The German Democratic Republic and the West

Abstract

to by spokesmen of the Western powers, the words so-called inevitably precede its national designation. In contrast to the Federal Republic of Germany, it appears backward, sullen and resentful: a Marxist aberration on hallowed German soil. Its population has revolted twice: once actively in 1953; once silently with their feet until the Berlin border closure in 1961. The implication is that popular hostility is endemic. Industry is alleged to lag and agriculture to stagnate. Its leadership is regarded as the most pedantic and pedestrian in the lacklustre constellation of Eastern Europe. East Germany remains a transitory entity on the world scene, a relic of Soviet expansion from which the Russians will ultimately pull back. German unification, based on free elections, eventually will return a liberal, popular, Christian, and non-Communist government. Or so almost everyone expects. The thesis of this article is that times have changed. The model of Stalinism most frequently associated with the German Democratic Republic (GDR) has never had significant validity. For Stalinism, among other things, implies extreme police terror and capricious one-man rule. But since the inception of the GDR, Ulbricht has had to share his power: first with Pieck and Grotewohl; presently with Erich Honecker and the party bureaucracy on the one hand, and a rising class of managers and