Partnership in leadership? The United States and Germany post 1989. Poland’s perspective.

The “Partnership in leadership? The United States and Germany post 1989. Poland’s perspective” project conducted under the auspices of the Institute for Western Affairs of Poznań, is financed by Stiftung für Deutsch-Polnische Zusamenarbeit (Foundation for Polish-German Cooperation). Project work is scheduled to take place between July 2015 and December 2016. Its outcome will be a Polish-language monograph comprised of approximately 30 sheets. Additionally, a report will be drafted in the form of an expert study, to be published in the IZ Policy Papers series (English, 3 “publishing sheets”).

The research will focus on U.S.-German relations in 1989-2014 viewed against the changing background of domestic conditions and factors as well as international developments.

The overview of U.S.-German relations will be enhanced by references to Poland, helping to shed light on how the extent and nature of the evolution in U.S.-German relations has impacted Poland’s international standing and its ability to achieve its objectives. The findings will significantly effect the Polish political practice.

The project is conducted with the use of relevant literature, documents, expert studies and reports available in Polish, German and U.S. analytical and research centers.

Aims

By following German-American relations over the last quarter of a century, researchers expect to resolve a number of key research questions:

A study on the evolution of U.S.-German relations has shed light on whether Washington has changed the ranking it gave Germany in its strategy. Has Germany really become a “partner in leadership”, as once proposed by the Americans? Has the reunified Germany, having boosted its status in relations with the American superpower, acted responsibly and credibly? Or perhaps it has lost its sense of loyalty to its U.S. partner and become less trustworthy?

Could the United States, in its turn, draw the right conclusions from the fact that its partner’s economy has become powerful and that its political role in the European Union has grown highly significant? What hopes and expectations did the U.S. have of Germany? How did the United States respond to Germany’s greater forcefulness in reasserting its vital interests and identity? Is the U.S. capable of working optimally and effectively with the Federal Republic under such new circumstances?

The Polish perspective will help answer the question of whether Poland could have in the past and can in the future benefit from the poor state of U.S.-German relations. How true is it that having committed to cooperation with Germany, the Americans have no interest in seeing Warsaw’s relations with Berlin deteriorate? Or is it rather that Washington prefers to keep Poland strong in Europe seeing its good relations with Germany as a unique benefit. Finally, how could close relations between Warsaw and Berlin be an advantage in the relationship between Poland and the United States?