Berlin is a city with a unique and challenging past as well as a promising future
in the new Europe. At the citys oldest and most hallowed site, East
German authorities tore down the war-damaged "Stadtschloss" in 1950 and
erected the "Palast der Republik" in its place. Since Reunification, a debate on
whether to preserve the Palast or rebuild the Stadtschloss has raged, fueled
as much by ideology as by aesthetics. In 2002 the German parliament decided
in favor of a reconstruction bearing the façade of baroque master Andreas
Schlüters Stadtschloss. What will the new walls say about Berlins...