Bücher von John Kampfner

The new book from Sunday Times bestselling author John Kampfner: the 800-year story of Berlin, the most important capital city in Europe

No other city has had so many faces and so many disasters and has reinvented itself so many times. No other city is like Berlin.The Berlin of the past 800 years has been both haven and hell. It is a city tortured by its history, where the traumatised gather and where traumas are unleashed. Each plague, each fire, each war, each act of destruction and self-destruction requires it to start again.Berlin should never have become a world metropolis. Its geography and topography spell trouble: where are the great rivers and bridges? The mountains on the horizon? Instead, it started out as a swamp and all around are sweeping plains, exposed to the Siberian winds. Over the centuries, few of the great figures who have visited have had much good to say about it. Yet now it is the destination to which the world is flocking. It has been a trading post, military barracks, industrial powerhouse, centre of science and learning, consumer paradise, hotbed of self-indulgence and promiscuity - and the laboratory for the worst experiment in horror known to man. It has now achieved global status/it is the geographical and spiritual midpoint between the rival superpowers/it is the city of refuge/it is home to 180 nationalities, and more than a quarter of the population have a migrant background. After all the episodes of disaster, redemption and reinvention, is Berlin finally at ease with itself? This is the tale of a turbulent city that in spite of itself has become a magnet for the world.

Die Deutschen sind Meister der Selbstkritik. Dabei macht das Land es besser, als viele denken, sagt John Kampfner. Der Autor ist Brite und zeigt, wie sehr sich das Deutschland-Bild im Ausland in den letzten Jahren verändert hat. Die deutsche Politik hält er fu¿r vorbildlich: Finanz- und Flu¿chtlingskrise - kaum ein anderes Land navigiere so erfolgreich und souverän durch schwierige Zeiten. Sogar die Corona-Bekämpfung hält er für größtenteils erfolgreich. Während anderswo autoritäre Politiker und Populisten regieren, sei Deutschland ein Bollwerk aus Anstand und Stabilität. Den Grund dafu¿r sieht Kampfner vor allem in der soliden Politik Angela Merkels und in der kritischen Auseinandersetzung mit der eigenen Vergangenheit; darin liegt fu¿r ihn der Schlu¿ssel zu einer sensiblen Demokratie. Eine erfrischend andere Geschichte der Bundesrepublik.«Ausgezeichnet und provokant, ein leidenschaftliches, aktuelles Buch.»Sunday Times