Commemoration of War Dead for Peace Education: Implications from the Case of Germany

This article focuses on challenges in the commemoration of war dead for peace education, drawing on modes of remembrance of the war dead in Germany as an informative case: In Germany’s official remembrance culture ‘all victims of war’ are mourned. Yet in public and in private divided narratives and interpretations have been cultivated. In this ‘memory competition,’ the vanishing of the contemporary witnesses of World War II entails challenges but it also offers opportunities for peace education. To take advantage of these, questions must be tackled publicly about what the (different) war dead may mean to us today, and to future generations. A reflective remembrance culture requires historical accuracy but also recognition of the complexity that belies the notion of there being one collective memory