Franz Walter

Göttingen is a scientific biotope. Since the founding of its university 275 years ago, the city has repeatedly been the centre of life or at least a base for outstanding scientists, renowned politicians and prominent activists. Names such as the Max-Born-Ring, Felix-Klein-Straße or Minna-Specht-Eck are reminiscent of such personalities. But how did the physicist and philosopher Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker spend his years in Göttingen? What links Edmund Husserl, the founder of phenomenology and thus one of the most influential thinkers of the 20th century, with this city? What influence did Peter von Oertzen, the programmatic pioneer of social democracy, have on this place? Where was the nucleus of the Internationalist Socialist Fighting League centred around Leonard Nelson, Minna Specht and the later mayor of Göttingen, Arthur Levi? What drove the well-known student activist of the 1968 movement Hans-Jürgen Krahl to the local university? In this volume, a good two dozen biographical essays tell vividly and vividly about all those historians, scientists, philosophers, lawyers, politicians and activists who were associated with Göttingen in the 20th century and who influenced the political culture of our country beyond their genuine academic achievements. The result is an exciting and inspiring collection of Göttingen life stories.