#rp25 speaker Max Czollek: On the present and future of the culture of remembrance

Coming to terms with and overcoming Germany's violent past is a multi-generational project of German civil society and politics. For a long time, the Federal Republic was also regarded internationally as a role model. With the rise of the nationalist right in the past decade, there is now a reality that should not exist according to Germany's self-narrative in terms of the culture of remembrance.

Some are reacting to this by redefining the cultural memory project. Central claims of the Federal Republic of Germany after 1945 are being disparaged as supposedly woke claims, from asylum rights to anti-discrimination. Others look for causes and always find them somewhere other than in themselves: culture, universities, climate activism or the left.

At re:publica 25, Max Czollek asks whether there is a third way: recognising the failure of the promises of the culture of remembrance, which forms the basis for starting anew. Towards a culture of remembrance that fits in with pluralistic post-national socialist democracy. And which actively opposes its enemies.

Max Czollek is the author and host of several podcasts and discussion series, co-editor of Jalta - Positionen zur jüdischen Gegenwart and curator of the project heimaten at HKW Berlin and the Coalition for a Pluralistic Public Discourse (CPPD). In 2022, he was the idea generator and co-curator of the exhibition Rache. Geschichte und Fantasie at the Jewish Museum Frankfurt. His most recent publications include the poetry collection Gute Enden (2024) and the essays Desintegriert euch! (2018), Gegenwartsbewältigung (2020) and Versöhnungstheater (2023). In October 2025, the essay Alles auf Anfang. Auf der Suche nach einer neuen Erinnerungskultur, written together with Hadija Haruna-Oelker, will be published.