"Akten zur Auswärtigen Politik der Bundesrepublik Deutschland"

Herausgeber
Prof. Dr. Andreas Wirsching (Hauptherausgeber)
Prof. Dr. Stefan Creuzberger
Prof. Dr. Hélène Miard-Delacroix

In 1989, the Leibniz Institute for Contemporary History (IfZ) was commissioned by the German Federal Foreign Office with the task of editing the series Akten zur Auswärtigen Politik der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (“Documents on the Foreign Policy of the Federal Republic of Germany” – AAPD). The editorial team of nine historians, forming a department of the IfZ at the Federal Foreign Office and since 2000 headed by Ilse Dorothee Pautsch, is given unlimited access to all the materials of the Political Archive there. Additional papers from the Federal Chancellery and from select other collections are also taken into account. The Editorial Board, which is made up of Prof. Dr. Andreas Wirsching (chair), Prof. Dr. Stefan Creuzberger and Prof. Dr. Hélène Miard-Delacroix, bears the overall academic responsibility. Based on a decision by the Federal Foreign Office the edition started with volumes on 1963, which were published in 1993, immediately after the thirty-year restricted period and thus in accordance with the contract between the Federal Foreign Office and the IfZ. Since then, the two or three volumes appearing each year immediately after the thirty-year rule have provided a crucial basis for research on German and international policy. Since 1997, volumes on the years before 1963 have also been prepared, though at larger intervals and without contractual obligation, so far covering the years 1949 to 1953 as well as 1961 and 1962.

Upon the publication of documents from 1982 in 2013, the series surpassed a total of 10,000 documents. An even higher number of previously classified documents are available in File B 150 in the reading room of the Political Archive. The edition thus also contributes towards the availability of otherwise inaccessible archival materials.

Immediately after their publication in print the AAPD volumes are also available as e-books, and after the expiration of the moving wall of four years they are provided as open-access documents via the internet. The 1949-1953 and 1962-1985 AAPD volumes can already be read and researched online free of charge.

Direct access to the open access volumes can be found here.