The Holocaust architects could claim nonsuch rational cover. Miss Arendt explainednthe German experience asnreflecting “the banality of evil.” Innanother work she traced its source to then”destratification” of elites in Germany.nThe “cultural middle class” employed innthe civil service, she argued, bore honornbut lacked corresponding wealth and politicalninfluence. Such destratificationnresulted in a nation of “the merelynwealthy,” “the merely prestigious,” andn”the merely powerful.” Privileges werenincreasingly seen as “functionless,” nonlonger serving society but only the privateninterests of individuals. The SS complex,nArendt suggested, exemplifiednsuch one-dimensional elites in its inabilitynto link prestige to power. Germany’sn”destratification of inequalities” amongnelites also destroyed “the social nature ofnidentity,” both individual and collective.nIn such an environment, she concluded,nidentity became a matter of subjective,npersonalized choice. Andnmorality lost any public meaning.nProfessor Baum applies the insights ofnMax Weber and Talcott Parsons—twongiants of a discipline increasinglyndominated by pygmies—both to testnand to go beyond Arendt’s thesis. Thenmoral indifference exhibited in thenHolocaust, he states, rested on a commitmentnto two ideas: that in a modernnsociety the public sphere is necessarily annamoral one; and that the “humannresources” of a modern society must benused just as the nonhuman ones, unrestrictednby any absolute constraints. Suchnviewpoints, he admits, could be found innmost contemporary nations. Why didnthey develop a consistency in Germanynthat made genocide and national suicidenpossible? Baum cites the critical necessitynof a modern nation to generate a valuenconsensus—at least among its elites—nthat embodies some shared vision of thengood society. Such a consensus providesnthe “ought” for a nation, the commonnand morally compelling perceptions of andesirable social order, and the frameworknwithin which measures of normality andndeviance are placed. It was here, in thenSOlHHHIH^BMMnChronicles of Culturenrealm of articulating shared values, thatnmodern Germany utterly failed.nTo prove this point, Baum employs ancontent analysis of nearly 100 popularnGerman novels published between 1871nand 1914. His statistical assessment ofnthe moral judgments found in their principalnthemes and characters reveals thatnGermany was indeed a deeply dividednsociety, a nation afflicted by “valuendissensus.” Divisions were most apparentnregionally. “Prussians,” for example,nexhibited strong attachment to ancorporatist, hierarchical perception ofnthe good society. “Rhinelanders”nadhered to the market model, emphasizingnindividual initiative and responsibility.nThose in Bavaria and the Southwestn(Baden-Wiirttemburg), meanwhile, revealednGemeinschaft or socially Integrative,ntraditionally “Catholic”nvalues. Neither socioeconomic classesnornrural-urban distinctions provided anynsignificant bonds that might heal thesenregional cleavages. The upper classes ofnPmssia, Bavaria, and the Southwest allnexhibited a different value consensus,nwhile in the Rhineland there was no consensusnat all; its upper class was, in sociologicalnterms, an undifferentiated mass.nEven the national middle class exhibitednno common value base. Only among thenlower class did the Gemeinschaft modelnshow some predominance in every regionnexcept the Rhineland. The only othernimportant exception of this value dissensus,nBaum notes, was the common commitmentnof the Prussian and the Rhinelandnupper and middle classes to a secularizedn”work ethic.”nIn the MailnJDaum also analyzes the one-dimensionalnnature of Germany’s elites. Junkernofficers, for example, commanded enormousnhonor but—by the early 20th century—littlenwealth. Industrial managersnhad great wealth, but little honor ornprestige. Academicians and civil servantsnenjoyed enormous cultural prestige butnfound themselves increasingly impecunious.nAssuming the drive for status consistencynto be a universal human trait,nBaum relates how these various onedimensionalngroups turned to politics asnthe sole possible means of compensatingnfor “status destratification.” TTie result,nhe suggests, was a quest for power of nearn-Hobbesian proportions. He concludesnthat Germans were in fact ethicalnstrangers to one another and that thenGerman nation was, inasense, no nationnat all. Created by the sword, united Germanynnever generated any core conceptionnof what “the good life” was. Instead,nethical and moral judgmentsnbecame highly subjective and privatized.nGerman national elites developed annelaborately cultivated sense of valuenrelativism. In the political realm, modernityncame to mean a system of endlesslynshifting interest coalitions, each searchingnfor advantage and power. For thisnmilieu, procedural legalism became annecessity. Yet it was a pecuUar kind ofnlegality, one wherein the law wasnsomething to be made and unmade asnneed dictated, unrestrained by anyn”saaed” fetters.nIt was this unrestrained value pluralism,nBaum insists, that permitted impe-nCroatia on Trial: The Case of the Croatian Historian Dr. F. Ttidjman translated by Dr. ZdenkanPali(!-Ku5an, United Publishers; Amersham, England. Croatian Dr. Tudjman spoke out andnwrote about the subjugation of Croatia by the Yugoslavian government, acts for which he wasnjailed. Included here are texts relating to his second imprisonment.nReport of The United States Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy, 1982; Washington,nDC. The U.S. International Communication Agency (USICA) is die subject of this report. A keynrecommendation notes that the USICA “is vital to our national interest and the conduct of ournforeign policy.”nnn