My Life in Politics Book

Born in 1913 to working-class parents, Willy Brandt got an early start in politics. By 1933 he was an active anti-Nazi and was forced to flee Germany for Denmark and Norway. He remained outside Germany for thirteen years, actively involved in the Resistance and as a radical journalist. For these actions he was stripped of his German nationality by the Nazis in 1938; it was returned to him only in 1948. A year later he was elected a deputy for Berlin in the first German Bundestag. A rapid rise followed. In 1957 he was elected Mayor of West Berlin - a pivotal position in Germany - and in 1964 he was elected Chairman of the Social Democratic Party - the main opposition. Brandt was on the front line when the Berlin Wall was erected in 1961, and welcomed John F. Kennedy to the city when he made his famous "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech. In 1966 Brandt was appointed Foreign Minister and three years later Chancellor. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1971. Countless doctorates and awards followed. But all this came crashing down in 1974 over the East German spy affair (about which he has much to say in this book). Brandt was, however, re-elected to the Bundestag and became President of the Socialist International. One of the first statesmen in Europe to fight for internationalism, Willy Brandt remains passionately committed to a single Europe and a unified Germany. His book North-South: A Programme for Survival was and continues to be a guideline for third world development and cooperation. The historic events of 1989 were the fulfillment of an extraordinarily exciting and distinguished political career, one dedicated to the emergence of a new Germany whose social and humanitarian impulses would derive from a melding of East and West.