Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg’s doctoral thesis had received the top grade. Both reviewers rated it summa cum laude. When the plagiarism became known, the University of Bayreuth did not lower the grade. Its own explanation: Verstöße dagegen führen nicht zu einer anderen Note, sondern wie hier zur „Disqualifikation”. Violations of the rules lead not to a different grade but to disqualification. The university withdrew the doctorate on 23 February 2011. For this it did not need to decide whether he had cheated on purpose. It was enough that the title had been acquired unlawfully in objective terms. Guttenberg admitted that he had not worked correctly. He denied any intent to deceive. A commission for self-regulation in science then examined that question separately. On 6 May 2011 it found that he had die Standards guter wissenschaftlicher Praxis evident grob verletzt und hierbei vorsätzlich getäuscht, evidently and grossly violated the standards of good scientific practice and deceived on purpose.
politics
The Toll Without a Risk Assessment
After the German car toll failed, the federal government had to pay the operators 243 million euros in damages. In 2023 the Federal Transport Ministry had lawyers examine whether it could make former minister Andreas Scheuer pay. Their opinion looked at how he had decided. He had signed the operator contracts at the end of 2018, noch bevor endgültige Rechtssicherheit beim EuGH bestand, before the European Court of Justice had given final legal certainty. The lawyers found: Es habe keine entsprechende Risikobewertung gegeben, there had been no corresponding risk assessment. A claim would still have needed gross negligence. Einfache Fahrlässigkeit dürfte daher, so das Gutachten, nicht ausreichen, simple negligence would probably not be enough. The burden of proof for gross negligence lay with the federal government. There were no signs of intent. Federal law also has no liability rule for ministers. In December 2023 the ministry decided not to sue. It added: Unabhängig davon bleibt es bei der unbestrittenen politischen Verantwortlichkeit von Bundesminister a.D. Scheuer. Regardless of this, the undisputed political responsibility of former minister Scheuer remains.
The Last Three Reactors
On 15 April 2023, Germany switched off its last three nuclear reactors: Emsland, Neckarwestheim 2 and Isar 2. The Federal Agency for Civic Education wrote that this sealed an exit planned for more than twenty years. On 30 June 2011, the Bundestag had decided that the last reactors should be shut down by the end of 2022. Russia’s war against Ukraine raised doubts about energy security, and on 11 November 2022 the Bundestag voted to let the three run until 15 April 2023. The final shutdown remained disputed. The CDU and CSU wanted the plants kept in reserve so that they could return to the grid in an emergency. On 10 November 2023, the Bundestag rejected an AfD motion to reactivate the plants, with 550 votes against and 69 in favor. It also rejected an AfD bill to stop their dismantling, with 535 votes against.
Words for Going Back on a Decision
zurückrudern — To row back. DWDS gives the figurative meaning: to withdraw a measure that met with rejection, or to take back an opinion or position. Its example: Wird die öffentliche Empörung zu heftig, rudert die Partei zurück. If public outrage grows too strong, the party rows back.
eine Rolle rückwärts machen — To do a backward roll. DWDS: to take back something one had announced or promised.
umfallen — To fall over. DWDS lists the figurative meaning seine Meinung, Gesinnung überraschend ändern, to change one’s opinion or conviction suddenly, and marks it as disparaging.
der Umfaller — The one who falls over. Duden marks the word as colloquial and disparaging.
“It Is Serious”
On 18 March 2020, Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke to the country on television about the coronavirus. She did not soften the message. Es ist ernst. Nehmen Sie es auch ernst. It is serious. Take it seriously too. She also said: Die nächsten Wochen werden noch schwerer. The next weeks will be even harder. The rhetoric department of the University of Tübingen named it the speech of the year 2020. On 9 December 2020, in the Bundestag, she backed a call by the national academy of sciences, the Leopoldina, for a hard lockdown over the holidays. She said that if there were too many contacts before Christmas und es anschließend das letzte Weihnachten mit den Großeltern war, dann werden wir etwas versäumt haben, and it then turned out to be the last Christmas with the grandparents, we will have failed to do something.
Fit for War
On 29 October 2023, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius spoke on the ZDF program Berlin direkt. Wir müssen uns wieder an den Gedanken gewöhnen, dass die Gefahr eines Krieges in Europa drohen könnte. We must get used again to the thought that the danger of a war in Europe could threaten. Then he said: Wir müssen kriegstüchtig werden. We must become fit for war. The word kriegstüchtig set off a long debate. The journalist Heribert Prantl called it false and dangerous. The historian Sönke Neitzel noted that most politicians said they understood what Pistorius meant but did not want to say it that way. The military had already used the term. The Inspector General, Carsten Breuer, had used it often since March 2023. Neitzel concluded: Die Politik hinkte dem öffentlichen Diskurs semantisch hinterher. In its words, politics lagged behind the public debate.
The Teachers’ Letter
In early 2006, the teachers of the Rütli school, a secondary school in the Neukölln district of Berlin, wrote to the education authorities. They described Aggressivität, Respektlosigkeit und Ignoranz uns Erwachsenen gegenüber, aggression, lack of respect and ignorance toward the adults. They wrote: Wir sind ratlos. We are at a loss. They asked for more teachers in the short term. In the longer term, they wrote, the Hauptschule in its current makeup had to be dissolved in favor of a new type of school. The public soon called it a Brandbrief, a fire letter. Duden defines the word as a very urgent letter of appeal or warning. Leading newspapers printed it, and it started a national debate on integration and on the Hauptschule, the lowest track of secondary school. The school was rebuilt as a combined all-day school under the name Campus Rütli. Of its first upper-school class, 18 of 23 students passed the Abitur, the university entrance exam, in July 2014.
The Commander of the Gorch Fock
In November 2010, a 25-year-old officer cadet fell to her death from the rigging of the navy’s sail training ship Gorch Fock. There were also accusations that members of the permanent crew had harassed cadets. On 22 January 2011, Defense Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg had the ship’s commander, Captain Norbert Schatz, removed from his command. He was relieved for the duration of the investigation. In March 2011, the navy’s commission of inquiry found that the accusations against the ship’s leadership were largely untenable. Its findings also cleared the commander. Members of parliament from both government and opposition then spoke up for him. The SPD’s Hans-Peter Bartels said he must be rehabilitated. The CDU’s Jürgen Hardt said: Ich kann der Marineführung nur dringend anraten, Herrn Schatz wieder in sein Kommando einzusetzen. I can only urge the navy leadership to put Mr. Schatz back in command.
Hard Boards, Not Thick Ones
On 28 January 1919, in Munich, the sociologist Max Weber gave his lecture Politik als Beruf, politics as a vocation. It contains this sentence: Die Politik bedeutet ein starkes langsames Bohren von harten Brettern mit Leidenschaft und Augenmaß zugleich. Politics means a strong, slow drilling through hard boards, with passion and a sense of proportion at the same time. German politicians quote it often. Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier used it on 16 November 2015, when he presented the Federal Cross of Merit to two diplomats. In 2011 the writer Alexander Kluge called a book of 133 political stories Das Bohren harter Bretter, the drilling of hard boards.
In everyday speech the boards have changed. Many Germans say dicke Bretter bohren, to drill thick boards. A Protestant news site wrote in 2014 that many politicians describe their work as das Bohren dicker Bretter, and a FAZ review of Kluge’s book spoke of Webers Wort vom Bohren dicker Bretter. Weber wrote hard boards, not thick ones.
Care Before a Quick Shot
In September 2022, politicians from the opposition and from the governing coalition pressed Chancellor Olaf Scholz to send tanks to Ukraine faster. Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann of the FDP, a coalition party, asked: Auf was um Himmels willen warten wir noch? What in heaven’s name are we still waiting for? Scholz described his course as besonnen und entschieden, level-headed and decisive. On 17 February 2023 he explained his approach at the Munich Security Conference: Und bei allem Handlungsdruck, den es ohne Zweifel gibt: In dieser entscheidenden Frage gilt: Sorgfalt vor Schnellschuss, Zusammenhalt vor Solovorstellung. For all the pressure to act, which no doubt exists, this rule applies: care before a quick shot, unity before solo performances. He added that support had to be set up from the start so …, dass wir sie lange durchhalten, so that it can be kept up for a long time. By then, Germany had also agreed to deliver Western battle tanks.