On "Alienated Consumption" - How a Large Company in the GDR Dealt With Alcohol Abuse

Abstract

The paper investigates the treatment of alcohol abuse in the GDR, and specifically in Rostock, and was written using insights from the documentary film Abhängig [Addicted], which was filmed in 1983. This is not a film analysis. Rather, the paper functions as an impetus to examine from a micro-historical perspective the various dimensions of the way in which alcoholism was dealt with in a large GDR enterprise. From a historical perspective, the documentary is interesting in several respects and is ideally suited as both a source and an analytical tool for the study of the history of psychiatry in former East Germany. By intertwining perspectives from the history of ideas and social history, the film makes it possible to experience the tension between social ostracism, on the one hand, and acceptance of alcoholism as a disease, on the other. Moreover, it also shows attempts to establish therapies in multiprofessional teams and thus, ways out of addiction. Extensive archival material, viewed here for the first time, as well as interviews with contemporary witnesses are used as sources to supplement the film. The insight which the combined sources provide into the social space of a large, "volkseigener" [nationally owned] enterprise (the Neptune shipyard with polyclinic) permits a more nuanced insight into real socialist society and - in the broadest sense - into its specific approach towards deviant and depending on interpretation, marginal-asocial or pathological excessive alcohol consumption. In addition to highlighting different perspectives on alcoholism in the GDR, in the course of whose existence/history an expansion of the scope of medical definitions took place, the paper aims to provide impetus for comparative research and to point out where shifts in perspective may be necessary. In the long-term, the goal of such research would be to make generally valid statements about the role of psychiatry in the context of the healthcare system of the GDR.