Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution—the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz,(BfV)—wields extraordinary power in determining what speech remains “constitutionally acceptable.” Though lacking police powers, this authority effectively creates a red list of censorship targets—declaring groups, political parties like the AfD, individuals, and even books as enemies of the constitution.
This week saw a rare victory against the BfV’s overreach when a court ruled that Martin Wagener’s book was not unconstitutional. However, this triumph is limited and does nothing to address the deeper problem of such an institution existing in Germany at all.
The Wagener case: when the hunter becomes the hunted
Wagener’s book, Kulturkampf um das Volk (“Culture War Over the People”), was deemed unconstitutional, and the latest court ruling marks the temporary end of a battle that has raged since its publication in 2021. During this period, Wagener was suspended from his job. In a separate court case, the German Publishers and Booksellers Association demanded a refund of the grant it had awarded to the publisher for the book.
The irony runs deeper than mere bureaucratic overreach. Wagener isn’t some fringe activist but a professor of politics who was, until his suspension, intimately connected to the very institution now targeting him. He taught at the Centre for Intelligence Training and Education (ZNAF), jointly operated by Germany’s external intelligence service (BND) and the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution itself.
This reveals the profound tensions within Germany’s security apparatus—tensions that emerged when Wagener first clashed with authorities in 2018 over his critique of Germany’s open border policies and his support for Hans-Georg Maaßen, the former BfV head dismissed for challenging the government’s migration stance.
The ‘Volk’ weapon: linguistic policing as political control
Both Wagener’s case and the proposed AfD ban rest on the same foundation: the BfV’sinterpretation of how the term ‘Volk’ (people) is used. According to the BfV, Wagener and the AfD promote “völkischer Nationalismus“—an ethnic nationalism that echoes Nazi ideology through concepts like ‘Volksgemeinschaft.’
This accusation crumbles under scrutiny. The BfV has trapped itself in an untenable position by rejecting not just racist definitions but also any culturally defined concept of ‘Volk’—a rejection that contradicts Germany’s own constitutional language and historical practice.
For a start, the Basic Law itself repeatedly employs the term ‘Volk‘—most notably in its opening declaration that “all state authority is derived from the people (Volk).” This constitutional usage clearly envisions a community bound together by more than mere legal documentation—a people connected through shared history, common fate, culture, and language.
When the Berlin Wall fell, crowds chanted “Wir sind das Volk” (“We are the people”). These protesters weren’t claiming to represent all humanity or asserting some abstract universal citizenship. They declared themselves to be Germans, just like their western counterparts. Touching on this, Berlin’s beloved former mayor Willy Brandt (SPD) declared that “what belongs together is growing together.”
The chant “We are the people” also alluded to another truth: that democracy requires a ‘demos’—a people with sufficient common ground to sustain a political community. The demonstrators understood this.
Indeed, decades after the war, the existence of a German ‘Volk‘ was considered self-evident across the political spectrum. How else can one explain Germany’s systematic repatriation programs that specifically welcomed people of ‘German ethnicity’ from across Eastern Europe? The moral authority behind this understanding came from figures like Kurt Schumacher, the SPD’s postwar leader whose anti-fascist credentials were beyond reproach—having spent nearly a decade in Nazi concentration camps for his resistance. Schumacher argued that West Germany bore a special obligation to welcome German refugees from the East precisely because they belonged to the same ‘Volk.’ He also tirelessly campaigned for a reunification of the divided country, arguing that “only a united German Volk” could campaign for its interests.
The multiculturalist contradiction
Most importantly, Wagener’s critique targets the shallow ideology of multiculturalism that has captured Germany’s elite in the past decades. He quotes Samuel Huntington on the centrality of identity: societies seeking to integrate foreigners must first answer “who we are.”
His book, though certainly not without problems, is a scathing rebuke of former chancellor Angela Merkel’s relativism, exemplified in her 2013 declaration: “We want to become a country of integration … anyone who contributes to our country with their respective cultural background, interests, knowledge and experience is an asset.” More tellingly, she stated, “There is no justification whatsoever for small groups within our society to presume to define who the people are. The people are everyone who lives in this country.” In Wagener’s words, it was no wonder that Merkel, pursuing such an approach, refused to even control Germany’s borders.
The BfV has weaponized the accusation of promoting an ‘ethnic-ancestral concept of the people’—transforming what should be an open debate into grounds for constitutional suspicion. This charge has become a convenient tool for silencing critics not only of multiculturalism but even of Germany’s accelerated naturalization program that granted citizenship after merely three years of residence (before it was changed back to five years by the current government).
Popular will vs. elite consensus
The BfV’s position contradicts not only historical precedent and common sense but also contemporary public opinion. Survey data cited by Wagener shows vast majority support for the principle that “foreigners living in Germany should orient themselves towards German culture”—with German culture taking precedence in conflicts while allowing immigrants to maintain their customs and religions as long as they don’t interfere with majority values.
This disconnect between elite ideology and popular sentiment explains the populist revolt that has manifested in the AfD’s rise—precisely what the BfV seeks to contain through constitutional interpretation and bans.
As Claudio Casula from Nius observed, this ruling delivers “a veritable slap in the face” to the BfV and could influence proceedings to ban the AfD, since both cases hinge on identical interpretations of ’Volk.’
In truth, a democratic society cannot—and should not—be prohibited from discussing cultural identity and national belonging. The attempts to do this by beleaguered elites, keen to absolve themselves, are bound to lead to ever more rifts and tensions. As sociologist Frank Furedi puts it, our societies’ problem is not simply mass migration but also the lack of a story that could bind people together.
But this single court victory, while significant, cannot secure free speech in Germany. The multicultural consensus among elites may be showing cracks, but the attempt to control the public debate persists. A true democratic breakthrough requires eliminating what no healthy democracy should tolerate: an institution empowered to police the boundaries of acceptable political thought.
Sabine Beppler-Spahl is a writer for europeanconservative.com based in Berlin. Sabine is the chair of the German liberal think tank Freiblickinstitut, and the Germany correspondent for Spiked. She has written for several German magazines and newspapers.
The Office for the Protection of the Constitution: Democracy’s Enemy Within
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Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution—the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz,(BfV)—wields extraordinary power in determining what speech remains “constitutionally acceptable.” Though lacking police powers, this authority effectively creates a red list of censorship targets—declaring groups, political parties like the AfD, individuals, and even books as enemies of the constitution.
This week saw a rare victory against the BfV’s overreach when a court ruled that Martin Wagener’s book was not unconstitutional. However, this triumph is limited and does nothing to address the deeper problem of such an institution existing in Germany at all.
The Wagener case: when the hunter becomes the hunted
Wagener’s book, Kulturkampf um das Volk (“Culture War Over the People”), was deemed unconstitutional, and the latest court ruling marks the temporary end of a battle that has raged since its publication in 2021. During this period, Wagener was suspended from his job. In a separate court case, the German Publishers and Booksellers Association demanded a refund of the grant it had awarded to the publisher for the book.
The irony runs deeper than mere bureaucratic overreach. Wagener isn’t some fringe activist but a professor of politics who was, until his suspension, intimately connected to the very institution now targeting him. He taught at the Centre for Intelligence Training and Education (ZNAF), jointly operated by Germany’s external intelligence service (BND) and the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution itself.
This reveals the profound tensions within Germany’s security apparatus—tensions that emerged when Wagener first clashed with authorities in 2018 over his critique of Germany’s open border policies and his support for Hans-Georg Maaßen, the former BfV head dismissed for challenging the government’s migration stance.
The ‘Volk’ weapon: linguistic policing as political control
Both Wagener’s case and the proposed AfD ban rest on the same foundation: the BfV’sinterpretation of how the term ‘Volk’ (people) is used. According to the BfV, Wagener and the AfD promote “völkischer Nationalismus“—an ethnic nationalism that echoes Nazi ideology through concepts like ‘Volksgemeinschaft.’
This accusation crumbles under scrutiny. The BfV has trapped itself in an untenable position by rejecting not just racist definitions but also any culturally defined concept of ‘Volk’—a rejection that contradicts Germany’s own constitutional language and historical practice.
For a start, the Basic Law itself repeatedly employs the term ‘Volk‘—most notably in its opening declaration that “all state authority is derived from the people (Volk).” This constitutional usage clearly envisions a community bound together by more than mere legal documentation—a people connected through shared history, common fate, culture, and language.
When the Berlin Wall fell, crowds chanted “Wir sind das Volk” (“We are the people”). These protesters weren’t claiming to represent all humanity or asserting some abstract universal citizenship. They declared themselves to be Germans, just like their western counterparts. Touching on this, Berlin’s beloved former mayor Willy Brandt (SPD) declared that “what belongs together is growing together.”
The chant “We are the people” also alluded to another truth: that democracy requires a ‘demos’—a people with sufficient common ground to sustain a political community. The demonstrators understood this.
Indeed, decades after the war, the existence of a German ‘Volk‘ was considered self-evident across the political spectrum. How else can one explain Germany’s systematic repatriation programs that specifically welcomed people of ‘German ethnicity’ from across Eastern Europe? The moral authority behind this understanding came from figures like Kurt Schumacher, the SPD’s postwar leader whose anti-fascist credentials were beyond reproach—having spent nearly a decade in Nazi concentration camps for his resistance. Schumacher argued that West Germany bore a special obligation to welcome German refugees from the East precisely because they belonged to the same ‘Volk.’ He also tirelessly campaigned for a reunification of the divided country, arguing that “only a united German Volk” could campaign for its interests.
The multiculturalist contradiction
Most importantly, Wagener’s critique targets the shallow ideology of multiculturalism that has captured Germany’s elite in the past decades. He quotes Samuel Huntington on the centrality of identity: societies seeking to integrate foreigners must first answer “who we are.”
His book, though certainly not without problems, is a scathing rebuke of former chancellor Angela Merkel’s relativism, exemplified in her 2013 declaration: “We want to become a country of integration … anyone who contributes to our country with their respective cultural background, interests, knowledge and experience is an asset.” More tellingly, she stated, “There is no justification whatsoever for small groups within our society to presume to define who the people are. The people are everyone who lives in this country.” In Wagener’s words, it was no wonder that Merkel, pursuing such an approach, refused to even control Germany’s borders.
The BfV has weaponized the accusation of promoting an ‘ethnic-ancestral concept of the people’—transforming what should be an open debate into grounds for constitutional suspicion. This charge has become a convenient tool for silencing critics not only of multiculturalism but even of Germany’s accelerated naturalization program that granted citizenship after merely three years of residence (before it was changed back to five years by the current government).
Popular will vs. elite consensus
The BfV’s position contradicts not only historical precedent and common sense but also contemporary public opinion. Survey data cited by Wagener shows vast majority support for the principle that “foreigners living in Germany should orient themselves towards German culture”—with German culture taking precedence in conflicts while allowing immigrants to maintain their customs and religions as long as they don’t interfere with majority values.
This disconnect between elite ideology and popular sentiment explains the populist revolt that has manifested in the AfD’s rise—precisely what the BfV seeks to contain through constitutional interpretation and bans.
As Claudio Casula from Nius observed, this ruling delivers “a veritable slap in the face” to the BfV and could influence proceedings to ban the AfD, since both cases hinge on identical interpretations of ’Volk.’
In truth, a democratic society cannot—and should not—be prohibited from discussing cultural identity and national belonging. The attempts to do this by beleaguered elites, keen to absolve themselves, are bound to lead to ever more rifts and tensions. As sociologist Frank Furedi puts it, our societies’ problem is not simply mass migration but also the lack of a story that could bind people together.
But this single court victory, while significant, cannot secure free speech in Germany. The multicultural consensus among elites may be showing cracks, but the attempt to control the public debate persists. A true democratic breakthrough requires eliminating what no healthy democracy should tolerate: an institution empowered to police the boundaries of acceptable political thought.
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