The forgoing chapters have told the story of how the governments of Austria, Germany, and Japan have struggled for over half a century to deal with the consequences of terrible histories that continue to haunt them to this day. The evolution of their official historical narratives, along with the changes in their collective memories and the domestic and international tensions that have arisen over historical issues have been traced in some detail. Now, in conclusion, it is appropriate to step back from the particulars of the empirical cases and ask what their stories have told us about the dynamics of the politics of history in general.

Five sets of conclusions stand out. First, with respect to the determinants of the official narrative, we can see that no one theoretical approach alone – be it of the Historical Determinist, Instrumentalist, or Culturalist variety – can provide an adequate explanation for any particular case. Instead, as the Historical Realist perspective developed in this book suggests, a combination of the explanatory factors emphasized by the different theoretical schools is needed to understand the evolution of the official narrative and the politics of history over time.