Western Approaches to East German History

Abstract

Historical studies of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) should be engaging and enlightening. East Germany was the focal point of international politics from 1945 to 1961, when the Berlin Wall was built. Despite enormous adversities, the GDR economy has shown so-called miracle growth since about 1950. According to the crude projections of Hermann Kahn and A.J. Wiener (The Year 2000), East Germans should enjoy a higher standard of living than any Europeans except Swedes by the end of the century. It is the most modern society yet to experience radical socialization. East Germany has created an educational system that is one of western standards. Its medical care and daycare systems would be envied by westerners and other easterners alike. And the East German economic system distributes income far more equitably than does the West German system, perhaps more equitably than any western system. Much that is simple fact in East Germany today is still a dream among western welfare liberals. During the past decade there has been a growing number of books surveying the history and present condition of this remarkable society. After the anti-intellectualism of the cold war fifties, these new studies should be welcome; the writers have taken on a task worthy of tough-minded analysis with the attractive incentive of being first in the field to consider seriously the whole sweep of postwar East German history. General studies of the GDR published in the West in the past decade include David Childs, East Germany (1969), Welles Hangen, The Muted Revolution (1966), Ernst Richert, Das zweite Deutschland: Ein Staat, der nicht sein darf (The Second Germany: A State That Ought Not Be, 1964), and Jean Edward Smith, Germany Beyond the Wall (1969). In addition, there are the more academic studies, including Arthur M. Hanhardt, Jr., The German Democratic Republic (1968), and Peter C. Ludz, The German Democratic Republic from the Sixties to the Seventies (1970). Ralf Dahrendorf, until recently one of the leading western sociologists, includes a chapter on East Germany in his Society and Democracy in Germany (1965). These are all relatively general studies of East German history. Their original publication dates range from 1964 to 1970, the period in which westerners apparently began to conclude that the GDR was a stable reality. Books published before and after that period have typically been more nearly specialized accounts rather than broad surveys. It would be mildly unfair to found a judgment of western historical studies of East Germany merely on the quality of the general works cited above, because some of the specialized accounts have been based on much more meticulous collections and analyses of relevant data. But these are the books to which those unfamiliar with East Germany would probably first turn, and only the resolute are likely to continue reading past them. Readers who turn to these studies (except perhaps the short chapter by Dahrendorf, not the least because it is short) will discover that they have taken on an infelicitous task. Tough-minded analysis? There is some in Richert, less in other works. Perhaps one of the meaner things one can say about East Germany is that it