Suchergebnisse

Janka Kuball & Kerstin Engelhardt outline the research project, which was aimed at exemplifying forms of civic engagement independent from state controlled activities in the former GDR by looking at four case studies. Adapted from the source document.

Linda Fuller, Where Was the Working Class? Revolution in Eastern Germany (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1999)Jonathan Grix, The Role of the Masses in the Collapse of the GDR (New York: St. Martin's Press, 2000)

The political changes in 1989/1990 affected all of East German society, including in particular the country's ethnic Sorbs. Sorbian institutions that had enjoyed a relatively regular influx of financial resources in the GDR now found themselves in an uncertain situation. The new democratic and liberal society did not guarantee Sorbs their previous certainties in the fields of science, education, culture, and other areas. This article looks at selected institutions to provide an idea of how the transformation process took place. One educational institution that did not survive the collapse of the GDR is the Zentrale sorbische Sprachschule Milkel (Sorb.: Centralna serbska rěčna šula w Minakału), which provided language instruction and an overview of Sorbian history and culture for many people who subsequently went on to work for Sorbian institutions. By comparison, one organization that weathered the changes was the Sorbian Institute, although the dissolution of the Akademie der Wissenschaften der DDR necessitated a change in legal form (e.V.). One new institution, whose main task is to distribute financing to the most important Sorbian organizations, is the Foundation for the Sorbian People. Smaller changes affected the Sorbian print media at this time as well.

Mit der Einführung der elektronischen Datenverarbeitung in den Verwaltungsapparaten der DDR Anfang der 70er Jahre nahm dieses System der sozialen Buchführung Orwellsche Züge an: So waren im Datenspeicher 'Gesellschaftliches Arbeitsvermögen der DDR' (GAV) die Arbeits- und Berufswege von etwa 7,25 Millionen Erwerbstätigen in der DDR erfasst (Stichtagsbestand 21.12.1989), im Zentralen Einwohnerregister (ZER) die gesamte Wohnbevölkerung der DDR, mit über 200 Einzelangaben in 45 Dateifeldern, die ausführliche Auskünfte u.a. über Vorstrafen, Ausreisebegehren und Auslandsverbindungen enthielten (vermutlich 1992 gelöscht). Besonders tief in den Arkanbereich der DDR reichen jene beiden Datenbestände, die zwei sehr unterschiedliche 'Marginalgruppen' der DDR-Gesellschaft erfassen: die 'Strafgefangenen- und Verhaftetendatei' und die Kaderdatenspeicher des Ministerrats der DDR. An der letzteren Datei wird exemplarisch gezeigt, welche Chancen, aber auch welche Probleme eine Verwendung prozessproduzierter Daten für eine retrospektive Soziologie des 'realen Sozialismus' enthält. Die Tatsache, dass der Kaderdatenspeicher sowohl für Personalentscheidungen genutzt wurde als auch für strukturelle Analysen erweist sich dabei als sehr vorteilhaft, da der Speicher als Arbeitsmittel vermutlich keinen gezielten Manipulationen unterlag und aufgrund der intendierten Nutzung einen sehr breiten Merkmalskatalog enthält, der ein historisch, sektoral, positional und sozialstrukturell sehr differenziertes Bild der Kader in der DDR möglich macht. (ICA2)

Hans Siebert war als exponierter SED-Funktionär der wirkungsstärkste Vertreter stalinistischer Erziehungsauffassungen in der SBZ und frühen DDR. Die nachstehende biographische Recherche erhellt insbesondere die Entstehungsgeschichte seiner Auffassungen im englischen Exil. Dabei wird den bislang kaum beachteten Erziehungs- und Schulungsunternehmungen der KPD nachgegangen. Es wird deutlich, daß Siebert, der besonders eng an sowjetische Vorbilder gebunden war, nur bis in die fünfziger Jahre tatsächlich Einfluß auf die Bildungspolitik hatte und danach in eine Außenseiterposition geriet. (DIPF/Orig.) ; Being a prominent functionary of the Socialist Party in the GDR, Hans Siebert was the most influential advocate of Stalinist educational conceptions in the Soviet-occupied zone and in the early GDR. The following biographical study focusses above all on the history of the origins of his conceptions during his exile in England. In this, the so far largely neglected educational and indoctrinary efforts of the German Communist Party are examined. It becomes clear that Siebert, with his very close orientation by Soviet models, did, in fact, not longer exert any influence on educational policy after the 1950ies. (DIPF/Orig.)

Während es über die Lebensbedingungen der Arbeitsmigranten in der alten Bundesrepublik eine nahezu unübersehbare Anzahl an Untersuchungen, Veröffentlichungen und Materialien gibt, ist das öffentlich verfügbare Wissen über die besonderen Lebensumstände der von der früheren DDR angeworbenen ausländischen Arbeitnehmer sehr begrenzt. Als Einleitung des Bandes "Schwarz-Weiße Zeiten", der sich diesem Thema widmet, bildet der Text eine Einführung in die Geschichte der VertragsarbeiterInnen der Ex-DDR und ergreift zu Beginn der 90er Jahre Partei für diese spezifische, von Ausweisung bedrohte Kategorie von Migranten.

In der DDR-Literatur, in der die Problematik des Zweiten Weltkriegs zentral blieb, sind Texte, die den Völkermord an den Juden thematisieren, kaum präsent. Der Hauptgrund für diese Lücke liegt in der durch die SED-Spitze proklamierten politischen Linie: Die DDR-Führung, die den "antifaschistischen Gründungsmythos" kreierte, ernannte den sozialistischen Staat zum "Sieger der Geschichte" und wollte somit keine Verantwortung für die Shoah übernehmen. Darüber hinaus führte das DDR-Regime eine aggressive, antiisraelische Politik. Das Schaffen Stephan Hermlins aus dem Gründungsjahr der DDR (1949) ist eines der wenigen Beispiele für die Auseinandersetzung mit dem Holocaust in der DDR-Literatur. Zum Ausgangspunkt seiner Ausführungen werden die von ihm 1949 besuchten Erinnerungsorte: Auschwitz und Warschauer Ghetto-Ehrendenkmal. Das Gedenken der Ermordeten wird bei dem Autor zur absoluten Referenz. ; In the literature of the GDR, where the problem of the II World War was a central topic, texts that were related to the annihilation of the European Jews were almost nonexistent. The reasons of this void were political matters: The political leaders of the GDR created so called "anti-fascist creator myth" of a new country and claimed themselves as "the heroes of the history"; additionally, they declared aggressive anti-Israeli politics. The works of Stephan Hermlin, written in 1949, in the same year as the creation of the GDR, are a few of the examples that faced the Holocaust in the literature generated in the East Germany. The main starting points in the author's writings were the places of the remembrance that he visited in 1949: Auschwitz and the Monument of the Heroes of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising; in his writings, the memory of the murdered victims becomes a value of a superior significance. ; W literaturze NRD, dla której problematyka II wojny światowej była tematem centralnym, teksty poświęcone zagładzie Żydów są niemalże nieobecne. Powodem tej luki są względy polityczne: przywódcy NRD wykreowali "antyfaszystowski mit założycielski" państwa i ogłosili się "zwycięzcami historii", ponadto prowadzili agresywną politykę antyizraelską. Teksty Stephana Hermlina, powstałe w 1949 r., czyli w roku utworzenia NRD, są jednym z niewielu przykładów mierzenia się z Holokaustem w literaturze tworzonej we Wschodnich Niemczech. Punkt wyjścia rozważań Hermlina stanowią odwiedzone przez niego w 1949 r. miejsca pamięci: Auschwitz i Pomnik Bohaterów Getta Warszawskiego. Pamięć o zamordowanych staje się w jego tekstach wartością nadrzędną.

Anhand einer schriftlichen Befragung untersucht die vorliegende Studie im ersten Teil das politisch-ideologische Verhalten junger Arbeiter (Sozialismusbild, Staatsbewußtsein, Rolle der Arbeiterklasse, Rolle der Partei, gesellschaftliche Mitarbeit). Der zweite Teil untersucht die Einstellungen zur Arbeit und zum Betrieb nach folgenden Dimensionen: Berufswahl, Arbeitszufriedenheit, Betriebsverbundenheit, ökonomisches Denken, sozialistische Demokratie im Betrieb, Qualifizierung, Verhältnis zum Kollektiv, Verhältnis zum Leiter, Kenntnis über betriebliche Leiter und Funktionäre. (pmb)

Attempted darling murders -- Songs of recognition -- Freedom from skepticism -- The mess at academic boot camp -- Tolstoy at rikers -- Transreading women from the gdr to the prc -- Neighborhood slave narratives -- Threepenny cynicism -- Posthuman optimism -- Taliban poetry for veterans

Conceptualizing horror -- The Camp Mittelbau-Dora -- An end and a beginning -- The change of command -- Shaping the new land and its memories -- The Mahn- und Gedenkstätte in the GDR -- The wall comes down -- The modern Gedenkstätte -- Major themes and conclusions

This contribution focuses on the career trajectories of the functional elites of the collapsed state socialist GDR after reunification. There is up to now no consensus, whether cadres of the middle and upper stratum of the service class could usually continue their careers after 1989/1990, or not. On the one hand, past research indicates career continuity. On the other hand, there is also evidence of a considerable extent of career interruptions or even disruptions in the early 1990s. In this respect, the contribution discusses the option of matching data from different sources by approaches of 'Statistical Matching' or 'Data Fusion' as has already been practiced by the author and his colleagues by fusing data of the Central Cadre Data Base with data of the German Socio-Economic Panel Study, a longitudinal sample, that has been introduced to the GDR already in 1990. Here an event history analysis, on the Basis of GSOEP-data, that qualify for the criteria of having a near-identical 'statistical twin', is applied.

This volume contains extensive professional, conceptual, and social-biographical interviews with experts of a special kind: actors of the second hierarchy who were responsible for GDR history propaganda and who had a lot of influence and impact. These interviews, which were conducted about 25 years ago, testify to an epoch and help to explain how history propaganda worked as a system

Cover -- Half Title -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- List of Tables and Figures -- Foreword -- Acknowledgments -- 1 Introduction -- The Background -- The Organisation of the Book -- Notes -- 2 Industrial Innovation and Diffusion in the Centrally Planned Economy -- The Ulbricht Years 1945-1962 -- The Ulbricht Years 1963-1971 -- The Honecker Years 1971-1989 -- Notes -- 3 The Technological Level of Industry -- Measuring the Sophistication of GDR Technology -- Labour Productivity -- The Machine and Vehicle Building Industry -- The Electrical, Electronics and Instrument Building Industry -- The Chemical Industry -- Summary -- Notes -- 4 The Scale and Direction of the Research & -- Development Input -- Measuring the GDR's Research & -- Development Input -- The Overall Scale of the R& -- D Input -- The Industrial R& -- D Input -- The Academic R& -- D Input -- Summary -- Notes -- 5 The Quality of the Research & -- Development Input -- Qualification and Employment Structure of R& -- D Manpower -- Facilities for Industrial and Academic R& -- D -- Summary -- Notes -- 6 The Quality of the Research & -- Development Output -- Assessing the GDR's Research & -- Development Output -- The Academic R& -- D Output -- The Industrial R& -- D Output -- Summary -- Notes -- 7 Conclusion: The Old GDR and the Five New Länder -- Research, Technology and the GDR's Competition with the FRG -- The Dictatorship of Research & -- Technology in the GDR -- Research & -- Technology in the Five New Länder -- Notes -- Appendix A: Tables -- Appendix B: Figures -- Glossary -- List of Abbreviations -- Bibliography -- Index.

AbstractThe rich body of literature on the cultural legacies of East Germany has privileged white German perspectives on material culture at the expense of non-white and non-European encounters with socialist things. In shifting the spatial lens to the global South, and to the foreign students and workers who lived for extended periods in East Germany, I trouble the implicit whiteness in the study of GDR cultural memory. Popular identification with GDR goods extended beyond the borders of Germany to newly decolonized countries that were the beneficiaries of the GDR's solidarity policies. Using the example of Vietnam, I challenge formulations ofOstalgieas a site of white German memory production only, highlighting consumption of East German products by racialized foreign Others. In examining the objects that Vietnamese migrants amassed and transported back to Vietnam, and their subsequent use and circulation through today, I offer a different take on the temporal and spatial relationship between people and commodities, one that assigns value and agency to imported socialist things. In contrast to reunified Germany, where socialist-era goods were deemed disposable and obsolete, in Vietnam, East German products did not lose their utility and associations with modernity. The essay argues for a more inclusive exploration of memory and approach toOstalgiethat takes seriously the alternative logics of time, space, and materiality that informed the circuits of consumption, trade, and meaning of GDR things.

Abstract Background A number of research results on closed venereology facilities in the Soviet Occupation Zone (SOZ) and the German Democratic Republic (GDR) have been presented in recent years. However, little is known about similar facilities in the Western Occupation Zones (WOZ) and in the early Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). Method We have researched the records of the State Archive in Hamburg. Subsequently, the analysed sources were evaluated using the historically critical method. Results Three closed venereology wards existed in Hamburg. Compulsory commitments were conducted according to a three‐stage procedure. In the immediate postwar period, the wards had barred windows and the doors were locked. Everyday life in the wards was initially determined by the postwar situation – poor facilities, poor hygiene, overcrowding. In the early 1950s, the number of beds was drastically reduced. The function of the wards consisted of isolation and medical care for the compulsorily committed persons. Medical care was in accordance with professional medical standards. Discussion Closed venereology wards in Hamburg followed the tradition established during the period of the Weimar Republic. This becomes apparent both in terms of the legal framework and in terms of the structure and functions of the wards. Thus, they clearly differ from the closed venereology facilities in the SOZ and in the GDR. These facilities were established in the tradition of Soviet prophylactics institutions. The wards in Hamburg served as isolation and treatment centres, the facilities in the SOZ and in the GDR also had a disciplinary function.