Impossible Missions?: German Economic, Military, and Humanitarian Efforts in Africa (review)

Nina Berman's book is divided into an introduction (1–21) and two main parts. "Part One: Prototypes" comprises three chapters, entitled "The Modernizing Mission" (25–59), "The Civilizing Mission" (61–97), and "The Globalizing Mission" (99–136), which present an analysis of the African experiences of the engineer Max Eyth (1836–1906), the "Urwalddoktor" (bush doctor) Albert Schweitzer (1875–1965), and the airplane pilot Ernst Udet (1896–1941) within the general context of Germano-African relations and in light of their consequences in the African countries in which these three men worked. "Part Two: Successors" treats in two chapters the relations of contemporary Germany (since the fall of the Berlin Wall and reunification) with Africa: "Humanitarian Interventions: The German Army and Bodo Kirchhoff in Somalia" (139–73) and "Tourism: Repeat Visitors Turned Aid Workers in Kenya" (175–212). An appendix, "Statistics on German Tourism in Kenya" (219–33), follows that latter chapter, and the conclusion states the book's point and summarizes its essential theses.

In the introduction, the author justifies her choice of concepts such as "modernization," "civilization," "progress," "humanitarianism," and "tourism" in place of the ideas such as "alterity," "race," "hybridity," "ethnicity," "identity," or "feminism" that dominate in large measure today's "postcolonial" studies. The book thus becomes much richer from the viewpoint of its material and with respect to information provided on the authors, the historical periods, and the African countries. This is a book that brings new information to our understanding of Germany, Africa, and the relations between the two, and a book that makes for pleasant and sometimes fascinating reading, leading us to the recognition that the endless debates on "alterity" and "sameness" risk becoming more and more sterile.

Thus, for example, in the chapter "Max Eyth in Egypt," the reader not only learns that "Eyth's account gradually evolves from a cliché-ridden rendering of the Egyptian environment to descriptions that reflect a daily interaction with his context" (47), but is also informed about Germany's industrialization in the second half of the nineteenth century, the changes in its social structures, the efforts of the Egyptian elite toward modernization of the country and the partial failure of those efforts, for which Edward Said's paradigm of "Orientalism" does not offer a sufficient explanation. As in the other chapters, here one is confronted with a "complex web of factors that generates global inequality" (59) and also—beginning with the very first sentence of the book—with the paradox that many Germans (undoubtedly the fact applies to other Europeans as well) "went to Africa with 'good intentions' but [their] interfering in local affairs often had disastrous consequences for Africans" (1).

This is particularly true in the case of "Doctor" Schweitzer, an Alsatian by origin, a doctor and philanthropist in Gabon, who certainly cured many Africans of their maladies and brought them physical and moral support, but who, at the same time, through his presentation and staging as "the Great White One"—philosopher, theologian, musician, and music historian, philanthropist, and benefactor to humanity—contributed in large part to the endurance of "white superiority" in Africa. The answer to the question "Why did Albert Schweitzer choose Africa as a location for his activities?" (68) is found in an entire set of impressions and motivations that take us back—as with the other authors—to the early years: readings of missionaries' stories and adventure books, events with a "mystical" character and which are perceived as "true callings," the search for an "empire of his own, [where] he could be independent and free and could work in ways that were utterly different from the situations he would have encountered in a European clinic, as a social worker or as a priest" (81). Like Max Eyth's encounter with Egypt, Schweitzer's with tropical Africa has very few markings of nationalist or racist sentiments. Nevertheless, the paternalism of his philanthropic activities, which at the beginning of...