Pia Beckmann’s view of perspectives on freedom

Where freedom has limits in the pandemic, Pia Beckmann is just getting to feel very clearly. Beckmann, who was the mayor of Würzburg from 2002 to 2008, has taken the liberty to think about freedom in many nuances and to talk to people about it. She called for a dialogue about “Perspectives of Freedom”, wanted to develop ideas on a tour through German cities in conversation with citizens and keep alive the feeling for the value of freedom. Several cities had already promised their support. But then Corona came with force? and one event after another was canceled.

Freedom: a hot topic

Especially in times of the pandemic, freedom in many nuances is a particularly important topic that is constantly being explored: There is compulsory vaccination versus personal freedom of choice, there is the hope of many citizens that, thanks to the syringe, they will soon be free of restrictions again, and there are lateral thinkers who push the limits of freedom of assembly with “walks”. And the social discussion is hanging around? partly aggressively led? with verbal attacks along the border of freedom of expression.

With “free Perspectives on Freedom”, Beckmann now presents a multi-faceted book in which encounters with people shed light on various aspects of freedom: a judge and a cleaning lady, a constable and a sociologist who accurately highlighted the change in values ​​of Generation Y (born between 1985 and 2000) illuminated. A 17-year-old thinks about values, creativity and art, and an artist about what little gold plates at various points in the regional court in Berlin-Moabit say about artistic freedom. After all, where is it easier to talk about freedom and its limits than before and in court? In this way, Germany’s most famous justice center becomes a stage and a central theme in Beckmann’s book.

Call and invitation

The work “is a call and an invitation,” she says. It reminds us of how the judiciary, and with it the executive, play a key role in our society, influencing people’s behavior. This is shown by the Habima scandal in Würzburg in the run-up to the Third Reich: During the first major violent riots against Jews in 1930, when the country was still democratic, the perpetrators felt safe from appropriate prosecution. The judgments did not have a deterrent effect, on the contrary, because of their mildness, they were indirectly encouraging.

The judgments on defamatory insults against politicians, such as in 2019 against the Green MP Renate Künast, which were classified as freedom of expression in the first instance, were signals that encouraged some to continue their brutal rant and hate speech. The latest example is the mask affair in Bavaria. While the Munich Higher Regional Court has declared that there is no bribery in the Sauter and Nüsslein case, criminal law expert Michael Kubiciel considers this assessment to be critical. He fears that this will “open the door to corruption”, as he recently said in an interview with Holger Sabinsky-Wolf in the Main-Post.

Justice and the press: guarantors of freedom

So what happens in our country, whether it jeopardizes our coexistence, discriminates against people or even turns away from our democracy, also depends essentially on “how individual representatives of the administration of justice fulfill their obligations, how much trust people have in the judiciary and with what keen eye the press reported on all of this, “says Beckmann.

The book “free ?? Perspektiven auf die Freiheit” is about a court that represents the judiciary in Germany, about the people in it and the place that is the focus of what happens in our society. The occasion was the art campaign “free” by Winfried Muthesius, which can be seen as a permanent exhibition in Europe’s largest criminal court, the Moabit Criminal Court in Berlin. The artist has integrated over a hundred small fields of gold leaf into the architecture of the imposing building from the imperial era in such a way that they become one with the ground and are hardly noticeable. “You know,” Muthesius said in an interview with Beckmann (p. 142), “there are many things that we do not see and that still have a strong influence on us in life”.

The 160-page non-fiction book, published by Verlag für moderne Kunst, features high-quality images from the “free” art exhibition. The gold fields and the book, in which Beckmann portrays people with the most varied of experiences, but also lets fellow authors have their say and illuminate freedom from their expertise, make you think.