Remembering the Future
Recalling Chernobyl
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
Chernobyl changed the nature of disasters. For the millions who live in the contaminated territories, the accident is bereft of the visible effects of what happened. Unlike after the Second World War, it is impossible for humanity to fall back on the slogan “Never again!” The disaster is in the world. Chernobyl made mankind aware of what it can mean to live in “risk society”. Furthermore, “blindness to the apocalypse”, which Günther Anders numbers among the essential characteristics of the nuclear age, makes it more difficult to understand the disaster and to learn from it.
(Osteuropa 4/2006, pp. 7–18)