after the wall: german

8/3/2019 After the wall: German

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FEATURE

AFTER THE WALLOliver Marc Hartwich looks at Germany's unif ication history

Tenty years ago, the Germans werethe 'happiest people on Earth. ' Thisis how Walter Momper, the mayorof Berlin, summed up the moodwhen he addressed a crowd gatheredoutside West Berlin's Town Hall the day after theWall had been opened.

For nearly three decades, the monstrosity of theWall had torn apart friends, families and lovers. Itwas an inhumane scar running right through theheart of Berlin. Where once there had been vibrantstreets and tow n squares, the death strip had turnedthe city centre into an eerie no-man's land.

The Wall had been buil t by the communistrulers of East Germany in August 1961 as moreand more people were leaving behind oppressionand misery for a better life in the West. In orderto prevent the East German state from bleedingout , the East German government had closed theborder. First with barbed wire and improvisedbrickwork, then with a technology that turnedthe whole of East Germany into one big prison.Watchtowers, spring guns, tank traps, guard dogs,and landmines made the German-G erman borderan almost impenetrable barrier.

I had visited Berlin in 1988, almost exactly ayear before the fall of the Wall. W he n I rem emb erlooking across the Wall from one of the manyviewing platforms on the Western side, it stillsends shivers down my spine. The border wassecured with brutal perfection.

Since the Berlin Wall had been built in August1961 , at least 255 people had died trying to crossit. An oth er 6 17 peo ple were killed along the 1,378km long inner German border and the Baltic Sea.Most of the vict ims were shot , many drowned,and some bled to death.

When we commemorate the events of 9Novem ber 1989, our first thou ght should be withthese victims of the W all.

They died because they wanted to be free.We should not forget the other victims of theEast German regime, ei ther. The people whose

lives were ruined by the secret police; whoseambit ions were thwarted because they did notconform to the communist ideology; who wereimprisoned, tortured and killed for their beliefs.

The 9th of November signalled the end oftheir suffering. It quite literally opened the gatesto a new life.

For these reasons, the Germans were indeedthe happiest people on Earth in those Novemberdays of 1989 . Th e end of the second Germ andictatorship of the twentieth century wasa blessing that could not be celebrated enough.

But what made the fall of the Wall evenmore remarkable was the way that i t happened.It was not a revolution from above but a peacefulrevolution of the people of East Germany. First,they voted with their feet by leaving the countrythrough Hungary and Czechoslovakia. In tensof thousands. East Germans took to the streetsof Leipzig and Berlin demanding freedom and

Dr Oliver Marc Hartwich is a ResearchFellow at The Centre for IndependentStudies. This article is based on hispresentation to a CIS event markingthe 20th anniversary of the openingof the Berlin Wall .Endnotes for this art icle can befound at www.pol icymagazine.com.


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potitical rights. And ultimately they pulled downthe Watt from the East.

I was a l4-year-otd high school student inWest Cermany when all of this happened. I recallspending hours glued to the TV watching historyunfold in front of my eyes. Soon the first Trabis,these comically designed East German cars, wererat t l ing through my home town of Essen. Wesuddenly had to get used to hearing Saxon accentsnot onty on TV but sometimes even in the street.

It was a remarkabte, fascinating time, and atime of great joy.

But when I look back over the 20 years thathave passed since the Fait of the Watl, I cannothelp feeling saddened by what has happened toC ermany since. And i t is certainly not some kind ofnostalgia because there is no thin g to feel nostatgicabout the years of division. Rather, Cermany hasmissed a massive opportunity. Instead of makingthe most of its regained freedom, it soon startedto lose it in the process of unification. Neither thepolitical left nor the political right had the poticiesneeded to make the process of unification a socialand economic success.The embarrassing failure of the LeftThat Germany's unification cannot be calteda complete success is not least a faiture of WestGermany's tack of preparation for the eventsof 1989. In hindsight, it is astonishing howitl-prepared the West Germans were for EastGermany's collapse. Maybe it was the monstrosityof the Walt that made it seem as if nothing couldever change the country's inner division.

If you had asked the West Germans before1989 ab out th e chances of re-unification, the olderones would have totd you that it was not goingto happen in their tifetime. The younger oneswould not even have understood the quest ion.An opinion poll among West Germans in 1987revealed that 97% betieved re-unification was notgoing to happen anytime soon. '

As a West G erm an b orn after the War youwould have grown upand become used tothe reality of German division. East Germanywould have been quite an exotic place to you. Inalt likelihood, the average West German of 1989wou ld have spent mu ch more t ime in Spain, Franceor Italy than in Thuringia or Saxony. He would

have know n his way around Capri or Tuscany bu tnot around Rgen or Mecklenburg.

To many of West Germany's poli t icians, theidea of re-unification had also tost its appeal. Lipservice was paid to it once a year on the nationalhotiday, the Day of German Unity, but suchcelebrat ions had become empty ri tuats. Only aminori ty knew wh y i t was celebrated on 17 June ,and even fewer really believed in the cause. Formany West Germa ns, 17 June , which was meantto commemorate the uprising in East Berl in of1953, had become just another work-free day thatmarked the beginning of the barbecue season.

The West German political Left had distanceditself from the idea of a united Germany. In thelate 1980s, the Social Democrats attempted to cutfunding for the Central Registry of State JudicialAdministrat ions in Salzgit ter, which documentedand verified human rights violations by the EastGerm an governm ent. This coincided with at temptsby the party leadership to cooperate with the EastGerman Communist Party, which culminated inthe publication of a joint declaration in 1987:'Our hope cannot be that one system replacesthe other.'^

Even when the cracks in Eastern Europebecame clearly visible in 1989, the West GermanLeft did not understand the significance of theevents for Germany. In June 1989, GerhardSchrder (the future Chancellor), said, 'After 40years of the Federal Repubtic we should no longertetl lies to the new generation about the chancesof re-unification: there are none.'^ And JoschkaFischer, a leading Green politician who wouldtater become Foreign Minister, said in September1989 : 'Let's forget reunification! .. . . W hy don't wejust shut up about it for the next twenty years?'"*

In wide parts of the political Left, nationaldivision had not only been accepted as the statusquo of German poli t ics. More than that , i t hadbeen embraced almost as a moral necessity. HansEichel, a Sociat Dem ocrat w ho wen t on to becomea State Premier and Federal Treasurer, wrote inNovember 1989: 'Those who currently talk aboutre-unification have learnt nothing from history. '^

The person who most clearly expressed thisview of the Left was none other than GnterGrass. The author of The Tin Drum, who wouldlater be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature,


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had always styted himself as the moral conscienceof the nation. In February 1990, Grass gave aspeech in which he expressed his disgust at thethought of a united Germany. 'Whoever currentlythinks about Germany and tries to find answersto the German Question has to keep Auschwitzin mind. The ptace of horror, mentioned here asan exampte of the remaining trauma, prectudes afuture unitary state. ' ' '

For Grass, national division was the justpunishment for Auschwitzand wasn' t i tconvenient that Westerns like him could enjoyall the prosperity and freedom they wantedwhile leaving it to the Easterners to pay the pricefor Nationat Socialism? Or maybe he thoughtthat life in the East was not that bad. Grasslater euphemised the East German state as a'commodious dictatorship' and, when criticisedfor this, justified his words by pointing out thatother dictatorships had been worse.

The West German Left was closing its eyesto the tyranny in the East, and some teft-wingersprobably admired this practical experimentin building a sociatist society on German soit.Besides, they betieved that the mere existenceof East Germany would help tame capitatism inthe West.7

The West German Left was closingits eyes to the tyranny in the East.

This view was atso shared by teft-wingChristian Democrats tike Germany's tong-servingSociat Security Minister Norbert Blm. Heremarked that the demise of socialism in the Eastwas uttimately the reason why Western welfarestates had come under pressure. Capitatism, heargued, was forced to show that it was 'a moresociat system' when it stitl faced a challenge fromthe socialist East.*

Bleeding hearts like Blm and the G erman Leftthus have every reason to mourn the loss of theEast German dictatorship because it robbed themof their best argument for greater redistribution inthe West. Does it ever occur to them how cynicalthis is?

The economic naivete of the RightIf the West German Left 's attitude towardsunification can only be called embarrassing, theRight's view on unification was not much better,either. Where the Left was less than enthusiasticabout the fatt of the Watt and the prospect ofre-unification, conservatives wetcomed it witha mixture of political calculation and economicnaivete.

Chancel lor Helmut Kohl , who had led WestGermany's centre-right government since 1982,is usually seen as the great architect of Germanunity. Not least Koht himsetf sees his own role inthe process of unification as that of a visionarystatesman, driven by high ideals and a good degreeof patriotism.' Reality, however, was perhaps a bitless glamorous.

By the summ er of 1989, Kohl's chan cetlorshipwas hanging by a thread. His party had lost aseries of state elections, and members of his owninner circle were unsuccessfutty try ing to oust himfrom the Chancettery. Opinion potts for Kohtwere disastrous.

That was when suddenty things started tohappen in the East. The peacefut revotution inEast Germany and the fatt of the Watt surprisedKoht as much as everybody else. In the immediateweeks after these historic events. Kohl appearedutterty ctuetess. Should he try to stabilise the EastGerman state? Coutd he prevent a mass exodusof East Germans to the West? How shoutd hedeat with fears abroad about the rise of a new andmuch more powerful Germany?

In the end. Kohl decided to grasp theoppor tuni ty that h is tory had presented himnot only to unite Germany but also to save hisown politicat career. The recipe was simpte: Hepromised everything to everyone. To the East, heptedged 'btossoming tandscapes. ' Within threeor four years, Koht argued. East Germany woutdhave been turned, almost magicalty, into a tand asprosperous as the West. An d wh at did he promisethe West Germans? That all these policies wouldnot cost much.

Kohl's s trategy worked wonders for him. Heentered the history books as the statesman whounited Germanya twent ieth century vers ionof Bismarck, if you like. And instead of losingthe next election, he remained Chancellor until


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1998, making him the longest serving head ofgov ernm ent in the F ederal Republic's history, evenovertaking the legendary Konrad Adenauer.

There was only a sl ight problem with HelmutKohl's appro ach to unification: His ov er-optimisticpromises were not only unrealistic but they werealso the reason for much dissatisfaction in bothEast and West for years, if not decades, to come.

Economically, the East has undoubtedlyimproved but at a much slower pace than Kohlhad predicted. Besides, the transformation from acommunist command-style economy to a marketeconomy did not happen without hardship orpain. Unemployment and welfare dependencyin East Cermany is still much higher than in theWest . Is i t any wonder that many East Germansfeel disillusioned today?Meanwhile, in the West dissatisfaction withthe results of unification is equally widespread.An d again, it derives from K ohl's hollow pro mises.First, he pretended that unification would becostless. Then he tried to hide the real costs aswell as he co uld by m aking the welfare state carrya great part of the burden. But as time went by,the true costs could no longer be denied, andthey are staggering indeed. According to a studyby the Free University of Berlin, the total netcost of unification between 1990 and 2009 was1.6 trillion. Transfers from West to East remainsubstantial even today, am oun ting to abou t 4% ofG D P per year. '" These nu mb ers are mu ch higherthan anyone would have forecast in 1989.The real tragedy: unity before l ibertyGermany's reunification became a political dramabetween the Left, who was unprepared to embraceit, and the Right, who were exploiting the eventsto remain in office.

The real victim was liberty.In the immediate years after World War II,West Germany had been a remarkably liberalcountry in economic terms. Thanks to i ts fi rsteconomics minister, Ludwig Erhard, the countrywent for a free-market order that stood in clearcontrast to, say, Clement Attlee's socialist andKeynesian experiments in post-War Britain.

However, the West German welfare state hadbeen expanded throughout the 1970s and 1980s,so that by the time of the fall of the Wall, WestGermany was in need of reform. Public debt had

climbed steadily, unemployment had risen, andtaxes were high and complicated. Furthermore,it was becoming increasingly obvious that WestGermany's social security systems had become fartoo generous and needed to be cut back to restorea climate favourable to economic growth.Unlike Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, orindeed Bob Hawke and Roger Douglas, Kohl hadnever been an economic reformer. Where othercountries were mod ernising their econom ies. Kohlpreferred to play it safe and muddle through.

It is quite possible that without the country'sunification. West Germany would have eventuallywoken up to this reform backlog. Instead,unification dominated domestic politics and thepolitical agenda for years.

Worse still , Kohl's promises had theunfortunate result of extending the bloated WestGerman welfare state, its regulatory regime, andcomplicated tax law onto East Germany. Andby burdening the social secutity systems with abig chu nk of the costs of Ge rm an unification.Kohl erected enormous obstacles to creatingemployment .

The perverse result of these policies was this:the East Ge rma ns foug ht for liberty and even tuallybrought down the Wall . But what they got in theend was no t a free co un try b ut a struggling welfarestate. An d it is struggling no t only b ut also becauseof the integrat ion of the East German economyinto a united Germany.

The liberation of East Germany from decadesof totalitarian dictatorship was a blessing. Thechance to unite the nat ion against mu ch domesticresistance is an achievement for which Kohldeserves full credit. But the practical policiesini t iated by his government have turned arevolution for freedom into an evolution of thewelfare state.De spite all the joys over the fall of the Wa ll, thiswas a missed op por tunity of historic propor t ions.


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