Accidents are challenges to the structures of modern societies in the twentieth century. They expose structural weaknesses and often give rise to new developments and legal and social innovations that aim at preventing accidents or diminishing their impact. The consequences of accidents are enormous: They often lead to a huge death toll and vast economic costs and they disturb economic and social processes. In the workshop on ‘Accidents and the state’ we want to discuss, from a historical perspective, the changing relationship between accidents and the modern state during the 20th century. We are, for instance, interested in the following questions:

1. Accidents, legitimacy and the various expectations towards the state: How are accidents debated in a political context? Do accidents affect the legitimacy of the modern state? How are different responses by different states to accidents linked to particular expectations towards the role and the task of state?

2. Risks, citizenship and notions of social justice: How do social structures and notions of social justice relate to the response of the state to accidents? How are, on the other hand, notions of social justice influenced by accidents and emergencies? What is the role of varying concepts of citizenship for the perception of accidents and the development of responses to them?

3. The build-up of a regulative framework: What kind of legal, organisational and regulative solutions did the modern state develop as a response to accidents? How effective were the attempts by the state to regulate individual behaviour that was deemed to be dangerous and risky?

4. The emergence of a modern error culture: How does the reception of errors that can lead to accidents evolve over the 20th century? What characterises the relationship between acceptance and disciplining of citizens? Which role does the state and its institutions play in the development of learning processes? Does the public perception of individual and structural errors change during the 20th century?

5. Accidents, medicine and technical innovation: Which role do accidents play for the development of medical and technical innovations? How do different states promote or discourage the development of different cultures of medicine and technology?

One of the working assumptions of the workshop is that the analysis of the impact of and reactions to accidents and emergencies enables conclusions about both the resilience of modern societies and about different strategies to achieve resilience. The debates about how to achieve resilience are linked to conceptions of statehood and citizenship.

The workshop takes place in the context of a USIAS-FRIAS joint research project on military accidents in France and Germany in the twentieth century. We are therefore especially interested in proposals that deal with the role of the military. However, relevant topics for the workshop could, of course, also come from the realm of the histories of technology, of environment, of medicine, or of the rise of the modern state. We are interested both in presentations of case studies as well as in more conceptual approaches on the topic. Contributions that deal with accidents in German and French history are highly welcome. However, the call is by no means limited to historians of France or Germany.

Please send your proposals including a short abstract of approximately 200 words for the workshop and brief biographical details (affiliation, main areas of research and relevant publications) until February 29 2016 to the following addresses:

Anne Rasmussen: anne.rasmussen@unistra.fr
Birgit Metzger: birgit.metzger@mail.uni-freiburg.de
Peter Itzen: peter.itzen@geschichte.uni-freiburg.de

Proposals will be reviewed by the project’s organising committee, and selected contributors will be notified in March 2016.