Deconstructing ourselves to death: Why liberalism needs a new way to talk about the past7 min read
Vergangenheitsbewältigung was supposed to be the shining example of liberal remembrance. For a long time, Germany’s decades-long process of coming to terms with its past was lauded as an example of how liberal and post-conflict societies should remember their histories. Through a critical and painful confrontation of Nazi history and the acceptance of responsibility, it was argued, German society avoided the typical cycle of historical enmity that fuels new violence. Against all odds, the twice-defeated, traumatised, post-totalitarian society avoided the dangers of scapegoating to become an exemplar democracy. So ingrained in society was this reckoning with the past that many even argued the success of contemporary far-right parties would be inconceivable, in contrast to societies that refused to admit their past shortcomings and crimes.
The results of the 2025 German federal election showed these views to be rather wishful thinking than accomplished reality. As the light blue column of the Alternative for Germany continued to rise in the post-election statistics, eventually surpassing twenty per cent of the votes, it exposed cracks in the argument that a critical view of the past, if practised for long enough, would prove a winning liberal strategy. At the time of writing, a quarter of Germans favour a party that belittles the significance of the Nazi period, refuses the emphasis on shame, and calls for a more positive and amnesiac view of German history – one in which the Nazi past is little more than a “bird shit in more than 1,000 years of successful German history”. Despite its ethical merits and the time it had to take root, the position of liberal, self-critical memory is in peril.
In other countries, an argument used to be made that liberal remembrance was just not widespread enough to inoculate against illiberal ideas, that it needed more time to make its case, to become more like the exemplary German case. Today, Germany complicates this view. The German case is thus special, as it reveals a bitter message to liberals: while ethically compelling and universally accepted by experts, the public appeal of liberal self-reflection is being abandoned by its voters in droves – even in places where it has been the strongest.
A Central European pattern
The demise of liberal remembrance in Germany is cause for alarm for the region’s liberals, who have largely copied a similar approach to remembering the past. Epitomised by political scientist Maria Mälksoo as myth-busting, cosmopolitan, and open to different interpretations of the past, the liberal approach to history has been a cookie-cutter model for liberal parties to address the troubled European past. And much like in Germany, there are signs that it is struggling elsewhere, as well. Central Europe has become perhaps the most salient example of the rise of illiberal memory. Openness and a critical approach to the past are giving way to nationalist myths and memories that invoke a homogenous people, pitted against the nation’s enemies, domestic and international.
In countries such as Slovakia, Hungary, or Poland, a reaction to the liberal handling of the past has entered the mainstream. Increasingly, far-right populist parties have successfully branded themselves as the guardians of history, protecting a national past that they say is threatened by critical efforts to reexamine history. Fico’s grandiose, Russophile celebrations of the 1944 Slovak National Uprising and rehabilitation of communist figures like Gustáv Husák have sought to invoke a feeling of continuity with the socialist memory-making, leaning over widespread socialist nostalgia. Orbán’s politics have been embedded in the mythification of the Trianon treaty, used to reach out to sentiments felt by some Hungarians at home or abroad. Finally, the elevation of Karol Nawrocki from a key figure in the Law and Justice party’s (PiS) politics of history to the President of Poland shows just how crucial memory is in the region’s politics. Nawrocki’s efforts to tap into the difficult memories of Polish-Ukrainian tensions in Volhynia show that, once mobilised, memory easily spills out of speeches and textbooks into foreign policy.
In the illiberal playbook, national anniversaries become opportunities for politicians to rage against a ‘pedagogy of shame’, posing as champions of ‘true’, repressed history, which lingers in popular sentiments but is suppressed by the elites. The outcome is a return of national myths – emotional, simple stories which resonate, no matter their factual inaccuracy.
Getting it wrong
The use of history in a one-sided manner that prescribes a ‘historical truth’, feeds off enmity, and skims over uncomfortable periods of time is incompatible with liberal democracy. Liberals are right to feel endangered by the rise of this kind of remembrance, and they do – especially in academia and heritage institutions. Yet while the threat is keenly felt, the typical response so far has relied on false assumptions surrounding the liberal predicament.
One such assumption concerns the identification of criticism as the cure for the myth-struck citizens refusing liberal conceptions of remembrance. In this view, the forces of reason and critical thinking are the most effective remedy for the irrationalities of national myths and the division and falsehoods they often foster. What this logic overlooks, however, are the deep sources of the appeal of illiberal memory. Understanding these sources is the prerequisite for a healthier way to remember.
The contours of the rising alternative to liberal memory are not arbitrary. Its themes, ranging from a denial of shame and guilt to self-aggrandisement and the protection of perceived national identity, are all responses to a genuine insecurity. The feeling that the world is unpredictable, incomprehensible, and uncontrollable is quite common, and something that all try to avoid. And while feelings of rootlessness and estrangement have various socioeconomic causes beyond the symbolic realm of memory, the presence of societal narratives connecting the individual to the community is one way of orienting oneself in society and the wider world. For better or for worse, the rising alternatives to liberal remembrance represent ways to answer deeply felt insecurities. And while the shape of the illiberal response might be rightfully condemned, liberals too often overlook the feelings driving them.
The liberal predicament thus lies in ignoring the realm of meaning. Or, to be more precise, in aggressively deconstructing all attempts to create stories that help people to grasp their complex reality without also offering alternative narratives. Here, the role of the historian, scrutinising the stories we tell about our societies, is critical. Equally crucial, however, is the offering of stories to be heard, scrutinised, and believed. The vicious circle of our memory debates revolves around the disjunction of these processes, with liberal actors perpetually reacting to populist, illiberal narratives of the past. So long as liberals rely solely on myth-busting and deconstruction, and neglect to offer alternative stories that can contend with those they seek to replace, they will keep losing ground.
A narrow way forward
The challenge for liberals is to realise that, despite their best intentions, efforts to deconstruct the insecurity-driven, toxic narratives end up contributing to the insecurity that feeds them. In the words of the philosopher Leszek Kolakowski, “man does not live by reason alone”. And while it is not the liberal way to prescribe meaningful stories, it is possible to offer some for the public debate. The widespread demand for stories providing recognition will be answered. The question is by whom.
It is challenging, but not impossible, to become a constructive memory actor in free and democratic discourse. Protected, critical scrutiny of history is essential, but so are efforts to make the case for liberal democracy in a narrative form. The first step is not approaching national identity and discourse as something to be wary of, but rather as something necessary to help shape for the better. Moreover, claiming the nation can be not just compatible, but also beneficial for liberal fortunes. The liberal victory in Canada, which harnessed the surge in Canadian nationalism threatened by Trump, or the Dutch D66 party’s reclaiming of the national flag from the hands of the populists, offers a glimpse into what a more constructive attitude of liberals towards the nation and its stories might look like.
While often traumatic, the pasts of Central Europe provide plenty of history to cherish. Positive attachments to the religious tolerance of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth or the democratic experiment of interwar Czechoslovakia can coexist alongside historical scrutiny of their shortcomings. The need for societal stories lingers. Whether this need will harm or help the liberal cause remains up to the liberals themselves.
