Suffering and liberation in the age of therapy: Germany’s ‘grandchildren of the Second World War’

This article focuses on the ‘Kriegsenkel’ – the German ‘grandchildren of the Second World War’. Born in the 1960s and 1970s, Kriegsenkel feel that through processes of transgenerational transmission unresolved war experiences were passed on to them by their families and are largely responsible for their emotional problems – from depression and anxiety disorders to relationship break-ups and career problems. I explore how, after decades of public taboos on the suffering of the majority population, this emergent identity is constructed and addressed entirely within the framework of Western therapeutic culture. Sociologists have long critiqued therapy culture for promoting political disengagement and attitudes of victimhood. Based on more than 80 ethnographic interviews, I argue that this view needs to be moderated to account for the ways in which individuals use therapeutic culture to exert agency and devise strategies to actively deal with emotional distress in an environment where wartime suffering is considered politically sensitive.