Too Much Politics in Political Science? The Case of Red Hesse

Are you politically neutral?

Here is a nice little conundrum for you. As a political scientist, you necessarily spend much of your time analysing, well, politics. If you happen to study the system you are living in, that makes for some awkward social situations.

Senior Citizens in Hesse (2030 projection)
Grey or Red Hesse? Distribution of senior citizens in Hesse (2030 projection)

I have recently completed a chapter on political culture in the federal state of Hesse (pro-tip: this is not the place that supplies the community with those pesky non-invertible matrices). This is a contribution to a collected volume on the political history of Hesse that is subsidised by the Hessian “Centre for Political Education” and edited by one of their staff. Every German state has a “Centre for Political Education”.1 They are government agencies that were set up after the war as part of the effort to re-educate the Germans and help building a democratic political culture. Because they are tax funded and work for the greater good, it is part of their job description to be as party-political neutral as humanly possible.

(Still) Red Hesse? Oops, Wrong Question

In my contribution, I deal (amongst other things) with the “Red Hesse Myth”: the idea (promoted by the Social Democrats in the 1970s) that the people of Hesse have an innate disposition to vote for the Left. This notion is somewhat ridiculous, given that large parts of the state are still very rural and shaped by conservative traditions. It is also hard to reconcile with the fact that Hessian state politics is rather polarised by German standards.

I thought my data-based rambling was innocent enough, but now, several months after I have submitted what I thought was the final draft, the editor has informed me that some passages could be misconstrued in a party political way and asked me to re-write them in a more neutral tone. Rather charmingly, she failed to tell me whether it was too left-leaning, too conservative or simply too much concerned with politics. So I asked her to clarify, but so far, she has not replied. If you read German, see for yourself and drop me a hint.

The annoying thing is of course that I will have to withdraw my contribution (specifically written for this book) if they demand changes that I am not comfortable with, which just goes to show that one should steer clear of edited volumes. Has something like this ever happened to you?

Footnotes:

1

German Politics aficionados will not be surprised: Obviously, there is also a Federal Centre for Political Education which has absolutely no say over the work of the state centres, although they often co-operate.

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