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Europe and the Nation State
The convulsions of the last decade have profoundly disoriented European integration scholarship. Integration has always entailed "more Europe," but it has never entailed autonomous democratic and constitutional legitimacy. For that, national institutions have remained crucial. In his book Power and Legitimacy: Reconciling Europe and the Nation State, Peter Lindseth offers a historical synthesis to understand integration as an extension of administrative governance. His lecture will explore the implications of integration moving forward. Moderated by Ingolf Pernice, the chair of Public, International, and European Law at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.
The Second Great Contraction
The Great Recession may be dwindling, but the global economy remains badly overleveraged. And there is no quick escape without a scheme to transfer wealth from creditors to debtors -- either through defaults, financial repression, or inflation. Kenneth S. Rogoff, the eminent Harvard macroeconomist and Stephen M. Kellen Distinguished Visitor this spring, calls the ongoing crisis is the “Second Great Contraction.” It applies not only to output and employment, as in a normal recession, but, as seen in both Europe and the US, to debt and credit. Such deleveraging, Rogoff says, can typically take many years to complete. Rogoff will discuss today’s sovereign debt crisis in the context of the 800 year history of international financial crises, and policy implications for Europe and the rest of the world in the years ahead.
Invitation only
Dictatorship and Information
Political scientists have long argued that autocratic regimes that lack adequate information about popular preferences will be short-lived and unstable. But communist regimes are on average very resilient. Based on his archival findings on China and Eastern Europe, Martin Dimitrov explores how communist regimes manage the problem of information scarcity by creating institutions for collecting information that is provided either involuntarily or voluntarily. The involuntary collection of information is executed primarily through the intelligence network of the secret police and allows the regime to track the level of political dissent in society. The voluntary provision of information takes place through citizen complaints and denunciations and is useful for assessing popular preferences about redistribution. Martinov argues that regime resilience is a delicate balancing act that is predicated on the smooth operation of the two systems for collecting information. When one system malfunctions, regime resilience is endangered. When both systems malfunction, regime collapse is likely.
The Fantastic
Karen Russell's novel Swamplandia! (2011) features a cast ranging from alligator wrestlers and a balding brown bear named Judy Garland, to a Bird Man specializing in buzzard removal and rioting melaleuca trees, all narrated by Ava, one of three Sawtooth grandchildren who run a floundering tourist attraction of the book's title. As a Mary Ellen von der Heyden Fellow in Fiction at the Academy this spring, Russell will be working on some new phantasmagorical creations. She reads from her work in progress, The Fantastic, on February 23. Moderated by Andrew Gross, Assistant Professor of Literature, John-F.-Kennedy-Institut, Freie Universität Berlin
In Celebration of Reri Grist’s 80th Birthday: A Unique Transatlantic Operatic Career
After Leonard Bernstein cast Reri Grist in the première of West Side Story, she found herself catapulted into stardom on opera stages in Europe and America. A regular at the Salzburg Festival, her domination of the lyric and coloratura Fach in Strauss and Mozart signaled a breakthrough for African-American singers. Younger generations have since revered Grist for her silvery tone, flawless technique, and stupendous acting. On February 28, in celebration of her 80th birthday, the Academy welcomes Grist for a discussion of her unique operatic career. Moderated by Pamela Rosenberg, the dean of fellows and programs at the American Academy in Berlin.
German Health Care: Moving to a Value-Based System
The German health care system is on a collision course with budget realities. Costs are high and rising, and quality problems are becoming ever more apparent. Decades of reforms have produced little change to these troubling trends. Why has Germany failed to solve these cost and quality problems? The reason is that Germany has not set value for patients as the overarching goal, defined as the patient health outcomes achieved per euro expended. This lecture, based on the findings of Michael Porter´s book Redefining German Health Care: Moving to a Value-Based System (co-authored by Clemens Guth), lays out an action agenda to move Germany to a high value system.
Time and location will be announced on this website closer to event. Please check back to register online.
A Transatlantic Debate for Health Policy Professionals and Experts
Michael E. Porter, Bishop William Lawrence University Professor, Harvard Business School
Generously supported by Daimler-Fonds
Invitation Only
On Beyond Mentoring – Answering Questions with Questions
On the occasion of John Cage’s 100th birthday, composer and performer Joan La Barbara will discuss her longstanding artistic exchange with one of the 20th century’s most influential composers. Their friendship, characterized by mutual respect and shared inspiration, began at the Berliner Philharmonie. La Barbara’s compositional process has often drawn on Cage’s layering of disparate elements, combined with her own bold incorporation of theater and other media into her pieces.
In cooperation with MaerzMusik | Berliner Festspiele
Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita
Leland de la Durantaye, Holtzbrinck Fellow at the American Academy in Berlin, speaks with Ijoma Mangold, deputy editor of the feuilleton at Die Zeit; accompanied by a reading from Nabokov's Lolita by Elmar Roloff, an actor at the Schauspiel Stuttgart; moderated by Pamela Rosenberg of the American Academy in Berlin.This discussion inaugurates the "Head to Head" series of the American Academy and Literaturhaus Stuttgart, a set of dialogues between outstanding Academy guests and their German counterparts.
Location: Literaturhaus Stuttgart, Breitscheidstraße 4, 70174 Stuttgart
Tickets under: info@literaturhaus-stuttgart.de or (01805) 70 07 33
In cooperation with Literaturhaus Stuttgart
Generously supported by the Robert Bosch Stiftung GmbH, Daimler AG, Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck GmbH, and the Berthold Liebinger Stiftung GmbH
Breitenau: The Workhouse Project
Founded as a Benedictine monastery in the 12th century, Breitenau is a small town fifteen miles south of Kassel. By 1579 the original church was converted into storage for fruit and vegetables. After standing vacant for much of the 18th century, the former monestary began its long history as a place of confinement and “correction." In 1874 Breitenau became a workhouse and correctional facility for the rural poor, targeting “beggars, vagabonds and prostitutes." In 1940, the Kassel Gestapo enlarged the workhouse, and until the end of the war imprisoned approximately 8,500 workers. As part of her work on Documenta 13, Avery Gordon, the Anna-Maria Kellen Fellow at the Academy this spring, takes the long view of incarceration, reform, and political order through her Breitenau Notebooks. Moderated by Anselm Franke, curator of the 2012 Taipei Biennial.