Sönke Neitzel: Scotland and Bavaria have much in common

Bavarians have sympathy for the Scottish cultural identity, but would they understand independence, asks Sönke Neitzel.

Scotland is incredibly popular in Germany. Thousands of Germans live here, and many more spend their holidays between Stranraer and the Orkney Islands, enjoying the rich culture and the beautiful landscape. Germans enjoy the friendly hospitality, and they like to see that there are so many German cars on the streets.

In Germany, Scotland is currently making headlines with its call for a referendum in 2014. The question most often asked in Germany is: will Scotland become independent? In most parts of the German Republic, the news that a referendum will be held in 2014 was met with disbelief and astonishment. Great Britain without Scotland – this is almost inconceivable for Germans.

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Most Germans refer to the United Kingdom simply as “England”. Scotland obviously has its own unique identity, but this is not clear to most Germans. Only the Bavarians might understand that.

Bavaria, Germany’s largest and economically most powerful federal state, has always had great sympathy for the Scottish and their cultural identity. And, in fact, there are several parallels: Bavaria has always emphasised its special role in Germany as the state with the most pronounced and distinctive cultural identity.

Today, there are 16 federal states in Germany, most of them artificial constructions from after the Second World War, often without any traditional structures rooted in history. Bavaria, however, is a different story. Bavaria has existed as its own territorial state since the Middle Ages, first as a duchy, then as a kingdom beginning in 1806, and finally as a so-called free state within Germany since 1918. Even though the borders have changed countless times, a genuine Bavarian identity has developed over the centuries.

Bavarians cultivated an aversion to Prussia over that time too. Bavarians were liberal and cosmopolitan, and Prussians were bellicose and conservative. In 1866, not even 150 years ago, both states waged their last war against one another. The Bavarians lost the fight, and five years later they became part of the Prussia-dominated German Empire. They had a few special concessions, though, and not just their own stamps; Bavaria also had its own army with its own general staff.

Yet sometimes, strange things happen: the Bavarians learned to love Prussia, above all Otto von Bismarck, the once-hated chancellor of the new German Empire. In the age of nationalism, Germany was a comfortable place to be. No-one spoke of political independence. This was also due to the fact that Berlin never established dominance over Bavaria as London did over Scotland. The Bavarian capital of Munich was the second centre of Germany – in economic, political and, above all, cultural terms.

The desire to reclaim independence only surfaced again after the World Wars, and only for a brief moment. Most Bavarians no longer considered going down their own path. And this has proven to be the right decision in many ways.

Finally, Bavaria has profited like no other German state from the twists and turns of the post-war period. In 1945, many businessmen fled from the Communist-occupied East to Bavaria, where they rebuilt their companies. The most prominent example is Siemens, which was just as much a “global player” then in Berlin as it is today in Munich.

German federalism, with its comprehensive rights for the states, has always provided Bavaria with sufficient opportunities for preserving its own identity. Interestingly, Bavarians are also united by the scepticism with which other Germans view them, which also explains why Germany does not want to be ruled by Bavarians. A Bavarian last became chancellor in 1894, and Franz Josef Strauss and Edmund Stoiber failed to win federal elections in 1980 and 2002. Germany does not have a Gordon Brown.

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On the other hand, Bavarians are apparently quite at home within Germany. The Bavaria Party may stand for office under the slogan, “freedom for Scotland in 2014 – and for Bavaria in 2016”, yet they have won no more than 1 per cent of the Bavarian vote. No-one wants to head down the road of political independence.

However, there are ever more voices insisting on more economic independence for Bavaria. After all, this economic powerhouse has to make enormous transfer payments to poorer German states.

Scotland and Bavaria are two countries connected by their cultural independence, though their historical experiences and political contexts are different. Yet, Bavaria’s case demonstrates that a strong political and cultural federalism can also hold together disparate identities.

One of Bavaria’s neighbours once took this idea much further: in 1867, the Austrian Empire became the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Austria and Hungary were two politically equal nations held together only by a monarch and shared ministries for economics, the military and foreign affairs; otherwise, they were independent states with their own armies. Whether all of this did Austro-Hungary any good is still a matter of debate among historians. In any event, it was the only option for preventing the collapse of the Empire, and the Hungarians knew that they counted more as an equal part of a major European power than as their own small state.

We will see in 2014 which political path Scotland and Great Britain choose to follow. If it comes to independence, we shouldn’t forget to explain the background for this decision to the Germans. And to do this, we should start from the beginning. Don’t forget: many Germans still believe that Scotland is part of England….

• Sönke Neitzel is professor of modern history and global security at the University of Glasgow.