German Unification (german + unification)

Distribution by Scientific Domains


Selected Abstracts


EU Enlargement, Migration, and Lessons from German Unification

GERMAN ECONOMIC REVIEW, Issue 3 2000
Hans-Werner Sinn
The paper studies the role of international implications after EU enlargement. Based on a formal model with migration costs for both capital and labor, it predicts a two-sided migration from the new to the old EU countries which is later reversed. As the migration pattern chosen by market forces turns out to be efficient, migration should not be artificially reduced by means of legal constraints or subsidies to the new member countries. The paper draws the parallel with German unification and points out the lessons to be learned by Europe. The analysis concludes with a brief discussion of the second-best problem posed by the existence of welfare states in the old member countries. [source]


Stereotypic ingroup bias as self-defense against relative deprivation: evidence from a longitudinal study of the German unification process

EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 3 2002
Manfred Schmitt
In a longitudinal questionnaire field study on psychological consequences of German unification, the intergroup situation between East and West Germans was investigated. Data were collected in 1996 and 1998. The sample consisted of 585 East Germans and 387 West Germans who had never lived in the other part of Germany. It was assumed that East Germans' social identity is threatened due to their fraternal deprivation in comparison with West Germans. It was predicted that East Germans would employ ingroup bias as an identity management strategy in order to protect their emotional well-being against harmful consequences of fraternal deprivation. In line with this prediction, it was found that (a) East Germans feel fraternally deprived compared to West Germans on important quality of life dimensions, (b) they display ingroup bias vis-à-vis West Germans, (c) ingroup bias increases with increasing East German identity, (d) ingroup bias is determined longitudinally by relative deprivation, and (e) ingroup bias buffers the effect of relative deprivation on mental health over time. As expected, ingroup bias and the effects of ingroup bias were larger for the dimension of personal integrity than for the dimensions of sympathy and competence. Ingroup bias is interpreted as compensatory self-enhancement. West Germans feel fraternally privileged compared to East Germans and consider their advantages to be undeserved. Unexpectedly, West Germans display outgroup bias on the stereotype dimensions of integrity. This bias is interpreted as an effort to appease the moral outrage of East Germans and to silence their own guilty conscience due to undeserved advantages. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source]


EU Enlargement, Migration, and Lessons from German Unification

GERMAN ECONOMIC REVIEW, Issue 3 2000
Hans-Werner Sinn
The paper studies the role of international implications after EU enlargement. Based on a formal model with migration costs for both capital and labor, it predicts a two-sided migration from the new to the old EU countries which is later reversed. As the migration pattern chosen by market forces turns out to be efficient, migration should not be artificially reduced by means of legal constraints or subsidies to the new member countries. The paper draws the parallel with German unification and points out the lessons to be learned by Europe. The analysis concludes with a brief discussion of the second-best problem posed by the existence of welfare states in the old member countries. [source]


Transformationsraum Fotografie: Berlin-Hellersdorf am Übergang von DDR Zu BRD

GERMAN LIFE AND LETTERS, Issue 4 2010
Svea Bräunert
ABSTRACT Built between 1979 and 1991, the housing complex Berlin-Hellersdorf was one of the last and most ambitious construction projects of the GDR. Located at the interstice between East and West Germany, Hellersdorf can thus be seen as a space conducive to thinking about the 1990s post-socialist transformations. The 1998 interdisciplinary project,Peripherie als Ort. Das Hellersdorf Projekt,picks up on this idea. Focusing on the works of Ulrich Wüst and Helga Paris, who have contributed to the,Hellersdorf Project, the following essay analyses the role photography and architecture play as indices of socio-political and spatial transitions. Entering into a dialogue with photography, East German prefab housing, commonly referred to as ,Platte', becomes a mnemonic space whose parallactic perspectives are materially bound to the past without denying the changing present. As such, Hellersdorf presents itself as a complex space outside Berlin's city centre that invites reflections about the transformations that have taken place since German unification. Die zwischen 1979 und 1991 errichtete Großsiedlung Berlin-Hellersdorf war eines der letzten und ehrgeizigsten Wohnungsbauprojekte der DDR. Solcherart am direkten Übergang von DDR zu BRD lokalisiert, kann Hellersdorf als Denkraum verstanden werden, anhand dessen sich die postsozialistischen Transformationsprozesse der 1990er-Jahre exemplarisch nachvollziehen und problematisieren lassen. An diesen Gedanken anknüpfend, entstand 1998 das interdisziplinäre Vorhaben,Peripherie als Ort. Das Hellersdorf Projekt, an dem sich unter anderem die Fotograf/innen Ulrich Wüst und Helga Paris beteiligten. Von ihren Arbeiten ausgehend, untersucht der vorliegende Essay die Bedeutung von Fotografie und Architektur als Indizes des Übergangs. Im Dialog mit der Fotografie wird der Plattenbau zum parallaktischen Erinnerungsraum, der in einer materiellen Verbindung mit der Vergangenheit steht, ohne jedoch die Veränderungen der Gegenwart leugnen zu können. Damit bietet Hellersdorf einen komplexen Raum abseits des Berliner Zentrums, der zum Nachdenken über die Transformationsprozesse seit der deutschen Vereinigung einlädt. [source]


,Wir stehen fest zusammen/Zu Kaiser und zu Reich!': Nationalism Among Germans in Britain, 1871,1918

GERMAN LIFE AND LETTERS, Issue 4 2002
Stefan Manz
German unification in 1871 triggered a wave of enthusiasm for the fatherland amongst German migrants worldwide. Britain was no exception. National confidence and coherence received a boost through the new symbols of ,Kaiser' and ,Reich'. From the 1880s onwards, more and more militaristic and chauvinistic undertones could be heard. Local branches of German patriotic and militaristic pressure groups were founded in Britain. Support for Germany's ,new course' of colonialist expansion and its ambitious naval programme was, however, not confined to right,wing groups but permeated ethnic life in general. Religion and nationalism stood in a symbiotic relationship; some German academics lecturing at British universities displayed chauvinistic attitudes; social clubs were increasingly dominated by an atmosphere of ,Reich',nationalism. After the outbreak of war, public expressions of pro,German attitudes did not disappear and were one of numerous factors contributing to Germanophobia within the host society. [source]


Berthold Auerbach's Deutscher Volks-Kalender: Editing as Political Agenda

GERMAN LIFE AND LETTERS, Issue 1 2002
Kristina R. Sazaki
An analysis of Berthold Auerbach's Deutscher Volks-Kalender (1858,69) reveals how Auerbach attempted to participate in and to shape the discourse on national identity. One of the most popular writers of his day, he used his position as editor to carry out a political agenda that advocated German unification. He attempted to unify the diverse strata of society by providing specific ideas and values , above all on German unification and emigration , that would be understood and accepted by the practical as well as the literary reader. Many stories and essays called directly or indirectly for a united Germany. Others dealt with the hot topic of America during the Civil War as a means to encourage Germans to remain in Germany. Auerbach routinely engaged like-minded contributors from the fields of politics, science, sociology, and the arts to create a multidisciplinary forum on nationhood. By employing images of family, friendship, and the organic and also by conjuring up a common literary tradition in Friedrich Schiller, Auerbach projected his concept of nation onto a popular form of mass culture , the calendar. [source]


The Fate of Former East German Police in Reunified Germany, 1990,1996: The Dialectics of Inclusion and Exclusion

JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL SOCIOLOGY, Issue 2 2010
KATY A. CROSSLEY-FROLICK
This article analyzes the vetting of former East German police in Berlin and Brandenburg in the context of the former East Germany's transition to democracy and German unification. Police are one of the most critical and sensitive sectors of the civil service and typically, along with teachers, among the first groups to be vetted in the context of democratic transitions. The German case illustrates the often unpredictable and inconsistent approaches to vetting that led to very different outcomes throughout the East. It identifies several factors that influenced vetting and employment prospects for former East German police officers. These included political geography, who did the vetting, how a candidate's past was interpreted (whether aggravating or mitigating circumstances were weighed), the institutional arrangements for vetting, state-mandated guidelines or criteria for determining suitability, and timing. [source]


Made in China: Austro-Prussian Overseas Rivalry and the Global Unification of the German Nation

AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF POLITICS AND HISTORY, Issue 3 2010
Bradley Naranch
German unification is commonly seen as the outcome of a series of European wars, with the Hohenzollern dynasty asserting its model of a German Empire against a Habsburg alternative. This paper examines a broader context for the achievement of unification by looking beyond Europe to the larger dimensions of the German national project. More specifically, it focuses on a particular phase of the unification narrative and integrates it into a new global history. A telling example of the ways in which European politics was played out globally is in the history of the Austrian and Prussian voyages to East Asia undertaken in the period 1857,1862. A close examination of these expeditions reveals the extent to which Austrian and Prussian elites were aware of the need to tread the world stage, even during times of instability and uncertainty at home. The projects of domestic unification and overseas expansion were closely intertwined. [source]