Germany: A Centrist Welfare State at the Crossroads

Abstract

Since the late nineteenth century, Germany has undergone more drastic changes, both of political regime and territory, than most countries. During four decades after the Second World War there were two diametrically opposed regimes coexisting within Germany. Imperial Germany, the Reich (1871–1918), was followed by the Weimar Republic, the first German democracy (1919–33), and by National Socialism, the Third Reich (1933–45). After a period of occupation, a democratic and capitalist West Germany, the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), and a totalitarian and communist East Germany, the German Democratic Republic (GDR), were founded in 1949, only reuniting in 1990. These historical periods have left their marks on social policy as on other areas of policy. Yet, despite the changes, there were considerable institutional continuities across political regimes. Unification in 1990 was a takeover of the GDR by the FRG. On one day, all FRG legal and social institutions were imposed on the eastern part, including basic institutional social policy arrangements.