Angela Merkel's visit to Washington this week presents an opportunity for optimism about the future of trans-Atlantic relations. Ties were badly strained by the political disagreement between former chancellor Gerhard Schröder, French President Jacques Chirac and US President George W. Bush in recent years. As one conservative American scholar pointed out in a recent interview, it seemed almost as if the three leaders were looking to start fights with each other.

Of course, Merkel hasn't been shy about distancing herself from the Bush administration when politically expedient -- not only has Merkel has called for the eventual closure of the American prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, she has taken issue with other aspects of Washington's war on terror and eschewed a traditional visit with the US president during her election campaign. However, at the joint press conference at the White House on Dec. 13, Merkel and Bush appeared to genuinely like and respect each other. Perhaps that's understandable considering Merkel has repeatedly said improving "the quality and substance of the German-American relationship" would be one of her top priorities.

It's a message that also seems to be finding traction in the United States. "People underestimate the degree to which having leaders who can get along makes a big difference," says Gary Schmitt, a resident scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute in Washington. "But there aren't any huge expectations that somehow relations between Germany and the United States will be transformed overnight or approach anything like the way they were before the Cold War ended."

All pleasantries aside, major differences of thinking persist between Americans and Europeans, and more than a handful of cultural critics question how many common values still remain. British historian Tony Judt recently pointed out that Europe and the United States were only brought together as a unit called the "West" as a result of World War II -- and this alliance lasted only from Pearl Harbor until the end of the Cold War. In other words, Europe and the United States were brought together by mutual enemies.

Sometimes Europe and the United States take vastly different approaches towards societal mores. In large swaths of modern Europe, religion plays a diminished role in the determination of values than in the United States -- prostitution is legal in many countries, as are gay civil unions. When it comes to treating the drug addicted, prevention and rehabilitation are given a greater priority than prosecution. Capital punishment is banned in all European Union member states and most European countries impose milder -- Americans might say too lenient -- prison sentences on criminals than the US penal system does. Many Europeans also perceive the destruction of the environment and climate change as two of the greatest challenges to modern civilization. There are plenty of environmentalists in the United States, however, green issues -- such as global warming -- can often take a backseat to economics. American writer Robert Kagan has even joked that "Europeans are from Venus and Americans are from Mars."

Despite these differences, there is still far more that connects Europeans and Americans than divides them. The European Union is the United States' largest trading partner and its individual member states are Washington's most important political allies. The United States' political and cultural traditions remain strongly rooted in their European foundations.

The trans-Atlantic community also faces common challenges -- the upheaval that globalization brings, the threat from Islamic terrorism, what to do about states such as Iran and North Korea that wish to obtain nuclear weapons and how to deal with migration from poorer southern countries to the richer north. 

Too often, serious discussion of these issues is obscured by knee-jerk, anti-American sentiments in Europe and unilateralist, our-way-or-the-highway attitudes from the United States. For that reason, we are launching the SPIEGEL Atlantic Forum, which will bring together journalism from our staff of editors in Berlin, essays with and interviews from leading Atlanticists and other thinkers, and an interactive forum where readers interested in trans-Atlantic relations can carry on their own discussions. We also plan to work frequently with Atlanticist organizations in Washington and Berlin, as well as other European capitals.