Political Science

Associated Problems in the Process and Its Discontents

November 9, 1989 marks the historical event that finally unites Germany after twenty-eight long years of living on the opposite side of the Berlin Wall. The unification of East (German Democratic Republic or GDR) and West (Federal Republic of Germany or FRG) Germany was long been waited but unexpected when it happened. The coming together of the two nations was long called for but no one dreamed of its eventual realization because of the problems and discontents of different parties arising from the unification itself. This paper is an attempt to put together the reasons why the unification of East and West Germany almost did not happen. Three problems underscore this claim

First, the unification entails synchronization of two extremely different political and economic systems (GermanCulture.com). For the first time in history, a capitalist (West) and a socialist (East) economy will become one. There were no written guidelines on how to go about it and issues begun to surface even before the two Germanys became one. To complicate matter, East Germany suffered from comparative low productivity while the West was a struggling socialist country. Specific problems include the massive confusion about property rights. Expropriations made by Nazis, Soviets, and GDR created a confusion on the actual ownership of properties.  As more and more claimants emerged and cases filed in courts, less and less potential investors wanted to invest and be involved in the mess. Another problem for the investors was the inadequacy of infrastructure. Slow telephone service, energy shortages and poorly maintained roads and railroads were just some of the complaints. Further, the cost of production in the East was very high. The problem was on the conversion of East German marks to deutsche marks which kept the cost high and wages below productivity. As a result, western German firms found it more efficient to serve their new Eastern markets by expanding production in Western facilities.

Aside from these practical problems, there was also the problematic policy aspect that underlay the process of unification. Leaders of East Germany promised a swift solution to uplift the lives of West Germany and raised it to their standard of living by means of tax money (Center for Reformed Theology and Apologetics, 2007). Advocates of the unification disregarded the fact that West Germany was able to ascend from the ruins of the War by hard work in a relatively free economy and it took them many years to accomplish this. However, the mentality of East Germans was not like this and it could not be changed overnight. They still cling to the socialist idea that poverty is a responsibility of the State. For the most part, the West became an additional burden to the East, having to send billions of Deutschmarks to the East. Leaders promised wealth to the East without hard work, since hard work is so unpopular.

Second, the unification was hindered by the lack of social justice. To adhere to the promise of unification through social freedom, the crimes committed by Social party leaders were ignored. After World War II, Nazi criminals were brought to courts to be tried for the crimes and athrocities against humanity. Although not all of them were found or sentenced, there was an effort on the part of authorities for justice to become part of common mentality. However, this was not deemed important by the East German government. There was no attempt to bring social justice in the former GDR even against the criminals according to old GDR standars. The GDR citizens were hesitant to file lawsuits against the thousand leading membes of the East German Socialist party because these very same people still held the key positions in the society. They control most of the factories, city administrations, universities and even courts of law so that these leaders were still able to sabotage the capitalistic initiatives.

Third, the process of unification was complicated by the bias against the statism of the former GDR while enabling the statism of the FRG. The West Germany state owned numerous monopolies, some of them official including the post, telephone, railway, local transportation, public education, some of them by way of acquisition like airlines and electricity while some by strict regulation like long distance transportation which required a government permit to transport goods further than fifty kilometers. An extensive social welfare system also existed in which citizens were obliged to contribute to state insurance for health, unemployment and rent. As a result of these, West German leaders had a hard time differentiating between statist sosialism and statist capitalism. They referred to it as a social market economy, but this was just to appease the people that the old promise would be kept. They wanted to assure the East Germany that the State would subsidize citizens that are poor, ill, unemployed, old, or just not willing to work.

Fourth and last, the efforts to unify the two Germanys were hampered by bad publicity (GermanCulture.com). The international community begun to wonder whether the idea of one Germany was desirable given their history of military aggressions. The detractors of the unification were quick to point out that Germany may once again arm and launched another War against neighboring countries. These fears emanated from the fact that there were still demonstrations carrying Nazi slogans and propagandas (Petina, 1991)). Also cited was the demand made by Germans to give back to them the German lands which traditionally belonged to them. These unrealistic demands were a source of concern because they displayed the same unbridled nationalistic feelings that led to World War II. These demands were common among East Germans while West Germans seemed to move on after 40 years of democracy.  Statements of concerns and fears started to surface even from FRGs NATO partners in Europe, namely, Britain and France, who had rather become comfortable with the status quo. These countries had long established partnership with the economically potent West and uncertain in testing the waters of the East.

Despite these problems encountered during the process of unification, the leaders of the East and the West could no longer ignore the economic and social developments which required them to assume an active role (GermanCulture.com). The suddenness of the process did not provide the leaders to come up with a workable plan and thus encountered several problems afterwards. These problems, along with other discontents could provide many lessons for the Korean unification process.

Like the East and the West of Germany, North and South Korea have different economic and political systems. South Korea is a home to worlds top financial and commercial cities while North Korea has a state-run command economy aspiring for autarky with a negligible market segment (Wolf). North Korea is worse-off compared to East Germany back in 1990, with income gap rapidly increasing and economy stagnating. The country is also more populous compared to East Germany during the time of unification. While at the moment of German unification, the population of East Germany was about a third of the total population of West Germany, the North Koreans are currently half of the South Korea population. Moreover, North Koreans have experienced far-worse isolation than their East German counterparts for they cannot receive foreign broadcasting or read foreign publications and they have endured this far more longer for over 60 years.

Germany and Korea were divided as a result of the post-war ideological conflicts. However, it can be argued that Germany is more fortunate and Korean divide, as a result of internal conflict, is more traumatic. The socialist halves of the two countries have experienced stagnant growth with near complete-public sector control and ownership of production. But similarly, all it takes is a strong political leadership to start the process of transition. One thing Korea has to learn from Germany is that the government should make the necessary sacrifices to seize this moment in history. The country is lucky enough to have the efficient and market-driven regulations and institutions, and more importantly, skilled and experienced leaders. These factors should be flexible enough to undergo the transition.

In general, the problems encountered by Germany during the process of unification  adjustments in political and economic systems, issues of social justice, bias towards one side and bad publicity  will be encountered by countries divided by conflict for many years as proved by the counterpart experience of Korea. After the unification, Germany went to a recession in 1992 which continued until 1993 (GermanCulture.com). By 1994, however, the country resumed to a modest growth which continued ever since. Though the process would be slow and somewhat painful, many believe that the unified Germany could bounce back to its path of prosperity.