Collective Memory and Cultural Constraint: Holocaust Myth and Rationality in German Politics

Using a case study of official representations of the Holocaust in the Federal Republic of Germany, we address the ways in which collective memory constrains political claim-making. In contrast to the commonly held views that the past is either durable or malleable, we characterize collective memory in political culture as an ongoing process of negotiation through time. We distinguish between mythic and rational political cultural logics, and delineate mechanisms through which these logics operate as constraints: taboo and prohibition, duty and requirement. With these conceptual distinctions, we describe transformations in the memory of the Holocaust as a constraint in German political culture.