This issue of Debatte deals with a complex of interlocking themes which also connect with questions we have taken up in a number of recent issues. One central connection is that between the experience of migration both within Europe and into Europe from the wider world and the construction of European identities—a process that happens at least in part through the differentiation of Europe from its other. Brigid Haines looks at a fascinating result of such migration here; the growth of German language literature created by writers whose origins are in Central and Eastern Europe. The translation this year into English of the novels The Collector of Worlds by Ilija Trojanow and How The Soldier Repairs the Gramophone by Saša Stanišić has brought this emerging literature into mainstream public view within Britain. Haines sets such writing in a broader context and draws important parallels (while also highlighting differences) between it and the work of Turkish-German writers; thus linking up with recent articles in Debatte on film by Rob Burns, Seán Allen and Gareth Dale. Melinda Kovács and Olena Leipnik take up the question of “Europeanization” from a different direction; examining the way in which the enlargement of the European Union has affected concepts of European identity in the two cases of Ukraine and Hungary.
Another theme in this issue of the journal is that of perceptions of history and their effect on the present. Eithne Knappitsch provides a detailed account of the commemorations of the 10 October 1920 plebiscite in Carinthia which also illuminates more general questions of national identity—in this case as mediated through relationships between German and Slovene speakers. Dieter K. Buse also deals with an important case of social memory in his examination of the changes in the historical consciousness of the Nazi period within Germany. Buse sees 1961 as a pivotal year in this regard, with concerns being raised at that point which prefigured in important ways the turbulent debates of the late 1960s.
An important example of historical memory currently is the consideration, forty years later, of the world-wide significance of the events of the year 1968; also a key year for the region covered by Debatte. In this issue we carry an analysis of the Prague Spring by Dieter Segert, which makes important corrections to some widely held misapprehensions about the nature of political structures and changes within Central and Eastern Europe under Communist rule.
The nature and development of the GDR has been an ongoing topic of discussion within the journal. Here we print a careful account of relationships between the GDR and Australia by Peter Monteath. This is complemented by Ulf Brunnbauer's review of the recent book by Jeannette Madarász about working life in East Germany.
Two other reviews deal with key areas of economic transformation currently facing Europe. László Andor looks at Anders Åslund's analysis of the building of capitalism within Central and Eastern Europe, and Berksoy Bilgin assesses the collection of articles edited by Joachim Becker and Rudy Weissenbacher on the rise of the Euro, also focusing on the East.
Since our last issue, Debatte has organised a very successful conference on Russia at the University of Richmond. Around seventy participants gathered to listen to and discuss a variety of papers on both internal developments within Russia and Russia's external relations. We hope to publish a number of these papers in future issues of the journal. The next Debatte conference will be a special conference on the 1989 East European revolutions, due to take place in October 2009, as announced in our April 2008 issue. As ever, we welcome suggestions for future conferences and related activities.