The Case of Hans Schafranek

Abstract

To the Editor, On August 29 of 1991, a federal court (Landgericht) in Frankfurt am Main found Austrian historian Hans Schafranek guilty of having defamed the character of Emil Carlebach, a longtime leader of the (West) German Communist party. Schafranek's libel, according to the court, consisted in having adopted and endorsed as his own allegations by others of misconduct against Carlebach which Schafranek had quoted from publicly accessible sources. In addition to awarding Carlebach considerable financial damages, the court has also imposed a gag order on Schafranek which forbids him, under penalty of DM 500,000, from quoting these sources in the future. If confirmed by the German equivalent of the Supreme Court, this unsettling development would have far-reaching implications not only for historians, but for any one researching sensitive topics in contemporary German history. Though this case has received considerable publicity in German-speaking Europe, it remains virtually unknown in the United States. Given its intrinsic importance as well as the possibility that it might set a dangerous precedent, I believe it ought to be brought to the attention of your readers. Hans Schafranek works as a free-lance historian in Vienna. He is the