Politics of the past: the use and abuse of history - Socialists ...

effective and positive factor in giving room to the opposition. Furthermore,
it is reducing the role of Willy Brandt, who himself was
persecuted by the Nazis, and Egon Bahr, father of the Ostpolitik, to
describe them as only working towards appeasement. Social
democracy was after some hesitation in good contact with dissident
movements and supported them. Take for instance the role of
the great Dutch social democrat Max van der Stoel, later first High
Commissioner for National Minorities of the OSCE, who fought the
Greek fascist colonel regime and was the first Minister of Foreign
Affairs to support Charta 77 openly.
On the other hand, one should not forget how the extreme right
tries to reduce the role of fascism and Nazism and sometimes even
hurray this dramatic episode.
There is one more reason why the left must protest against the
rewriting of the history, as Viktor Makarov from Latvia explained. In
his part of Europe, but also in other places, conservative and nationalist
groups claim the role of eternal victims; they have been
prosecuted by the successive occupiers and their human sacrifices
have not been recognised properly. Nowadays they still claim to be
victims, just as their political friends in Western Europe, because the
central powers do not want to give them the floor. As victims are
sacrosanct in these times, they are always right. You can only
defend yourself against this image by showing that the picture of
the past they sketch is incorrect and unjust.
Prologue
Gdansk, this place of history, is the right town to start a discussion
how the unification of memories has to begin, as the great Polish
historian and politician the late Bronisław Geremek, to whose
memory this book has been dedicated, expressed it.
Gdansk, the place of Johannes Hevelius, the 17 th century astronomer
who was the first to draw a map of the moon, is not only
a lieu de mémoire for wars and oppression but also a symbol for respect
and tolerance. Hevelius for instance is also known under the
Dutch, Platdeutsch, German and Polish names of Hewel, Hewelke,
Höwelke and Heweliusz and in the city of Gdansk of these days he
251 Hannes Swoboda and Camiel Hamans