Foreign Policy and Stability in West Germany*

Abstract

I N the last decade a flood of articles and monographs has analysed the motivations and implications of the Ost and Deutschlandpolitik of successive West German governments. These analyses have generally been pitched at the level of the impact of these policies on international politics. Where the impact of the Ostpolitik on the domestic arena has been analysed it has generally been in relation to the ostensible objects of the policy, i.e., the states of Eastern Europe.1 This article is basically concerned with the impact of these policies on the stability of the Federal Republic. It will be argued that foreign policy decisions taken in Bonn and relating to both Eastern and Western Europe have implied-as Brandt's quotation indicates-a self-acceptance by the Federal Republic and have contributed decisively to the stability of West Germany. In particular, the main body of this article will argue that the commitment of the Federal Republic to recreate an all-German state has been abandoned as a matter of practical policy and that the attempt to graft loyalties normally associated with the nation on to a West European construction has similarly been halted. In this situation, it will be further argued that West Germany is beginning to display characteristics normally associated with the nationstate.