The Wendish Research Exchange - Rein, Detlev: The Financing of National Minorities in Germany

Lětopis Abstract 2014 2: Rein, Detlev: The Financing of National Minorities in Germany

The author firstly analyses the needs of national minorities and their associations according to their specific financial requirements. He substantiates and justifies these needs by pointing to the fact that the members of a national minority have a different identity from the majority population and have a desire to preserve it; their needs cannot be satisfied adequately by what the state can offer, especially in the areas of language, culture and education.

In his search for standard guidelines, which grant minorities and/or their members the right to appropriate state support, the author establishes that both the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities and the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages do in fact contain the relevant calls for action to member states, but no quantifiable and enforceable rights for minorities.

Also, analysis of German law and administrative practice at federal and state level does in fact reveal fundamentally positive statements on the protection of national minorities, but – with the exception of the very clear right to establish private schools in Schleswig-Holstein – no standard regulations, which would grant an adequate, enduring and legally enforceable financial framework to an individual minority. The author recommends that minorities and their associations should present their legitimate needs effectively at a political level.