Der Kaiser, das Berliner Schloss und der deutsche Kolonialismus

In the article, I tie in with the debates on the role of Wilhelm II within the German political system and the Humboldt Forum and ask about the significance of the monarch and the Berlin Palace for German colonialism. To this end, I look at three specific episodes. I begin with an examination of the genocide of the Herero to enquire which part the Kaiser played in the extreme radicalization of violence in German South-West Africa. Subsequently, I focus on the “acquisition” of Kiautschou on the Chinese mainland, the episode in which Wilhelm II was probably most directly involved in the expansion of the German colonial empire. Finally, I address the visits of Frederick Maharero (1896) and Tupua Tamasese Lealofi (1910/11) to Berlin. Both were received in audiences in the Berlin Palace but could only travel to Germany as part of ethnological exhibitions (Völkerschauen). Overall, I argue, that the Kaiser was much more involved in “world politics” in Asia than in the African colonies, which hardly interested him. Here he played a role primarily as a symbolic figure embodying the empire, but less as an actor with a colonial agenda of his own. Likewise, the Berlin Palace had a primarily symbolic function, while the central decisions of colonial policy were made elsewhere.