Fritz Stern researched Germany's difficult path to modernity - and subjected the national-conservative resentment against the Weimar Republic to in-depth criticism. The University of Oldenburg has now awarded the important German-Jewish scholar an honorary doctorate.
Prof. Dr Dr h. c. mult. Fritz Stern, German-American historian, has been awarded an honorary doctorate by the School IV - School of Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Oldenburg. "Fritz Stern brings his knowledge and experience to society and enters into dialogue with it. He is a historian who brings his knowledge to bear on the challenges of today and tomorrow," explained Prof Dr Gunilla Budde, Vice President for Studies and Teaching at the University, on the occasion of the award ceremony.
"In Fritz Stern, we are honouring one of the most important historians, writers and critical thinkers of our time, whose outstanding academic achievements are known far beyond the boundaries of his discipline," said Dean Prof. Dr Andrea Strübind, explaining the School's decision. The award is in keeping with the intellectual tradition associated with the university's namesake, Carl von Ossietzky. Prof. Dr Wolfgang Frühwald, former President of the German Research Foundation (DFG) and one of the external reviewers of the procedure, emphasised: "It seems to me that it is fitting for a university that bears the name of the strong-minded publicist Carl von Ossietzky, who was persecuted and maltreated by the National Socialists, to award the learned, political and moral thinker and peacemaker Fritz Stern the dignity of Dr phil. h.c.".
Stern, who was born in Breslau in 1926, emigrated with his family to the United States in 1938, where he studied history at Columbia University in New York. He follows in the tradition of German-Jewish scholars who pursued an academic career in the USA after the National Socialists seized power in 1933. Stern gained international renown as a liberal historian who researched Germany's difficult path to modernity since the Bismarck era and subjected the national-conservative resentment against the Weimar Republic and the German-Jewish symbiosis to in-depth criticism.
"In Fritz Stern's life's work, European traditions and American experience, the vision of the great historian and the critical commitment of the public intellectual, an eventful biography and disciplined scholarship have come together to form a unique synthesis - with the Germans and their modern history at its centre," says Prof. Dr. h. c. mult. Jürgen Kocka, social historian and Vice President of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy, in his laudatory speech.
Of Stern's numerous works, his dissertation on the history of ideas, "Kulturpessimismus als politische Gefahr" (1961), stands out. In it, he examines the radicalising influence of conservative idealism on the educated elite during the Weimar years. His outstanding works also include the monumental monograph "Gold and Iron". In it, he deals with Bismarck and his Jewish banker Bleichröder and places the endangered and controversial beginnings of the German-Jewish symbiosis in the age of classical modernism in a larger, contemporary historical framework.
Stern's works are recognised and widely read in Germany beyond the academic world. In 1999, he received the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade for his services to German-Jewish reconciliation. In 2004, the then Foreign Minister Josef Fischer presented him with the Anglo-Israeli Leo Baeck Medal. In recent years, Stern's autobiography "Five Germanys and a Life" (2007) and the conversations he had with Helmut Schmidt in 2010 under the title "Our Century" have become bestsellers. Most recently, his conversations with Josef Fischer and the double biography of "Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Hans von Dohnanyi in the resistance against Hitler" were published. The historian has taught - with a few interruptions - at Columbia University in New York since 1946, where he is still active today as Emeritus Professor. For health reasons, Stern was unable to attend the ceremony in person. However, he addressed the participants of the ceremony in a video message and thanked them for the honour.
