Thirteen experts are to create a comprehensive proposal for the future of the Paulskirche as a national place of remembrance, commemoration and learning.

Everything else, for example an architectural competition, should then be based on this.

This is what it says in the key issues paper that the federal government, the state and the city have written as a kind of mandate for the panel of experts.

The composition of the 13-member commission follows a finely balanced proportion.

Almost half of the specialists come from Frankfurt and Hesse, and almost the other half from outside of Germany.

In case of doubt, the chairman of the commission, Volker Kauder, who has been the head of the Union parliamentary group in the Bundestag for many years, decides.

Rainer Schulze

Editor in the Rhein-Main-Zeitung.

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Matthias Trautsch

Coordination of the Rhine-Main report.

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The proposal should be ready by the end of next year.

That would be in good time before the beginning of 2023, in which the meeting of the Paulskirchen Parliament will be celebrated for the 175th time.

However, the implementation of the plans will then go beyond the anniversary year.

Among other things, it is planned to renovate the Paulskirche in such a way that its "memory-political significance" is strengthened.

In addition, a “House of Democracy” is to be built near the memorial site as a place of discourse.

Well-known commission

The former head of the Institute for Urban History, Evelyn Brockhoff, is one of the local members of the commission. She knows the Paulskirche and its history better than anyone else. Other Frankfurt representatives include Rainer Forst, Professor of Political Theory and Philosophy at Goethe University, the Protestant city dean Achim Knecht, the director of the German Architecture Museum, Peter Cachola Schmal, the director of the Jewish Museum Frankfurt, Mirjam Wenzel; in addition there is the President of the Hessian State Monuments Office, Markus Harzenetter.

However, it is not said that the discussions of the panel actually run along the lines of origin, and presumably the members would also reject that. The fact is, however, that there are different opinions between the city, the state and the federal government as to where the Paulskirche should develop. External influence is therefore excluded in the key issues paper: "The expert commission is autonomous in terms of content and organization." And: "It is free to develop ideas that deviate from previous resolutions."

On the other hand, the paper also expressly mentions that the experts only have an advisory role.

However, critics argue that the body has been given a fair amount of autonomy.

Jan Schneider (CDU), head of the building department, attaches great importance to the fact that the city, as the owner of the Paulskirche, has the last word.

“I see in the decision of the city council the basis and the framework for the work of the expert commission.” It must be clear that in the end the democratic bodies decided what happens to the Paulskirche.

Symbol for the new democratic beginning

But what is meant by the “previous decisions” from which the Commission's ideas may deviate? The city council decided in November 2019 that the Paulskirche will be renovated in the image of the post-war period. Instead of a historicizing renovation, the events of 1848/49 could be commemorated in a modern, multimedia and multilingual house of democracy, according to the resolution. During the renovation, for historical, structural and idealistic reasons, it is advisable to respect the external and internal shape of the Paulskirche, because this not only stands for the first German National Assembly, but is also a symbol of the democratic new beginning after National Socialism.

Peter Cachola Schmal believes that this is the right decision. “The Paulskirche remains as it is. The city has positioned itself clearly, ”says the director of the architecture museum. Although he expects that the state of the post-war period will be discussed again in the commission, he considers this to be “mock battles”. The actual task of the body is the determination, function and design of the House of Democracy. In his opinion, only Paulsplatz and the finance department come into question as locations.

In order to prevent the project from being delayed any further, it would be practical, from Schmals' point of view, if the renovation of the Paulskirche could begin before the democracy center was built. However, the commission of experts may also come to the conclusion that there are structural dependencies between the Paulskirche and the House of Democracy - for example through an underground tunnel. It is unclear whether Paulsplatz is available at all: In its coalition agreement, the new Roman alliance rejected any development.