| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 89.4

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 89.4 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Visions of the Future in Germany and America. Ed. by Norbert Finzsch and Hermann Wellenreuther. (New York: Berg, 2001. x, 580 pp. $68.00, ISBN 1-85973-521-5.)

The product of a symposium in Krefeld, Germany, in 1999, this volume displays the diversity that one expects of conference papers. Topics range from religious movements to post-Civil War race relations, science fiction, and contemporary foreign policy issues. The focus of the book is accordingly diffuse. Not even the umbrella title extends quite so far as to cover every contribution, and, although the subject begs for comparisons of Germany and America, with some provocative exceptions contributors tend to concentrate on one country or the other. 1

The nearest approach to a unifying theme is the idea of utopia, defined as a blueprint for a 'future intentional community.' Most contributors are inclined to treat utopia as ' someplace' rather than 'noplace' and to locate it in historical time. Even the more utopian-minded religious groups such as the early Moravians have often preferred to embody spiritual visions in the world rather than to withdraw to contemplation or passive expectancy, we are told. James B. Gilbert points out the 'continuity between utopia and mainstream culture' in the secular American 1930s, finding juncture in Greenbelt communities, urban planning projects, and certain aspects of the New Deal. . . .

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