Denkmalpflege zwischen System und Gesellschaft. Vielfalt denkmalpflegerischer Prozesse in der DDR (1952–1975)

Abstract

Listen

Translate article

East German architectural preservation does not have a good reputation. Too often, the history of heritage management in the GDR is recalled as a story of lost treasures and razed monuments, all sacrificed to the Socialist Unity Party (SED)’s alienating and ugly schemes for urban renewal. Less well understood are the individuals and institutions who worked to preserve the GDR’s wide architectural inheritance, often in the face of regime indifference, and sometimes with impressive results to show for it. But to understand how these individuals and institutions acted, what drove them, and what restricted them in their work, we require a big-picture approach that draws together all of the political, the technical and the cultural dimensions of East German preservation. This is the purpose underlying Franziska Klemstein’s detailed new work, Denkmalpflege zwischen System und Gesellschaft. Originating in a doctoral dissertation at the Technische Universität Berlin, Denkmalpflege zwischen System und Gesellschaft interrogates the political ideals, institutional tensions and key personalities that shaped preservation practices in East Germany between 1952, when the GDR adopted a new preservation ‘decree’, and 1975, the ‘European Year of Architectural Heritage’, in which the GDR finally adopted a formal law to govern all preservation activities. Klemstein frames her study around five working hypotheses: first, that East German preservation practices were complex and multifaceted; second, that personal networks were an essential factor in preservation successes in the GDR; third, that the many problems encountered when harmonizing preservation activities with the demands of dialectical materialism impelled a ‘search for international exchange and comparative values’ (Vergleichswerten); fourth, that monument preservation was seen as a ‘task for all of society’ (gesamtgesellschaftliche Aufgabe) in the GDR; and finally, that its affinity with Heimatschutz led to preservation being instrumentalized for ideological purposes.