Heimatisierung - Antifaschismus als konkrete Utopie

In the organizer's words:

Anti-fascism was never just a defense, but always also a concrete counter-proposal: the vision of a more just, inclusive and solidary society. In view of the strengthening of authoritarian forms of rule, global crises and the erosion of democratic traditions and institutions, the old question is posed with new urgency: How can anti-fascist thought and action become effective as a concrete utopia of plural democracy?

After the Second World War, two German states were founded, the GDR and the FRG, and "never again" was inscribed into the political DNA of both as their raison d'être. 80 years later, the country is at a decisive tipping point: the self-declared "bourgeois center" continues to follow the path of normalizing German nationalism - from homeland ministries to the rebuilding of Prussian castles - while the largest opposition party in the Bundestag is considered to be safely on the far right.

This situation, unique since 1945, raises the question of the success of the past policy of "never again" and thus also of the effectiveness of political self-images and established models such as the culture of remembrance as a strategy for coming to terms with Germany's violent history. The evening is therefore dedicated to a search for alternative approaches to coming to terms with the present:

Can an updated form of anti-fascist perspectives point the way to the future? How could such an anti-fascist practice be conceived that not only reacts, but actively pushes back the continuities of violence? At a time when political and social exclusion, racist and anti-Semitic narratives and the state's disparagement and criminalization of civil society initiatives are on the rise?

Antifascism as a concrete utopia brings together voices from activism, journalism and theory and explores the question of what antifascism has been as a historical necessity and what it can and must achieve as a future practice.

In German, simultaneous translation into English and German Sign Language (DGS)