidating to Americans. On the contrary, the more change is accepted as a fact of life, the less relevant are the past and continuity with the past, and all that much more important it is to be able and willing to adapt to new situations.
As is the case with many English terms, the Germans prefer to use the word service instead of dienen. The term dienen can be traced back to the 8th Century, when it meant runner, messenger, serf. Dienen in today‘s German means to serve, to be helpful, to be useful.
Dienen, however, also implies – and this is what Germans hear – subjugation, to place oneself below the person being served. Germans feel a loss of independence, personal sovereignty, autonomy, when dienen involves focus on the individual needs and wishes of the other person.
In such situations Germans sees themselves almost as slaves, as imprisoned, as unfree. They feel that their free will has been put on hold in order to serve the free will of the other. They no longer have the say over themselves.
Dienen, though, can have a positive meaning in the German context – namely when individuals freely choose to serve a common purpose, which is to the benefit of all, a greater good.
This all gives us a sense for why Germans avoid using the word dienen and instead prefer the English term service or the German-English combination Kundenservice, literally customer service. Germans have no problem subordinating their freedom when it comes to serving a purpose they believe in: Einer guten Sache dienen.
They do have a problem, however: serving exclusively the needs and desires of another individual. Such phrases as Ihr ergebener Diener, your loyal servant, or stets zu Diensten, at your service, have died out in Germany, and with these phrases the thinking behind them.
In 1975, Gary Dahl, a freelance copywriter, bought several smooth Mexican beach stones and began selling them in the United States as “pet rocks.” But what was initially meant as a joke soon became what Newsweek called “one of the most ridiculously successful marketing schemes ever.”
Within a few months, Dahl had sold over 1.5 million rocks. He was a guest on The Tonight Show, and at one point Gary was selling approximately 6,000 rocks per day.
The reason for his success was largely due to marketing: every pet rock came in a carrying case (with air holes), nestled on a bed of straw. Additionally, the purchase of a pet rock also bought its new owner a manual on the care, feeding, and house training of their new pet. Other factors, especially processes, were of very little importance in driving this pet trend.
Consumer products giant Procter and Gamble sold its hair products business and its fragrances division, including the struggling German brand Wella.
But some criticism of Wella had been going in the other direction, namely that innovations happen too impatiently, and that Procter and Gamble thinks in the same fast terms as in the drugstore-based consumer products business.
Hairdressers in Germany, however, want to use the products they know over the long term, providing that they have had positive experiences with these products. Too many new things annoy them.
When it acquired Wella, Procter and Gamble bought its way into an unfamiliar field, namely the hair salon business, said a manager with a competitor. Then the company cut off the brand’s roots by closing Wella’s headquarters in Darmstadt, Germany, thereby losing institutional knowledge and the confidence of its vast network of hairdressers.
According to the manager, a former strength of Wella, namely their sales reps’ good relationship with hairdressers, was lost.
Source: Handelsblatt Global Edition. June 10, 2015. “The Great Brand Sell-off.” By Christoph Kapalschiniski.
Members of the German Parliament are expected to vote with their party caucus. The term is Fraktionsdisziplin or caucus discipline.
Casting their individual votes in a unified way is the result of an internal process: party conventions define the political plattform; policy positions are worked out in detail; the parliamentary members are issued their guidelines for voting.
For in the end a party’s power and influence in the Bundestag is based on its ability think and act as a unified body.
Fraktionsdisziplin, however, does not mean Fraktionszwang – caucus coercion. On certain legislation Members of the Parliament can deviate from the party line.
They have what the Germans call the Prinzip des freien Mandats – principle of independent mandate, which on matters of conscience is greater than maintaining caucus discipline.
From Merriam-Webster: a usually short narrative of an interesting, amusing, or biographical incident. Synonyms: story, tale.
The artful placement of an anecdote is key to being persuasive in the American culture. Stories are convincing. They speak to our experience. Storytelling. Great leaders in business, politics, culture know how to speak to the imagination of their audience. Listen to former President Bill Clinton speak at the funeral service for Aretha Franklin: