Oberwolfach in the French occupation zone : 1945 to early 1950s

Abstract

— This paper is part of a larger research project dealing with the history of the Oberwolfach Research Institute for Mathematics between its foundation in 1944 and the early 1960s. While the history of its foundation is relatively well understood, the development of the institute after 1945 has scarcely been touched on by historians (of mathematics). After World War II the challenge faced by the institute was twofold. On the one hand, it had to virtually reinvent itself, i.e. to strip itself of the agenda of war-related mathematical research and find a new identity suited for the post-war situation. On the other hand, the institute was without a budget as it had completely relied on funds from Berlin, which permanently stopped flowing with the end of the war. To understand how the institute and its director, Wilhelm Süss, dealt with this twofold challenge, the consequences of the institute coincidentally being situated in the French occupation zone, and the potential implications of this political happenstance for the history of mathematics in post-war Germany, will be centre-stage in what follows. The history of the Oberwolfach Institute in the late 1940s and early 1950s cannot be understood without embedding it into the political and cultural context of the French occupation zone, which had a long-term impact on its institutional identity. Co-operation with French mathematicians and with Texte reçu le 10 février 2020, accepté le 27 mai 2020, révisé le 24 juillet 2020. V. R. Remmert, Interdisziplinäres Zentrum für Wissenschaftsund Technikforschung (www.izwt.de), Bergische Universität Wuppertal, Gaussstrasse 20, D42097 Wuppertal. Courrier électronique : remmert@uni-wuppertal.de 2000 Mathematics Subject Classification : 01A60, 01A74, 01A80.