Ethical Dilemma Analysis the Good

Ethical Dilemma Analysis

The Good German" is set out in the immediate post-war Berlin, a devastated city where the winning Allied powers are trying to work out the conditions for the post-war geopolitical framework and, at the same time, a set of conditions and basic rules of co-existence that will ensure that a Third World War will not happen in the near future.

On the other hand, the fear for the other getting too powerful is so great that the two superpowers, the Soviet Union and the United States are already setting in to divide the spoil of powers.

One of the most important treasure that needs to be split between them are the Nazi scientists, a redoubtable and formidable troop of man of science that were close to creating the atomic bomb during the war and that fuelled with technology the Nazi war machine for so long. Each superpower is trying to make sure that as many of them as possible end up working for one side and not the other.

In this rather gloom and confused setting, we find the main characters, a romantic triangle similar to the famous "Casablanca" love story. Jake Geismar is an American journalist returned to Germany on an assignment, trying to find Lena Brandt, his wartime lover with whom he has had an affair. Lena is married to Emil Brandt, a brilliant mathematician who is involved in some ethical dilemmas of his own.

In my opinion, the Good German is a novel where ethical dilemmas are developing on numerous levels and, from this point-of-view, the author is succeeding in describing an entire network of such dilemmas. The first ethical dilemma we can refer to is being unveiled at a macro level, above all others. This is a historical dilemma represented by the Potsdam Conference where the future of Europe is being decided, in accordance to the other meetings and commitments made by the main allies in the earlier phases of the war (the Soviet Union, the United States and Great Britain, at the Yalta and Teheran Conferences). According to these, in order to repay Soviet support in the war and the Soviet cooperation, Europe is being split up between the two main political and economical systems in power at that point, Capitalism and Communism.

The ethical dilemma in this case is represented by the fact that, with the disappearance of Nazi Germany, the Soviet Empire is more than ever assimilated to the Evil Empire, even if this phrase was to come only forty years later, during the Regan administration. This probably had happened during the war as well, but it is probably never more present than at the exact end of the war, at the Potsdam Conference. The fact that the Americans and British are negotiating at the same table with the Soviets, who have obviously no consideration whatsoever for basic value, such as democracy, human rights or the rule of law, makes us think of the ethical dilemma that the Allies faced when they joint forces with the Soviet Union in order to defeat Nazi Germany.

Even if the novel doesn't always necessarily focus on the Potsdam Conference, nevertheless we always feel its present in the novel, along with all its ethical implications and what it brings about. Indeed, we seem to be looking at a continuing ethical dilemma, through the Potsdam Conference, knowing what it brought about. The fact that the Americans were allied to the Soviet Union during the war was part of the dilemma, but now, the Conference brings about the second part, with the same gravity.

The Soviet Union is going to receive a free hand in Eastern Europe, which means that all the countries in this geographical region are going to become Communist, with the democratic powers giving their green light for this transformation and with Communist governments already being implemented, sometimes with the help of the Soviet Army, in these countries.

If we think of a country like Poland, for example, a country that has suffered tremendously during the war from Nazi persecution, and think that it is going to suffer for another 45 years (up to 1989) from the persecution of a hard Communist regime, lack of democracy and respect for human rights, then we are bound to wonder about the ethical dilemma that the Western democracies faced when they decided to ally with Soviet Union and sacrifice their beliefs for Soviet support during the Second World War.

This is an extraordinary ethical dilemma, historically speaking and thus reflected through the novel, because, from a utilitarian point-of-view, the action of allying with the Soviets during the Second World War is just: choosing the lesser of the evils to defeat the greatest evil manifesting itself at that time, the evil one is fighting. On the other hand, given the later implications, the evil force that the Soviet Union came to represent, we are wondering whether or not it was the actual just decision to make.

On a micro level, we have small, individually addressed ethical dilemmas, like the one Gunther Behn is having. It is interesting to point out towards this ethical dilemma because, in some ways, it seems as if such small, micro dilemmas, are tying in to the title of the book.

Gunther was a decorated German soldier during the First World War and then worked as a police office during the Nazi regime. However, his very promising career was affected by one minor detail: his wife was Jewish and this could have affected his perspective.

As several other Germans, he faced an ethical dilemma on whether to remain married and be degraded or whether to divorce his wife and continue his successful career. He chose to divorce his wife and from a just perspective, we are bound to believe that this was definitely not fair.

On the other hand, he is seeking redemption by collaborating with the authorities in order to identify and capture war criminals and members of the Nazi regime. A 180 degrees turn for someone who obviously supported, at least tacitly, the Nazi institutions, committed to working for them and performing an excellent job as a policeman, only to turn around and use himself in order to capture people that may have helped him in the past. Just from a historical perspective, given the connotations of the Nazi regime, but not very fair if we think of the fact itself.

Another character facing ethical dilemmas is Emil Brandt, Lena's husband, although his actions really make us wonder whether or not he is actually thinking about these ethical dilemmas or it is the reader that faces them for him. He is the type of scientist of whom you are often bound to ask yourself whether the ethical norms and ethical framework is in accordance to the general human society agreement or whether he is living by his own ethical framework, generated by the science field he is contemplating. In this case, it is most likely that it is the latter, as we understand that Emil Brandt was significantly implicated in the experiments and studies committed by Nazi Germany, to a degree to which we understand his difficulty in judging right from wrong and his total adherence to science and scientific research, no matter what the implications and no matter what the final goal of the clients.