Revisiting History, Reshaping Memory: The Effects of Confronting Ingroup Atrocities

How do voters react to challenges of collective memories? We study the controversial "Wehrmacht exhibition" (1995–1999), which exposed the German public to graphic evidence challenging the ``myth of the clean Wehrmacht'' - the false narrative that only the SS, not the military, systematically committed war crimes and perpetrated the Holocaust. To study the exhibition's effects, we leverage survey data of over 830,000 voters in a staggered difference-in-differences setup. We complement this analysis with evidence from over 1,200 letters to the editor, an original survey of Germans born around the end of WWII, and interviews with public figures who spoke at exhibition openings. We find that the exhibition triggered political backlash, particularly among the children of WWII soldiers. However, this backlash was localized and short-lived. We also show that the exhibition effectively shifted public discourse on the Wehrmacht, demonstrating that memory entrepreneurs can overturn self-serving narratives without lasting political repercussions.