著者

川村 陶子

出版者

JAPAN ASSOCIATION OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

雑誌

国際政治 (ISSN:04542215)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.2012, no.168, pp.168_74-87, 2012

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In Germany it is often said that cultural policy is the third pillar of foreign policy. That means culture, together with security and trade, constitutes an essential part of international relations. This concept was formulated during the Cold War period, mainly by Dieter Sattler, director of the Cultural Department of the Foreign Office (1959–66), and Willy Brandt, foreign minister of the Kiesinger administration (1966–69).<br>When the Federal Republic was founded, its government was reluctant of pursuing international cultural policy on its own. It was in the latter half of the 1950s that foreign policymakers, in the face of cultural offensive by the Eastern Bloc, thought they need a systematic cultural policy. Some cultural attachés, such as Sattler in Rome and Bruno E. Werner in Washington D.C., insisted that cultural policy must indeed be placed at the core of West German diplomacy.<br>Sattler regarded cultural policy as a tool of managing transnational relations in the contemporary world of interdependence. As a head of the Cultural Department in Bonn, he insisted that culture is the "third stage" of foreign policy, and strived to establish the organizational, financial, and conceptual bases of foreign cultural policy.<br>The thesis "culture is the third pillar of foreign policy" was formulated by Brandt, who headed the Foreign Office under the grand coalition. When the Cold War was locked in a stalemate, he thought that cultural policy was a suitable means to maintain the unity of German nation without legally admitting the existence of two German states. Though his plan of "all-German foreign cultural policy" was not realized, Brandt repeatedly stated in public that culture is one of the main pillars of foreign policy. The popular foreign minister regarded cultural policy as essential for making Germany a peacepursuing nation.<br>Sattler's "third-stage" argument and Brandt's "third-pillar" argument both see culture as an important field of international relations. The two theses differ, however, in time scope and worldview. While the "third-stage" argument is based on rather liberal vision focusing on interdependence and long-time, structural transformation of the nation-state system, the "thirdpillar" argument is more realistic, stressing the integrity and prosperity of the nation.<br>While the "third-pillar" argument became a cliché, German foreign policymakers could neither establish a firm principle nor execute consistent policy in the field of culture. Rather, foreign cultural policy got increasingly negative attention from politicians and the media, who thought that tax was not used in a proper form. The "third-pillar" argument could actually have created complications, since it did not clarify the content of "culture" while placing cultural policy as a priority.