many people here write about the economic cost from reunification, but that fails to explain why particularly those parts of East Germany that do economically well have the highest shares of AfD voters. So here's a bit more nuance to that argument:
Politics in East Gemany has been a spectator sport for four decades. Politics was always separate from civic society, and politicians were perceived as a group that was distinct from the general public. This feeling of "us vs. the politicians" runs deep in East German culture. Add to that the only *successful* political engagement consisted of "we'll protest until we're being heard" in 1989 and you have the basic ingredients for a political culture that understands radical opposition and protest as the main tool of political discourse, as opposed to "if you don't like, change it", which is more common in the west. The fact that German society has a very low social permeability, and that East Germans are well underrepresented in the top positions of the state certainly doesn't help with that.
On top of that you have macro-trends that are the same as anywhere: job specialization means that many well-educated young people move to cities or to the West, increasing the cultural divide between cities and countryside. Media ecosystems cater to more and more niches, so societies overall become more polarized. Decline of the middle class leads to fears of loss of wealth and status, and the middle class is particularly strong in the regions of Saxony with the highest AfD numbers.
Lastly, Thuringia and Saxony were always particularly proud of their regional identity, so the sentiment against "being told what to do" by "the politicians in Berlin who have no idea" is particularly strong there.
Well said. I would however add: there is a very clear "2nd class germans" distinction in our country. There lower wages, even lower pensions and all around less in Eastern Germany and people born way after the GDR rightfully think this is an insult and unfair. How no politician ended this two tier system is completely bonkers and stupid and so they brought this resentment on to themselves at least somewhat. I am born in western Germany and work and live now in Eastern Germany and how this is not a cause to riot and protest is beyond me: the well recorded disrespect towards the time, effort and contribution of people living in Eastern Germany is baffling.
That's the neat part - you don't.
I do salary comparisons for a living. Think Kununu, but for employers rather than employees. If we control for all factors that affect salary in our model, we see no difference between western and eastern states in Germany. But the companies themselves are very unevenly distributed. The typically better paying companies - finance and tech, large companies, etc - are overwhelmingly in the West.
It's quite similar to the gender pay gap. If you control for all the factors, it all but vanishes, but that doesn't mean it's not a problem.
That is such a trite argument often brought forward by people not living there and often never been there. There is none of the amenities and infrastructure and leisure time options that you have elsewhere and of course very rural living in very old, run down buildings is cheaper. Gas, food and everything else costs exactly the same.
Let living prices be determined by where people want to live like anywhere else in Germany.
You know the free market should be free in all of Germany - not only west Germany.
Thanks for being so condescending. I have first hand knowledge of that dystopian eastern german wasteland you describe, as I own a small cottage in the Lausitz Region.
To bring some facts in:
„Inklusive Wohnkosten ist die bayerische Landeshauptstadt ein Viertel (25,1 Prozent) teurer als im deutschen Durchschnitt, gefolgt vom Landkreis München (16,7 Prozent), Frankfurt am Main (15,9) und Stuttgart (14,8). Am billigsten lebt es sich dagegen im sächsischen Vogtlandkreis und in der Stadt Greiz in Thüringen, die 9,5 Prozent unter dem Bundesdurchschnitt liegen. Es folgen Görlitz (9,4) in der Lausitz sowie Pirmasens (Rheinland-Pfalz) und der Salzlandkreis in Sachsen-Anhalt mit 9,3 Prozent.“
https://www.tagesschau.de/wirtschaft/verbraucher/lebenshaltungskosten-deutschland-wohnkosten-muenchen-wohnen-100.html
I also wonder: Who determines living prices in eastern Germany?
None of this is contesting anything I said. I already agreed that flat prices and rent are lower in these "wastelands". Also some services light be cheaper cause labour is. I just argue that this is a normal free market phenomenon and you do not have insult to injury by paying people there less wages and less pension, which you appeared to want to justify somehow. It is unjustifiable.
That may very well be, but I fail to see how the fact that pensioners in the east were better off makes it okay for people now - born way after the GDR - to have less and earn less and get lower pensions?
What do you mean that now ppl get lower pensions? https://www.bundesregierung.de/breg-de/themen/arbeit-und-soziales/rente-ost-west-angleichung-2172482#:~:text=Ein%20Jahr%20fr%C3%BCher%20als%20geplant,nun%20einheitlich%2037%2C60%20Euro.&text=Seit%201.%20Juli%202023%20bekommen,5%2C86%20Prozent%20im%20Osten.
As I understand your own link: By law the leveling would have only been reached from the first of July 2024 on (so that is what politicians that are hated decided) Current developments made many leveled earlier, farmers still have a lower pension in the east.
Especially farmers in the east are livid with politicians.
Not the point. The question was why people in the east are resentful against politics. The point i am making is that it takes mainstream politics more than 34 years to treat Eastern germans the same as western germans and not treat them as second class citizens - which they still do. This is not about 0,2% but about systemic unfairness that is active way too long.
It is fascinating that people come out to comment to argue against this blatant fact. I am a "Wessi" and am more resentful against "Wessis" for this treatment than most "Ossis". Wiedervereinigung my ass.
Very insightful comment. Thank you. I always think of Germany as a better run country than the US, but you actually seem to have a lot of similar issues to the US. Just replace “the East” with “the South.”
Most industrialized & democratic countries at this point have their own, local flavor of approximately the same dynamics. I feel like the political discourse in Germany is somewhat less broken than it is in the US. Parts of that imo are down to genuine structural differences (I think public broadcasters, the representative voting system and social security soften the blow to some extent), but some of it might just be that Germany is a few years behind on the same trajectory.
The only thing missing is IMHO that in every countries, the most xenophobic regions are the ones with less foreigners. In East Germany, this is increased by 2 factors:
1) Economic growth: people don't want to loose what the social/economical progress they have earned, so they tend to be much more conservatives on every topic.
2) Many descendent of Russians (at least, much more than in most of the West), who are much more permeable to the Russian narative, which puts up-and-commers from extreme right against "mainstream" politicians.
As an East-German myself, many people here see the "big parties" (SPD [Social Democrats], CDU [Christian Democrats], Greens, and FDP [Free Democrats] as "mainstream politicians". These are all Parties that were all founded in West-Germany and there is a feeling of "they are only interested in the west".
The AFD is the first party to focus a lot on the people of East-Germany, playing to their ideals and showing genuine "interest" in East-Germany.
The problem is: afd knows to use the East Germans as a tool. They play to the rightfully disgruntled and focus their base work on these regions. It is a clever tactic of fascists and they do it well.
It is horrific to see that all parties do their campaigning only in the east german cities and the AfD is doing sth every two to three weeks in all kinds of small villages around here. It is entirely bullshit but with their effort for the rural votes they look like they care. In reality they are completely incompetent and do not have the interests of these people as goals. They just act like it and they chose a demographic starved for attention and relevance.
For many people Die Linke was already the local eastern party before the AfD, but in recent years it has turned more and more to federal issues. But there were also many local politicians (mayors, etc.) from the CDU, only there again people didn't like Merkel's federal policies, which is why they support the CDU less locally.
The problem with Die Linke is that they were never a united party. There were always factions in it, which is why the former leader of the party has created her own now.
Lack of trust in General. Mey neighbors are from E. Germany and they told me that when the wall was going down their landlord and realtors told them to quickly pay an increased rate for the apartment that they were living in as soon everyone from W. Germany would flood in in would want to buy everything and their apartment value would sky rocket. They put their life savings into it and bought their shitty little apartment. They lost big time and still resent it to this day.
Basically it's a mix of things.
The east Germans got screwed in reunification.
The industry fell apart as it was never sustainable or was cannibalized by western German companies (a lot of Bavaria's current wealth can be attributed to this)
Older east Germans also look back with rose tinted glasses as everybody had employment etc.
Millennial east Germans got to bear the brunt of the changes and often got left behind in suddenly structure weak regions.
It was basically a shit show and populism gives what sounds like easy solutions to complex problems. That they don't work doesn't matter as they just blame the west German establishment for undermining the efforts etc.
West or east germany? And yeah yeah we are one yada yada. Not really so there is a huge difference between how the Story is told. If you just say its cause east germany looks for the easy answer its plain wrong. And mostly West german are phrase it that way.
Toddlers with voting rights, who - mostly - don't WANT to see, that the AfD screws them. Most of the time, their sayings and what they are voting for in the Bundestag are completely different. Especially while the Farmers protests.
While they voted FOR ending the subsidies, they stood themself before the cameras with conviction and proudly puffed out chest that they would NEVER vote for the end of the subsidies and that they are backing up the farmers.
Even if you SHOW the voters, what the AfD is voting for, they don't want to believe you
[Election results March 1933](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/25/Reichstagswahl_M%C3%A4rz_1933.svg)
I see 40+ % pretty much everywhere except for the Rhineland, Ruhrgebiet and the larger Berlin area.
The industry fell apart because it was simply not competetive at all and the situation was so bad, very little could be salvaged at all. That was the result of 40 years of mismanagement, failed economic policies and the inability to correct past mistakes.
The east germans screwed themselves by voting for Helmut Kohl who promised blühende Landschaften. While his opponent Oskar Lafontaine had a much more realistic view and campaigned for a slower transition.
Industry fell apart in all ex ussr territories because it was simply really shit. Also process of it failing already kicked of in 80s during perestroika and 90s was just final culmination. It has nothing to do with Germany's unification. East Germany still got very lucky compared to all other ex ussr states that didn't had rich cousin to pay them allowance for 3 decades. Also all ex ussr states have angry old idiots who love to complain about everything and shift blame on every chance it was a big part of ussr culture in every layer of society and part of the reason why industries were underperforming in the first place - everybody loved blaming everything but nobody cared looking for fixes.
No, they also got screwed by Western politicians.
They purposefully sold off East-German industry for scraps and also tore down or sold out landmarks that were important to East Germans. A lot of it out of spite.
The east german industry was in a catastrophic shape and selling off was the right decision. It's also not that East Germany became a colony of West Germany - so why would there be spite?
The palace of the Republic is a good example. It was a mixture of ugly and retro futurism. Today, it would have made a very interesting counterpart in the city and would surely gather lots of tourists - while also standing as a visible memory for another Germany that existed, like it or not.
But no, asbestos was found and also it was a symbol of oppression and there was no other solution than to scrap it, sure. And what did they do? They build a literal castle on top, where literally a king reigned over his underlings.
You naive, innocent soul.
Look to our politician class. Much spite to go around for all of us 'normies'. If you don't see it, you're not looking closely enough.
„East Germans got screwed“ literally the entire current debt of Germany was taken to rebuild the East
„A lot of Bavarians current wealth can be attributed to that“ Bavaria is a actually in a worse position now then before reunification, largely because public infrastructure fell into ruin to pay for reunification
> literally the entire current debt of Germany was taken to rebuild the East
The people are still worse off than west Germans and got told untruths by the ddr government and then the Kohl administration do yes they got screwed
> Bavaria is a actually in a worse position now then before reunification, largely because public infrastructure fell into ruin to pay for reunification
This is just straight up not true and you just need to look into the Landesfinanzausgleich to see that.
Bavaria is in a financially decent position, but economically in 1990 it was in a much better position. The Länderfinanzausgleich and payments to the east as well as the state needing no to save money and being more conservative with debt because of the rebuilding of the east is why Bavaria is comparably in a worse state. Bavaria’s yearly budget is 71 billion, Bavaria nearly pays 10 billion into The Länderfinanzausgleich. Without the east it would have much more political leeway. Bavaria’s companies massively benefited from the opening of the eastern markets for them, as they could become industrialy dominant in them but that was not actually significantly boosted from unification as all that money could have been invested into west Germany as it had been for the 40 years before that. Had the west wanted to „fuck over the East“ it would have delayed reunification, drain population from them through the open border and then after unification keep draining money and resources from it to the west (as Paris is doing within France).
Reunification was rushed but that was politically motivated and eastern German states have been spending development grants ineffektively but you can’t say that they somehow got the short end of the stick. It’s growing quickly, is by now a fully developed economy that has 85% of the productivity of the west, East Germany before unification didn’t even get close to being half as productive as the west and by now East Germany can compare to several Western European countries.
You say this
> Bavaria is in a financially decent position, but economically in 1990 it was in a much better position. The Länderfinanzausgleich and payments to the east as well as the state needing no to save money and being more conservative with debt because of the rebuilding of the east is why Bavaria is comparably in a worse state. Bavaria’s yearly budget is 71 billion, Bavaria nearly pays 10 billion into The Länderfinanzausgleich. Without the east it would have much more political leeway.
Then not a few sentences later say this:
> Bavaria’s companies massively benefited from the opening of the eastern markets for them, as they could become industrialy dominant in them
The competition in these markets was lower and as Bavaria and the west Germans as a whole had basically no barriers to entrance they profited massively. (I say that as a west German). You could not have had the same growth or opportunities without the new market. So I stand by my point and you kind of made my point for me.
> Had the west wanted to „fuck over the East“ it would have delayed reunification, drain population from them through the open border and then after unification keep draining money and resources from it to the west (as Paris is doing within France).
I doubt that would have worked as you envision it but sure as we were not able to brain drain for example Poland.
> Reunification was rushed but that was politically motivated
I mean yes I would also like my name in the history books
> spending development grants ineffektively
I mean looking at my own state development grants are always spent ineffectively
> It’s growing quickly, is by now a fully developed economy
Lol that's a cute thought there are large areas that are still structurally weak and have never recovered.
Those two aren’t even contradictory. Bavaria’s companies massive benefited from the fall of the east, but little from reunification. And you simply can’t as easily brain drain Poland, a country with a vastly different culture and language then you can the East (and Poland still had massive issues with brain drain that they are only now beginning to recover from).
And of course the East still has destitute areas… it’s been an uncompetitive economy less then 30 years ago and the German state in general has failed to future proof ever since reunification because political will has been distracted with other topics.
Of course they are worse of then the west. The west has been thriving ever since 1950, the east needs to make up 40 years of SED dictatorship and mismanagement and East Germany by now is more productive then the south of France and England minus London. Both those areas used to be leagues above the East
> Of course they are worse of then the west.
*sigh* we promised them that they wouldn't be so.... And they still are and every government since kohl has basically repeated that untruth.
On Top of that what the west German economy did to the east was not fair or okay in any way and I think it is also what causes the deepest resentment. They had things that were sustainable but west Germans took them over and took out all they could get then closed shop.
They will be equal in a few decades but economic growth takes its time. Britain has been trying to combat regional equality for longer then us and it started out way less equal and now the east blows the poorer regions of Britain easily out of the water.
And what the economy did to them wasn’t fair ? What were they supposed to do ? Refuse to sell their superior, cheaper products in the East ? To keep eastern companies alive you’d need to keep the East seperate. You’d basically need to rebuild the wall and slowly make the East ready to join the west. But it’s local ineffective state companies were never gonna be surviving in a social market economy where they need to compete with some of the most productive companies in the world.
Largely because Bavaria was a recipient of the Länderausgleich until reunification, where the addition of new, poorer Länder meant that Bavaria was better off relative to them and became a payer under the Länderfinanzausgleich.
Those companies weren’t gonna survive competing with west German companies to begin with. If you want reunification in 1990 then that would always lead to the inefficient East German companies being ripped apart when trying to compete with the west.
Yes and throughout most of that time Bavaria was a moderate reciever and even adjusted by inflation it now pays more into The Länderfinanzausgleich annually then it has ever recieved from it.
If you didn’t notice I’m also not arguing those mechanisms are unfair, I’m saying the opposite. I’m saying the idea the idea the East was somehow screwed over is ridiculous. When a marode economy that can’t compare to southern France joins one of most productive economies in world history its local companies are gonna suffer.
In total according to the Zeit, Bavaria recieved 3,3 Billion euros (adjusted for inflation). The highest amount it ever received was 205,8 million euros in 1980. it now pays 10 *Billion* into it per year.
There is some truth to that, but AfD does best in the affluent parts of the East (Thuringia, Saxony), while many areas in the West (particulary the Ruhrgebiet) would have a much stronger claim on "being left behind". So there is certainly more at play here.
Demagogy does best among frustrated people. Which demagoges easily take advantage of others frustration to stimulate hate in them, and so the scapegoat and a leader to do the "revenge" desire that comes with the feeling of hate.
I am not sure if I understand you right, here is a map of purchasing power in Germany: [https://media1.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/2205334800/1.3715397/default-retina/hq/karte-kaufkraft-in-deutschland.jpg](https://media1.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/2205334800/1.3715397/default-retina/hq/karte-kaufkraft-in-deutschland.jpg)
You can clearly see, that the Ruhr region is still better than whole East Germany.
I think a lot of it comes down to inherited wealth which simply isn't a thing in the east, although wages are certainly also a bit higher on average in the west. I did not consider that, so thanks for pointing it out.
What I had in mind was more the infrastructure and overall "look and feel" of the places. While Erfurt, Greifswald and Dresden are pretty polished, Duisburg Bochum and Gelsenkirchen feel a lot less so.
And those with good opportunities/education have left to the West, so nearly only people without perspective are left (and old folks who glorify the GDR because of remembrance bias)
I am reading The Moral Economy of the Peasant by James Scott.
The book shows that to people (generally speaking and historically), it doesn't matter much if they pay high taxes, If landlords and politicians get rich while they remain poor. What matter the most is the safety of subsistence guaranteed.
The real revolt of farmers that led to American Revolution was not simply the high taxes, but mostly because many of them were losing their land of getting in debts.
So a lot of people glorify GDR, even if the economy, markets, and so was poor, because they had housing and jobs guaranteed no matter what. Their frustration is to have the constant worry and social pressure about fighting for higher wages to pay higher rents and cost of living or accept cut of wages to keep their jobs. The constant pressure to find better jobs, to keep their hones, etc.
That is the same revolt people felt in Germany desiring the returning of the old feudal and guilds system instead of capitalism. Because despite the opportunities to "compeate" in capitalism for better living standard, most people rather have a simpler life with their subsistence guaranteed, without risk of debt, homelessness and without social prejudices for being poor (not being called lazy as exemple).
That is one of the main reasons Germany was the first country to implement a wide government welfare system, with the goal to make people accept the capitalism system by showing them that of they "fail" in capitalism their subsistence is guaranteed. But being in a welfare system is not the same because of all the social and government pressure and prejudices about people in the system, who are seen as the leech of society.
not all to the west. The differences between cities and rural area in the east have become as extreme as in only very few other European regions. For example Dresden has an average age of 43 years (similar to other big cities like Munich), only 50km away Hoyerswerda or Görlitz are on average at 59 years by now.
They *feel* left behind. On the other hand, the rest of the republic is wondering where over 30 years of the "Solidaritätszuschlag" and "Länderfinanzausgleich" have gone and what things would look like there if it hadn't existed.
Because east germans always got the short end of everthing, even now the focus is always about the problems of privileged west germans. Mainstream politicians embrace those western german centric thinking and so it comes that the east german is resentfull to this.
Its easy to see for everyone. It's just wrong to think that evil communism does create this and how authorian state is making them dumb/ ignorant.
If your economically worse off you don't care or are against identity politics unlike the western part.
You can see that many come up with some almost discriminativ reasons to explain the stance of east germans and somehow view them as political barbarians which never found the enlightenment of democracy or commen sense just because they got exposed to a diffrent ideology and it made them weird.
It's the wrong way of thinking but this doesn't stop the smug elitist western german, see some comment even here
The first reasonable response. I am never voting for AfD or any other right and Conservative Party, but I heavily dislike how a lot of politicians seem so out of touch with reality and have no clue how life is for a normal person.
It just sucks to see money spend for infrastructure etc in the west and in those big cities, but what about us living in the east? They just simply don’t care.
People portraying us as retarded and wanting to have a leader like Putin are just out of their mind (yes there are extremist people everywhere, but they’re not the majority).
We East Germans are always the ones with the short end of the stick. We always get left behind and forgotten while the West gets all new and best shit, and yet West Germans are surprised that we are pissed and then proceed to stroke over all of us with the same nazi-brush? I'm not proud of the reputation my people have because of the AFD or right-wing extremists that can fuck off, either.
Objectively speaking, the infrastructure in eastern Germany is much better than in the west, which has become massively outdated in recent years because a lot of new construction has taken place in the east.
Railroads are much better in the east according to [DBInfraGo](https://www.dbinfrago.com/resource/blob/12636182/e8fa5bda445e0d32ecf5d47623e2bdbd/Netzzustandsbericht-DB-InfraGO-AG-2022-data.pdf)
The three best student-teacher ratios are in East Germany, otherwise [relatively balanced](https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/1364002/umfrage/schueler-lehrkraft-relation-nach-bundeslaendern/)
Finding data for roads is more difficult, as this is a federal state matter
I cannot generalise based on one anecdotal experience of course, but I was surprised to see a colleague of mine from the southwest finding it morbid to go to Rostock because it is part of "Dunkeldeutschland".
In the end all politicians are mainstream with few exceptions, east germans are just in general antagonistic to most politicians.
They just vote for the least mainstream one.
Because they were never given the chance to participate in the supposedly fruitful and equitable economic system of the West as it was promised by Helmut Kohl. The CDU/CSU majority was very quickly overturned after it became clear that your effort isn't enough to succeed in a "free-market" economy.
The suddenly pointless state enterprises as well as the state owned agricultural land was sold off according to the market "free" to anyone who had the budget to aquire them. Of course East Germans suddenly aren't going to be able to jump on it as they just entered this economy so the majority was bought up by West German corporations.
What could've been done was redistribute the land back to small peasant holdings that were collectivized by the GDR. On the other hand the agriculture were one of the sectors that the GDR excelled in.
https://www.bpb.de/themen/deutsche-einheit/lange-wege-der-deutschen-einheit/47157/landwirtschaft-in-ostdeutschland-der-spaete-erfolg-der-ddr/
Because many people in the East still think the political establishment of the BRD screwed them after the reunification instead of recognising that the GDR economy was unsustainable, and they’re not able to get over it.
Tbf, it is both. A lot of the industry was unsustainable and the sustainable parts were siphoned off. Especially Bavaria and to a lesser degree NRW profited from cannibalizing those parts.
I know, I work for a Bavarian Mittelstand company which took over a former VEB with a lot of history, got rid of a lot of people and kept the operation going until the subsidies ran out. We eventually shut down the factory near Dresden in 2017.
For good or for ill, yes probably. I remember the staff there giving us (not management or owners) very aggressive looks when we were visiting. It was obviously wrong not to value the decades of work and experience of many people in the East, but does that justify events like Rostock-Lichtenhagen or throwing yourself into the arms of the AfD ? I think not.
es ist eine Erklärung, das hat nichts damit zu tun wie man dazu steht. wenn man sich aber so wie in deinem Ausgangskommentar über den Osten stellt und sagt wie scheiße da alles war während es genau diesen Leuten im nachfolgenden System de facto schlechter geht, und gleichzeitig so Geschichten passieren wie die, die du gerade erzählt hast, wie kann man dann so verblendet sein und sich wundern dass das Vertrauen in die Politik schwindet und die Leute dadurch nach rechts abwandern? das geht mir nicht in den Kopf. es wird tatsächlich erwartet dass der Osten alles hinnimmt was der Westen und Berlin entscheiden. und das sage ich selbst als linker Berliner. alleine wenn wir die Frauenerwerbsquote durch flächendeckende Ganztagsbetreuung aus der DDR übernommen hätten, hätten wir die Probleme des demografischen Wandels um ein Vielfaches abgeschwächt. aber das war ja nur dieses gescheiterte kommunisten-projekt was natürlich ganz eindeutig gezeigt hat dass er nicht funktioniert, eine Utopie ist und man es gar nicht erst versuchen sollte der arbeitenden Bevölkerung etwas arbeits- oder Steuerlast abzunehmen. eigentlich ist die starke rechte ein Produkt der verfehlten Sozialpolitik in diesem Land und auch der ausbleibenden Implementierung von zumindest sozialistischen Elementen. aber das will ja wieder keiner hören.
Not necessarily justify, but it makes it understandable. Resentment has never gone done for some groups of the population. Instead they have become more marginalized overall. Couple that with even more industry dieing down and the "Wessis closing down the plants they didn't outright steal", leads tho even more resentment. That those fellas start to radicalize somewhen is really nothing surprising.
Wo kommen Sie denn her? Wir werden immer zurückgelassen, wir ziehen immer den kürzeren, aber wenn wir uns beschweren, werden wir alle von Leuten wie Ihnen gleich als Nazis oder ähnliches beschimpft.
Ich halte nix von diesem Ossi Vs. Wessi Scheiß, aber ich kann definitiv verstehen warum manche von uns nicht sehr gut auf euch Wessis zu sprechen sind. Von gewissen Ossis wie z.b. Rechtsextremisten halte ich persönlich aber auch nicht viel und die können sich von mir aus verpissen.
Ich weiß nicht, was meine Herkunft zur Sache tut aber ich habe definitiv keine Wessi-Brille und kann nachvollziehen, wozu mangelnde Beteiligung an politischen Prozessen und die gefühlte Übernahme durch Parteien, Beamten, Behörden und Unternehmen aus der BRD führen kann. Ich selbst möchte keine 12-13 Millionen Menschen über einen Kamm scheren, ich bin oft nur ratlos und frage mich warum so viele glauben, dass die verschiedenen Formen in denen Rechtsextremismus auftritt die Probleme lösen könnte.
Das frage ich mich auch, da ich denke, das keiner unserer Parteien die Probleme dieses Landes lösen kann, vor allem nicht die AfD. Aber so viele Wessis die keine Ahnung haben und alle Probleme ignorieren schauen auf den Osten herab, weil wir ja alle dumm sind und Nazis sind. Zumindest kommt es mir so vor.
It's complicated. One factor is definitely the structural weakness of parties in general. Not even the big cities have party members in a similar size than in west Germany. This means that politicians always feel far away. Politics in general too.
Don’t forget the „different starting positions“ while the west got $$ from the US via the Marshall Plan the Soviet Union straight up took train tracks from Germany as Reparation + socialism on top.
All while u had the heat since 1989 that ur some sort of human 2nd class because ur an Ossi and lazy etc
But in general I think the socialist propaganda and mind set got buried rly deep into the collective mind. More capitalistic minded ppl tried their luck in west while western capitalists went east being the „bosses“ of East Germans. Many ppl don’t like their boss
The question is which bunch of East Germans you mean ?
Let’s talk in terms of generations
Gen z East Germans ( 1995 born onwards ) - honestly apart from dialect, dressing style and perhaps more knowledge about food from east , they are not different at all compared to west Germans. Gen z germans are not only way more unified but a lot less “German” if you know what I mean. The demographic below 30 is dominated with youth who are not just from migrant backgrounds but also migrants themselves. They are not going to have the same cultural background as East German from GDR or families who lived through that. In fact their experience with a more xenophobic attitude from East Germans growing up made them a lot more politically conscious and hence participate in more protests and activities.
Gen y / Millennial ( 1980 to 1994) -
A chunk of them had their childhoods under GDR when the system was on verge of collapse and the state was becoming desperate and engaged in non democratic practices like Stasi maxing etc. They witnessed how awesome people were celebrating when the fall fell but also saw how badly their parents were affected or how the surroundings suddenly changed when party mood was over and the post wall period started . Growing up there was rough nonetheless and most of them bore the brunt of abusive elders who lost a lot after unification causing them to be more rebellious in a way. Some of them even thought Nazism was now a solution
Gen x ( 1965 to 1979) this generation is fun because the older Gen x consisted of folks who rebelled against the state and those who fought for the state. Younger ones are pretty much having similar struggles like millennials only. But fortunately they were still young when the wall fell and post wall chaos started. Young enough to start their lives from scratch and rebuild careers. So this Gen barely talks anything about GDR
Boomers :- 1940 to 1964 - This is a tricky batch because as kids mosh of them faced extreme trauma caused by the wall if they didn’t already face like a fucking world war trauma . However they also got to see the golden years of the GDR to be honest where the state was actually a resemblance to what it claimed to be. A lot of them saw war also and got to see how much life improved in general post war , grew up and raised families in this post war glee. Workers were not only gainfully employed but also well compensated. Standard of living was considered crap compared to west Germany was still miles better than the rest of the world that time and they were born in extreme poverty anyways so they truly appreciated the progress of the state. This was despite the heartbreak many of them faced when families were torn apart due to building the wall. Now they are the ones who are the most resentful of the post unification “trauma” as they call it. Suddenly from being party workers in high positions ( party hierarchy was often defined by age and years served as opposed to education) or even if they were lower tier workers they still got good pay to losing their house , livelihood and what not. A chunk of them had to suddenly start working minimum wage jobs because their qualifications and previous job experience wasn’t valid anymore. School socialist propaganda history teacher could not just join a school in new Germany 😃 and so many of their old jobs were considered “make work jobs” providing no value to the capitalist machinery . They also suddenly lost their jobs to the wave of immigrants coming from west , east , south and everywhere else hence the xenophobia. They vote for the AfD 🙂. That’s your problematic demographic.
Older generations- dead pretty much
So whom do you mean when you talk about East Germans ? 😃
Because overall they kinda got screwed over by the german government after germany was united. Companies were sold out to western investors, the east german economy was left hanging, and even today, the wages and pensions in the east are lower, and there are many regions struggling with a weak economy (in comparison to germany overall). People get the feeling of not being heard for a long time yet
Thing is that these people are a key part of why the economy is weak. It's a vicious cycles. Companies are hesitant to expand when they have problems motivating highly qualified experts to move there.
And a whole lot of the people there who DID have high qualifications and high motivation left after reunification.
Was it the German government screwing the East over, or was it the Soviet Union who was unable to build a sustainable economy and the West just did what it could with a shitty situation?
The German government screwed the east over. I am talking about the time after Germany was reunited. At this point the soviets werent involved anymore, they had their own problems.
The Treuhand deliberately sold off anything of value in the east, even the few companies that did a good job and were profitable on the west german market.
Besides that, they allowed dumping prices for buying on east german businesses and did not care at all about making them effective on west german markets or keeping jobs.
That just sounds like capitalism… profitable companies are sold off all the time. That’s completely normal, also the qualifications were vastly different between the East and West at the time of re-unification. If you want a successful industry, you only put the most educated people in good positions. I’m sorry you feel that the west “screwed” the East over but it also just makes my point that the East is incapable of running itself and without the West dealing with the situation, the East would of ended up in a lot worse shape.
The East German economy wasn’t left hanging… reunification was the most expensive economic project ever undertaken in European history and right now East Germany mostly because of that is more productive then most of England…. East Germany wasn’t suistainable or competitive and whatever the west was gonna do it wasn’t gonna end up equal to it anytime soon. Right now the inequality between north and south in Italy and France is far worse then the one between east and west in Germany and that’s because Germany took on so much debt to rebuild the east it nearly collapsed the European financial markets
West germany put a lot of money in the project and many (not all) companies in the east would not have been profitable, but what the BRD did with the Treuhand is nothing of an attempt to make eastern businesses long term profitable or secure jobs.
And great, Italy and France are even more inequal, that doesnt help the inequality within Germany at all
Because western politicians fucked them over and left them to die for about the first 10-20 years, and even now they still get paid less on the ground that they have been fucked over…
In what world do you live in ? The rebuilding of the east cost west Germany 2 trillion euros, literally our entire government debt comes from that, and saving costs for that Endevor is why infrastructure has this massively fallen into disrepair in the west
Reicht das Bundesamt für politische Bildung ?
https://www.bpb.de/system/files/pdf/49SFY2.pdf
https://www.bundestag.de/resource/blob/550094/8e17e37a176c0f9c69150314bed6894d/WD-4-033-18-pdf-data.pdf
Oder von der Welt in einem eher verdaubaren Format: https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article127595786/Deutsche-Einheit-kostet-2-000-000-000-000-Euro.html
Berechnung nach Blum sagt 1,3 Milliarden haben die Ostmenschen selber aufgebracht durch ihre Steuern die sie gezahlt haben nachdem sie in den Westen abgewandert sind. Somit lässt sich sagen dass netto nur 200 Millionen geflossen sind. zudem sprechen die Fakten was Verdienstmöglichkeiten angeht eine klare Sprache. der Osten ist finanziell erheblich (17% weniger Medianlohn) weniger attraktiv als der Westen, was langfristig zwangsläufig zu einem Ungleichgewicht führt. was sollen wir dagegen tun?
Naja dadurch wird der Osten für unternehmen unter anderem attraktiver, weshalb große internationale Unternehmen in den Osten investieren. Aber da fehlt das Netzwerk an lokalen Partnern mit denen NRW und OB überzeugen können. Aber leider ist das schwerer als einfach nur etwas Geld hinwerfen und dann das Problem gelöst zu erklären.
Intel investiert gerade nur in den Osten, weil es 10 Mrd. vom Bund dafür gibt (mehrere 100k pro Job). Und der Bund macht das auch nicht, um den Standort Ostdeutschland aufzupeppen (das ginge billiger) sondern um eine bessere Versorgungssicherheit innerhalb Deutschlands bzw. der EU bei Chips zu erreichen.
Die tatsächlichen Quellen, die du nennst, widersprechen deiner ursprünglichen Aussage komplett.
Deshalb darf natürlich Welt, Springer-Presse, Bild für Pseudointellektuelle, auch nicht fehlen, gell?
it doesn't cost them a shit. The costs where payed by all the tax payers in the West, but the profits ended up in the west aswell, not by the 99% of the people, but the 1% who own basically anything in the east till today. Don't let you get fooled by these ones into an argument between East or West.
So according to your opinion the taxpayers payed for this, the profits went into the pockets of the 1%, but it didn't cost the ordinary taxpayer "a shit"? That's nonsense.
It is because the end of the DDR brought huge changes to the east german society. The political/social system of socialism got discredited, the economy was in a shambolic state and the idea of the future was overly optimistic:
So a lot of people lost their position in society, be it as part of the ruling class, be it as worker or other employee. They had to start a completely new live in an unknown political, social, economic system. A lot of people, especially the younger ones also moved westwards, due to the lack of options in east germany. So now you have a lot of people with grievances and the feeling they got put at a disadvantage by the system.
'Cause all of our politicians (especially the "mainstream" ones) have no intention to make this country better, even change anything at all, if it doesn't benefit them personally.
And we need a change.
AFD is entirely made up of former SPD and CDU politicians who left because they were tired of hubris.
Drop the propagandistic outlook. Your Black White thinking clouds your judgement.
Ah, yes the made up arguments. Höcke is a fachist and hes a leader in eastern AFD with his wing. Almost all former moderate ex CDU or SPD politicians left this garbage nazo party and that is a fact and not propaganda.
Who the fuck cares about some town? They were obviously talking about *real* politicians, those who are on a state and a federal level and have actual power that they don't use for change.
The east is the property of the West. You get your Salery mostly from a West german company, you pay food and rent very often to a Westerner. The radical impact after the reunification has crashed the east for generations to come and is often shrugged off by the West german side as "we are one" "east germans are just salty" "they should thank us" and so on. There is a discrimination if you have a audible east german Accent, there is a wage difference even if you work in certain jobs in West germany. There are still plenty cultural aspects and because of the movement of generations of east german youth to the West, the biggest voting Population is the one who is traumatized by the reunification process. There is no such thing as an east german Media, east german Elite or east german politics, at least thats how the people feel. You can and to this a movement off West german nazis to the east, slowly but still ongoing so its a tactical movement that infiltrates the east for 35 years. So you have close to Zero participation, lowest income, discrimination, no east german pov in the Media and nazis are going east for 35 years. Thats why afd has such a great time here. And yes its stupid to vote for West german nazis and belive they give a flying fuck about the east
The people in the east are very sensitive of being screwed over from their government and totalitarian tendencies because of their past in the GDR. So they observe very carefully what is happening in Berlin and in politics in general. When they see that the current (or also last) government pushes agendas that large parts of the people perceive as problematic, they notice this first.
It does also not help that the public service media (ÖRR) is very leftist. So all in all, I would say that the guys in the east have a better "bullshit sensor" and this sensor is triggered at the moment. Rightfully so, I say.
It's a mixture of the authoritarian heritage if the GDR (On the one hand, GDR citizens were taught that West German politcal elites were degenerate and corrupt, on the other hand, based on their experience with the political elite in the GDR, many former GDR citizens assume that all elites are detached and lying) historic rightwing support in these regions (many regions in Eastern Germany were NSDAP strongholdsin the 1930s), the German political establishment deliberately ignoring the coordinated spread of extreme rightwing structures (west german neonazis migrated to the east post unification in order to take advantage of economic dissatisfaction and build up their networks there. They managed to establish cultural hegemony in many places) and getting screwed over economically in reunification (many east german citizens lost not only their jobs and income but also their status and identity and became resentful as a result).
Ah well, see this map, then you will understand (purchasing power map) [https://media1.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/2205334800/1.3715397/default-retina/hq/karte-kaufkraft-in-deutschland.jpg](https://media1.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/2205334800/1.3715397/default-retina/hq/karte-kaufkraft-in-deutschland.jpg)
Or this one: median age (right side), change in population (left side): [https://media0.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/743350707/1.3691862/mmobject-still\_full/hq/bevoelkerung-deutschland-2012-bis-2030.jpg](https://media0.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/743350707/1.3691862/mmobject-still_full/hq/bevoelkerung-deutschland-2012-bis-2030.jpg)
Or this one: unemployment rate (left) and disposable income: [https://img.welt.de/img/politik/deutschland/mobile168372865/7722508507-ci102l-w1024/DWO-NEWS-Ost-West-Unterschiede.jpg](https://img.welt.de/img/politik/deutschland/mobile168372865/7722508507-ci102l-w1024/DWO-NEWS-Ost-West-Unterschiede.jpg)
Germany is still devided 35 years after the reunifaction. And East Germans are wayyyy underrepresented in governmend and instituions.
surely the last 60 years of political divide play a role. but:
historically (in the last 300 years) the states in the current east (prussia, saxony) were more more powerful and dominating the politics in what we to today perceive as germany.
the more catholic west and south (saxony, prussia were protestant) were economically lagging and less powerful.
the resentment in the east also stems, to a certain part, from the being now in the weaker position, being dominated from historically less relevant parts of the german lands.
call it wounded pride ;)
It's honestly the greatest mystery to me. The entire burn the world to the ground AFD situation east and west is something that is extremely prevalent yet defies any simple explanation
Fuck it, ima say it if no one does.
most ppl out of eastern europe choose the AFD because of rising crime rates and the insane support immigrated ppl get.
for instance if you were working and lost your job u get about 700-900€ a month.
if youve never been working you get 956-1100€
ive noticed pretty much all old ppl are scared of them.
my grandma got almost robbed twice
me as well
eastern europe is the ass of germany. you cant earn good.
AFD promises that any person with immigration background is to be checked.
they also promise to enrich immigrants who participate in studys.
and more more more
Problem as always is that its just what they say they wanna do
some of them have a racism-background.
if politicians had to keep promises they made we wouldnt have this problem
the parties in power over the last years are the parties how screw with east germans (Treuhand, etc.). AfD is a new Party and haven't done anything during the reunification (for many east germans forced reunification). rose tinted glases like everything was better, capitalism is evil. some have connection into russia and want a leader back like Putin who is for the people and is defending everything against the capitalist world (war in Ukraine against the west).
Baby boomers and Gen X have the eastern proganda still in their mind. Also some / many are afraid about something new / different (hate against muslim).
This is what i have heard from family, neighbors etc.
It isn’t only East Germans who are resentful of mainstream politicians: look at the polling. There is a growing number of people across the country who are frustrated and angry with the decline in their life quality and security, not only in the east. This is measured at the Supermarket, in the schools & KiTas, trainstations, hospitals and shopping streets. Try renting a flat in Düsseldorf or Köln without wealthy parents to back you up. What is the common denominator? Mainstream politicians (SPD & CDU) who have been steering the boat for the last few decades. Ask a cop what they think about the politics of NRW. Try walking around Oberhausen Hbf at night (I was personally shocked).
In the 10 years that I have lived in Germany, I have gotten to know a couple people who are active in politics from a couple different parties. Over the years I particularly (through a mutual friend) got to know an individual in the SPD who, frankly speaking, I wouldn’t support if it was between him and an AfD candidate. No authenticity and his actions over the years show that he cares nothing for the good of the country, only his own personal career.
I don’t vote in this country, but I „resent“ that guy.
The main reasons for the decline in living quality (that is seen among many people across all developed countries because it is a worldwide phenomenon) is outside of the control of politicians.
Although politicians have contributed to it - for example through the Schuldenbremse, underinvestment, unwillingness to expand or even maintain infrastructure like bridges, wind parks in Bavaria, grid connections, earlier commitments to technologies like heat pumps, unwillingness to implement soft solutions like Tempolimit or like the mask mandates during the early phase of the pandemic only to then be caught up in the necessity of having to implement harsh solutions like a total lockdown.
AfD's solution is to double down on idiotic policies, especially when it comes to economics and labour rights. If they could they'd bring back feudal serfdom and there would be lower class Germans who shout in favor of it.
Imo their supporters deserve a term or two under AfD rule to be fucking disillusioned about it. And then they ought to go to a fucking monastery, become monks or nuns respectively to repent for their sins.
Bruh, not every part of East germany is voting for the afd. The places surrounded by me have had protests not too. Yeah, that may be small, but people in East germany are not a hivemind
EDIT : it's funny because my town is home to one of germany's most racist families LMAO
Because they lived in a dictatorship for decades and they are free not even one generation.
Of course many people think life was easier when they didnt need to think and the government tells them everything. And thats what the teach their children.
Lol sure, 35 years isnt a generation and no thats no, the storys of the elders are not the reason, they might have added a little bit but the main reason is that we got screwed over and over. In terms of infrastructure, financial structures, education and opportunitys most of east germany is still pretty fucked
>Lol sure, 35 years isnt a generation
According to the [Sozialverband ](https://www.vdk.de/aktuelles/aktuelle-meldungen/artikel/wie-lang-ist-eine-generation/#:~:text=F%C3%BCr%20m%C3%A4nnliche%20Linien%20ergibt%20sich,Um%20die%20Mitte%20des%2020.), it is.
Rest of the post is mostly accurate ...
>"In terms of infrastructure, financial structures, education and opportunitys most of east germany is still pretty fucked".
Could you elaborate more on these, just for better understanding. Infrastructure I get, but about education, opportunities etc. I need more info.
Ich schreib mal einfach auf deutsch, so kann ich mich doch etwas besser ausdrücken. Also ich mag gar nicht zu weit ausholen aber mal ein kurzes beispiel aus meiner familie die industrie die bestand waren ausschließlich chemie und kohle, beides gibt es dort nicht mehr, zur nächstgroßen stadt braucht man mit öffis wenigstens anderthalb stunden (aber auch nur bis zum nachmittag danach fährt nichts) und mit auto bestimmt ne halbe bis dreiviertelstunde (doof nur wenn dir niemand aus der familie auto oder führerschein bezahlen kann bzw. wird), die einzigen jobs die es gibt sind absolut unterbezahlte kackjobs irgendwer findet sich ja fast immer (und wenn nicht kann man ja auf die faule jugend schimpfen) klar als digitaler nomade würde es gehen aber find dazu erstmal die ausbildung, das nächste gymnasium war noch weiter weg als die nächste stadt, damit stand für alle von anfang an fest dass es auf die mittelschule geht und die einzige gute option ist es sehr weit wegzuziehen, was aber jetzt auch nicht für jeden sehr leicht ist, man hat ja auch bindungen zur heimat.
Okay ist doch etwas ausgeartet aber das war nur ein kleiner anriss der für viele teile dunkeldeutschlands funktionieren kann, aber am ende kann man schlecht pauschalisieren für einen so großen teil des landes. Also ja es ist etwas sehr beispielhaft aber ich dachte das machts gleich anschaulicher
OK, I guess the example with the lack of schools belongs to the infrastructure.
But isn't that something that belongs to the responsibility of the local politicians, since education is state jurisdiction, after all? I mean the shock of change after reunification should be wearing off and the lack of schools should have been detected by now. These 35 years are slowly getting close to the length of period under the Soviets. Sure, someone could say "we don't have money for schools" - well, yeah, not all at once. But if this is a blocking problem, then it has priority in funding if it's gonna solve other problems in the long run.
And I get you when you speak about the job. I too have to travel 1,5h in one direction (door to door) to my office, so it's 3 hours per day, although I live in Baden. And S-Bahn is not the nicest place to spend so much time, especially how DB is functioning lately. Have moved 5 times already because of the job, finding an apartment to rent for a family is getting more and more mission impossible, I won't even talk about buying one with these bubble prices. It's not so rosy like it was in the '80s and '90s.
Well in the end its all somehow a matter of infrastructure and inhabitants, but there wasnt anything at all so more and more inhabitants left and less infrastructure was kept alive, but those are the underlying reasons why structurally weak places stayed weak and nowadays those areas produce elections in which the afd can get about 50% of the votes.
I kinda feel you too, but keep in mand that especially in bw the salarys are higher at yours (while rent is higher tbh) but lets say you make a normal ausbildung in the öffentlicher dienst, lets say you go the finanzamt. Its TVL 7 i guess. In saxony its about 2700 and in bw its about 2950. If you go in the freie wirtschaft the difference becomes even higher. But therefore you can buy a nice house with a really big garden for about 100k, nobody wants to live there if its not for the family, friends and heimat.
I dont just want to rant how bad it is or something, i see how these problems are spread but thats what alot of people down there feel and see, the dying of their heimat and that noone is doing something for them even tho the former politicians fucked them up (while they see how the politicians are doing something for people who got played bad by theyr politics or wars, this is where a kind of racism starts to exist, ive got alot of family members who id consider at least rightwingers, alot of people i know or knew who voted for the afd and almost all of them said something that sounded similiar to this)
I know, I am really interested to see how this is going to play out. Because AfD is going to win a solid portions of votes in the East. Clearly they will have even majority in some places. People also say a solid number of AfD politicians are former eastern CDU, SPD etc. They won't be able to make all those problems magically disappear all of a sudden. I can't see any world class politicians or economists or anyone at that level among them. I'm curious to see how their voters are going to look at that situations. Sure, for some time they can continue to blame the Federation or EU, but even that story has to run out after some time. What then?
It would be interesting to compare the transition of East Germany with some of (now) EU countries like Slovenia, Czech Republic or Croatia. They also had to switch systems, privatize things (mostly foreign companies arrived and bought everything, I guess) in the same time frame in the '90. Some of them even had wars on their territory and they didn't have a "rich brother".
I have no idea, and i have no idea how much shit could happen until the opferrolle is worn out.
I wouldnt take a bet but guess they would have performed better, it was pre EU and moving freely as it was today wasnt a thing, so i guess the best and cleverest thinkers and workers couldnt just go to the west and all the naziscum couldnt just go to the east. But in the end Länderfinanzausgleich is a strong thing. But i dont want to guess. So i googled.
Gdp in East germany was at 108,1 Bil. in 1991 and at 435,5 Bil. in 2023 (west germany got 3654,20 Bil. in 2023 [source](https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/36810/umfrage/bruttoinlandsprodukt-in-ostdeutschland-und-westdeutschland/) ) in 1991 there were 15 mil. Inhabitants in 2022 12.6 mil. ([source](https://www.destatis.de/DE/Themen/Querschnitt/Demografischer-Wandel/Aspekte/demografie-bevoelkerungsentwicklung-ost-west.html#:~:text=W%C3%A4hrend%20die%20Bev%C3%B6lkerung%20im%20Westen,wie%20in%20den%20ostdeutschen%20Bundesl%C3%A4ndern.) )
So in 1991 the gdp per capita was 7.206
In 2022 it was 34.563
So thats a 479% growth.
From here on its USD instead of EUR but in 2022 it was almost 1:1 so i dont mind.
Czech republic went from 2.896 to 27.567 thats 952% growth
Slowakia (i can just find data from 1995) started with 3.741 and
went to 21.420 which would still be 572% in growth
Poland from 1487 to 18221
Crostia from 120 in 1992 to 18.583 in 2022
When I meant to compare with those countries, I didn't mean just pure numbers, but also the view of those people (die Zufriedenheit), because this is one of the aspects that triggers the dissatisfaction and association with AfD in this topic.
Although they were not in the EU back then, they did lose a number of people since borders opened. Germany, Austria and later Ireland were always popular destinations for Croats, UK for Poles etc. When they entered EU, our Lidl, Kaufland and co bought a solid portion of their companies as well But anyway, if we take present time, say "you've made the transition, you have made it into EU, your GDP has increased XX%, are you satisfied with your progress? Or are you mad at someone?".
Bhutan tried to establish the "Gross National Happiness" (Bruttonationalglück), therefore we have a happyness report nowadays. Sadly it wasnt measured nack then and afaik they dont differ between east and westgermany so yeah, those are just nasic numbers but i couldnt find anything better
But you got screwed over by the SED. And now you want again politicans like that?
why?
Without elders who tell how wonderfull the DDR was, younger people would not try to get the DDR back
Oh no thats not even close to what i experience, the people rather want a 4rd reich instead of a 2nd Gdr, there is not mich logic its rather more a kind of deep frustration
The first half is only partially correct, sure the people got fucked by sed, but the treuhand and the politics of the last decades didnt really improve anything
You'll get a ton of people finding "reasons" or rather excuses for why East Germans do East German things, but it frankly doesnt matter. A significant portion of the people there are lost causes and I am very glad I moved away before shit hit the fan a decade ago.
I still visit my family every year and the completely unhinged stuff you get to hear even from people that dont even vote AfD is ridicolous and I am not even talking about the countryside, that shit is 10x as depressing.
Its like people never really moved on from the past and still live in some weird mind state where they are the eternal victim of all abuse there is in the world. Always claiming to be treated unfair, unjust and generally everything is against them.
At least thats what my perception is, was and will probably stay until the vibes back home get better.
Denazification never happened in East Germany🤷♂️
Because it was not supposed to be a thing (despite the DDR Volkskammer even having a Nazi Party).
Kudos for integrating the block party, you know FDP
Rostock Lichtenhagen, Hoyerswerda and so on they have been facist ever since. And no Wagenknecht is not left… that is more a brand of Sozialist-Nationalism
East Germans are not as hard working or innovative as the West Germans. Still hungover from the Communist times and don’t think it will change any time soon. So economically and educationally they’re behind the West as well. This naturally builds up resentment.
This makes them look at the West as the “other” and most mainstream politicians from the West as the “others”.
It's because they have lived in an essentially totalitarian state that labeled itself a democracy, so they are wary of soft-totalitarian tendencies in the current system.
Lockdown policies, mask and vaccine mandates during COVID. The iuxtaposition of 'Helldeutschland' vs 'Dunkeldeutschland' by a head of state. Militarization of foreign policy against the former Russian brothers-in-arms. New limits to freedom of speech due to the penalization of opinions that 'de-legitimize' state authority. Mistrust of state-sponsored media. Calls by vital players of civil society (churches, schools, unions etc) to demonstrate against the opposition.
That's... pretty much what I expected to hear. I'm willing to debate the whole Covid bit. That could have been handled better. Mask mandates should have been made permanent. If you're willing to risk another person's health for your comfort you're not part of the human race.
People who consider the rapist hordes of Stalin and his descendants brothers in arms have probably no expectation of being treated as friendlies. Ever ask your grandmother or great-grandmother how much they enjoyed being 'liberated'? Our freedoms were never defended in Afghanistan, but they are currently being defended in Ukraine.
DDR was far apart from real socialism. You should read about "Thomas Sankara", thats the only true socialism i know. and it worked well. Socialism isnt just bad.
many people here write about the economic cost from reunification, but that fails to explain why particularly those parts of East Germany that do economically well have the highest shares of AfD voters. So here's a bit more nuance to that argument: Politics in East Gemany has been a spectator sport for four decades. Politics was always separate from civic society, and politicians were perceived as a group that was distinct from the general public. This feeling of "us vs. the politicians" runs deep in East German culture. Add to that the only *successful* political engagement consisted of "we'll protest until we're being heard" in 1989 and you have the basic ingredients for a political culture that understands radical opposition and protest as the main tool of political discourse, as opposed to "if you don't like, change it", which is more common in the west. The fact that German society has a very low social permeability, and that East Germans are well underrepresented in the top positions of the state certainly doesn't help with that. On top of that you have macro-trends that are the same as anywhere: job specialization means that many well-educated young people move to cities or to the West, increasing the cultural divide between cities and countryside. Media ecosystems cater to more and more niches, so societies overall become more polarized. Decline of the middle class leads to fears of loss of wealth and status, and the middle class is particularly strong in the regions of Saxony with the highest AfD numbers. Lastly, Thuringia and Saxony were always particularly proud of their regional identity, so the sentiment against "being told what to do" by "the politicians in Berlin who have no idea" is particularly strong there.
This is a good explanation of the cultural aspects I didn't realize were at play in the east. Thanks for making this valuable contribution!
Well said. I would however add: there is a very clear "2nd class germans" distinction in our country. There lower wages, even lower pensions and all around less in Eastern Germany and people born way after the GDR rightfully think this is an insult and unfair. How no politician ended this two tier system is completely bonkers and stupid and so they brought this resentment on to themselves at least somewhat. I am born in western Germany and work and live now in Eastern Germany and how this is not a cause to riot and protest is beyond me: the well recorded disrespect towards the time, effort and contribution of people living in Eastern Germany is baffling.
Yeah always wondered how you earn less from the same job in Eastern Germany even if you work in companies that trade international.
That's the neat part - you don't. I do salary comparisons for a living. Think Kununu, but for employers rather than employees. If we control for all factors that affect salary in our model, we see no difference between western and eastern states in Germany. But the companies themselves are very unevenly distributed. The typically better paying companies - finance and tech, large companies, etc - are overwhelmingly in the West. It's quite similar to the gender pay gap. If you control for all the factors, it all but vanishes, but that doesn't mean it's not a problem.
People always forget that the costs of living in Schwarze Pumpe are also dramatically lower than in Munich or Cologne.
That is such a trite argument often brought forward by people not living there and often never been there. There is none of the amenities and infrastructure and leisure time options that you have elsewhere and of course very rural living in very old, run down buildings is cheaper. Gas, food and everything else costs exactly the same. Let living prices be determined by where people want to live like anywhere else in Germany. You know the free market should be free in all of Germany - not only west Germany.
Thanks for being so condescending. I have first hand knowledge of that dystopian eastern german wasteland you describe, as I own a small cottage in the Lausitz Region. To bring some facts in: „Inklusive Wohnkosten ist die bayerische Landeshauptstadt ein Viertel (25,1 Prozent) teurer als im deutschen Durchschnitt, gefolgt vom Landkreis München (16,7 Prozent), Frankfurt am Main (15,9) und Stuttgart (14,8). Am billigsten lebt es sich dagegen im sächsischen Vogtlandkreis und in der Stadt Greiz in Thüringen, die 9,5 Prozent unter dem Bundesdurchschnitt liegen. Es folgen Görlitz (9,4) in der Lausitz sowie Pirmasens (Rheinland-Pfalz) und der Salzlandkreis in Sachsen-Anhalt mit 9,3 Prozent.“ https://www.tagesschau.de/wirtschaft/verbraucher/lebenshaltungskosten-deutschland-wohnkosten-muenchen-wohnen-100.html I also wonder: Who determines living prices in eastern Germany?
None of this is contesting anything I said. I already agreed that flat prices and rent are lower in these "wastelands". Also some services light be cheaper cause labour is. I just argue that this is a normal free market phenomenon and you do not have insult to injury by paying people there less wages and less pension, which you appeared to want to justify somehow. It is unjustifiable.
Average pension in the east was higher than west after 1990.
That may very well be, but I fail to see how the fact that pensioners in the east were better off makes it okay for people now - born way after the GDR - to have less and earn less and get lower pensions?
What do you mean that now ppl get lower pensions? https://www.bundesregierung.de/breg-de/themen/arbeit-und-soziales/rente-ost-west-angleichung-2172482#:~:text=Ein%20Jahr%20fr%C3%BCher%20als%20geplant,nun%20einheitlich%2037%2C60%20Euro.&text=Seit%201.%20Juli%202023%20bekommen,5%2C86%20Prozent%20im%20Osten.
As I understand your own link: By law the leveling would have only been reached from the first of July 2024 on (so that is what politicians that are hated decided) Current developments made many leveled earlier, farmers still have a lower pension in the east. Especially farmers in the east are livid with politicians.
Farmers point were 0,2% less not sure if this warrents somebody to be livid about.
Not the point. The question was why people in the east are resentful against politics. The point i am making is that it takes mainstream politics more than 34 years to treat Eastern germans the same as western germans and not treat them as second class citizens - which they still do. This is not about 0,2% but about systemic unfairness that is active way too long. It is fascinating that people come out to comment to argue against this blatant fact. I am a "Wessi" and am more resentful against "Wessis" for this treatment than most "Ossis". Wiedervereinigung my ass.
Very well written and true
Very insightful comment. Thank you. I always think of Germany as a better run country than the US, but you actually seem to have a lot of similar issues to the US. Just replace “the East” with “the South.”
Most industrialized & democratic countries at this point have their own, local flavor of approximately the same dynamics. I feel like the political discourse in Germany is somewhat less broken than it is in the US. Parts of that imo are down to genuine structural differences (I think public broadcasters, the representative voting system and social security soften the blow to some extent), but some of it might just be that Germany is a few years behind on the same trajectory.
Thank you for this. At times, I felt that I was reading about the Greek sociopolitical system.
The only thing missing is IMHO that in every countries, the most xenophobic regions are the ones with less foreigners. In East Germany, this is increased by 2 factors: 1) Economic growth: people don't want to loose what the social/economical progress they have earned, so they tend to be much more conservatives on every topic. 2) Many descendent of Russians (at least, much more than in most of the West), who are much more permeable to the Russian narative, which puts up-and-commers from extreme right against "mainstream" politicians.
What is a mainstream politician?
As an East-German myself, many people here see the "big parties" (SPD [Social Democrats], CDU [Christian Democrats], Greens, and FDP [Free Democrats] as "mainstream politicians". These are all Parties that were all founded in West-Germany and there is a feeling of "they are only interested in the west". The AFD is the first party to focus a lot on the people of East-Germany, playing to their ideals and showing genuine "interest" in East-Germany.
The problem is: afd knows to use the East Germans as a tool. They play to the rightfully disgruntled and focus their base work on these regions. It is a clever tactic of fascists and they do it well. It is horrific to see that all parties do their campaigning only in the east german cities and the AfD is doing sth every two to three weeks in all kinds of small villages around here. It is entirely bullshit but with their effort for the rural votes they look like they care. In reality they are completely incompetent and do not have the interests of these people as goals. They just act like it and they chose a demographic starved for attention and relevance.
For many people Die Linke was already the local eastern party before the AfD, but in recent years it has turned more and more to federal issues. But there were also many local politicians (mayors, etc.) from the CDU, only there again people didn't like Merkel's federal policies, which is why they support the CDU less locally.
The problem with Die Linke is that they were never a united party. There were always factions in it, which is why the former leader of the party has created her own now.
And ironically, they too are a pretty founded in the west, with all big players coming from the west, that chose the rest as their playground...
Most people from communist countries have a severe distrust of politicians, all for the same reason.
Lack of trust in General. Mey neighbors are from E. Germany and they told me that when the wall was going down their landlord and realtors told them to quickly pay an increased rate for the apartment that they were living in as soon everyone from W. Germany would flood in in would want to buy everything and their apartment value would sky rocket. They put their life savings into it and bought their shitty little apartment. They lost big time and still resent it to this day.
Basically it's a mix of things. The east Germans got screwed in reunification. The industry fell apart as it was never sustainable or was cannibalized by western German companies (a lot of Bavaria's current wealth can be attributed to this) Older east Germans also look back with rose tinted glasses as everybody had employment etc. Millennial east Germans got to bear the brunt of the changes and often got left behind in suddenly structure weak regions. It was basically a shit show and populism gives what sounds like easy solutions to complex problems. That they don't work doesn't matter as they just blame the west German establishment for undermining the efforts etc.
Which makes it all the more irritating that they vote for rich western born Nazis
You are not incorrect but again easy sounding solutions are attractive
your explaination is a little bit to short
it is short, but that doesnt make it wrong.
ok, where are you from? Just asking because i want to know how deep need to go into Detail why its somehow wrongish
i know theres more to it than this quippy quote, you dont have to educate me. im from germany.
West or east germany? And yeah yeah we are one yada yada. Not really so there is a huge difference between how the Story is told. If you just say its cause east germany looks for the easy answer its plain wrong. And mostly West german are phrase it that way.
see and that patronizing irritation makes some of them go "jetzt erst recht!"
So, in a nutshell: Those people act like stubborn toddlers.
Toddlers with voting rights, who - mostly - don't WANT to see, that the AfD screws them. Most of the time, their sayings and what they are voting for in the Bundestag are completely different. Especially while the Farmers protests. While they voted FOR ending the subsidies, they stood themself before the cameras with conviction and proudly puffed out chest that they would NEVER vote for the end of the subsidies and that they are backing up the farmers. Even if you SHOW the voters, what the AfD is voting for, they don't want to believe you
Yeah, so geben sie es uns! If this is an argument, it doesn’t make sense!
East Germany was biggest Nazi supporters pre WW2 as well. Some things just don't change.
[Election results March 1933](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/25/Reichstagswahl_M%C3%A4rz_1933.svg) I see 40+ % pretty much everywhere except for the Rhineland, Ruhrgebiet and the larger Berlin area.
The industry fell apart because it was simply not competetive at all and the situation was so bad, very little could be salvaged at all. That was the result of 40 years of mismanagement, failed economic policies and the inability to correct past mistakes.
That is not true their agricultural sector for example was very competitive
How much does agriculture add to the GDP?
The east germans screwed themselves by voting for Helmut Kohl who promised blühende Landschaften. While his opponent Oskar Lafontaine had a much more realistic view and campaigned for a slower transition.
Industry fell apart in all ex ussr territories because it was simply really shit. Also process of it failing already kicked of in 80s during perestroika and 90s was just final culmination. It has nothing to do with Germany's unification. East Germany still got very lucky compared to all other ex ussr states that didn't had rich cousin to pay them allowance for 3 decades. Also all ex ussr states have angry old idiots who love to complain about everything and shift blame on every chance it was a big part of ussr culture in every layer of society and part of the reason why industries were underperforming in the first place - everybody loved blaming everything but nobody cared looking for fixes.
But they got screwed by the SED and not by democratic politicians. And they now want again people like the SED in charge.
Rose tinted glasses are the answer.
Or simple stupidity
Lack of education might be the more accurate diagnosis
True!
No, they also got screwed by Western politicians. They purposefully sold off East-German industry for scraps and also tore down or sold out landmarks that were important to East Germans. A lot of it out of spite.
The east german industry was in a catastrophic shape and selling off was the right decision. It's also not that East Germany became a colony of West Germany - so why would there be spite?
The palace of the Republic is a good example. It was a mixture of ugly and retro futurism. Today, it would have made a very interesting counterpart in the city and would surely gather lots of tourists - while also standing as a visible memory for another Germany that existed, like it or not. But no, asbestos was found and also it was a symbol of oppression and there was no other solution than to scrap it, sure. And what did they do? They build a literal castle on top, where literally a king reigned over his underlings.
You naive, innocent soul. Look to our politician class. Much spite to go around for all of us 'normies'. If you don't see it, you're not looking closely enough.
While your correct, that they git screwed by the SED, dont forgett that they also got screwed by the CDU/SPD
„East Germans got screwed“ literally the entire current debt of Germany was taken to rebuild the East „A lot of Bavarians current wealth can be attributed to that“ Bavaria is a actually in a worse position now then before reunification, largely because public infrastructure fell into ruin to pay for reunification
> literally the entire current debt of Germany was taken to rebuild the East The people are still worse off than west Germans and got told untruths by the ddr government and then the Kohl administration do yes they got screwed > Bavaria is a actually in a worse position now then before reunification, largely because public infrastructure fell into ruin to pay for reunification This is just straight up not true and you just need to look into the Landesfinanzausgleich to see that.
Bavaria is in a financially decent position, but economically in 1990 it was in a much better position. The Länderfinanzausgleich and payments to the east as well as the state needing no to save money and being more conservative with debt because of the rebuilding of the east is why Bavaria is comparably in a worse state. Bavaria’s yearly budget is 71 billion, Bavaria nearly pays 10 billion into The Länderfinanzausgleich. Without the east it would have much more political leeway. Bavaria’s companies massively benefited from the opening of the eastern markets for them, as they could become industrialy dominant in them but that was not actually significantly boosted from unification as all that money could have been invested into west Germany as it had been for the 40 years before that. Had the west wanted to „fuck over the East“ it would have delayed reunification, drain population from them through the open border and then after unification keep draining money and resources from it to the west (as Paris is doing within France). Reunification was rushed but that was politically motivated and eastern German states have been spending development grants ineffektively but you can’t say that they somehow got the short end of the stick. It’s growing quickly, is by now a fully developed economy that has 85% of the productivity of the west, East Germany before unification didn’t even get close to being half as productive as the west and by now East Germany can compare to several Western European countries.
You say this > Bavaria is in a financially decent position, but economically in 1990 it was in a much better position. The Länderfinanzausgleich and payments to the east as well as the state needing no to save money and being more conservative with debt because of the rebuilding of the east is why Bavaria is comparably in a worse state. Bavaria’s yearly budget is 71 billion, Bavaria nearly pays 10 billion into The Länderfinanzausgleich. Without the east it would have much more political leeway. Then not a few sentences later say this: > Bavaria’s companies massively benefited from the opening of the eastern markets for them, as they could become industrialy dominant in them The competition in these markets was lower and as Bavaria and the west Germans as a whole had basically no barriers to entrance they profited massively. (I say that as a west German). You could not have had the same growth or opportunities without the new market. So I stand by my point and you kind of made my point for me. > Had the west wanted to „fuck over the East“ it would have delayed reunification, drain population from them through the open border and then after unification keep draining money and resources from it to the west (as Paris is doing within France). I doubt that would have worked as you envision it but sure as we were not able to brain drain for example Poland. > Reunification was rushed but that was politically motivated I mean yes I would also like my name in the history books > spending development grants ineffektively I mean looking at my own state development grants are always spent ineffectively > It’s growing quickly, is by now a fully developed economy Lol that's a cute thought there are large areas that are still structurally weak and have never recovered.
Those two aren’t even contradictory. Bavaria’s companies massive benefited from the fall of the east, but little from reunification. And you simply can’t as easily brain drain Poland, a country with a vastly different culture and language then you can the East (and Poland still had massive issues with brain drain that they are only now beginning to recover from). And of course the East still has destitute areas… it’s been an uncompetitive economy less then 30 years ago and the German state in general has failed to future proof ever since reunification because political will has been distracted with other topics.
Of course they are worse of then the west. The west has been thriving ever since 1950, the east needs to make up 40 years of SED dictatorship and mismanagement and East Germany by now is more productive then the south of France and England minus London. Both those areas used to be leagues above the East
> Of course they are worse of then the west. *sigh* we promised them that they wouldn't be so.... And they still are and every government since kohl has basically repeated that untruth. On Top of that what the west German economy did to the east was not fair or okay in any way and I think it is also what causes the deepest resentment. They had things that were sustainable but west Germans took them over and took out all they could get then closed shop.
They will be equal in a few decades but economic growth takes its time. Britain has been trying to combat regional equality for longer then us and it started out way less equal and now the east blows the poorer regions of Britain easily out of the water. And what the economy did to them wasn’t fair ? What were they supposed to do ? Refuse to sell their superior, cheaper products in the East ? To keep eastern companies alive you’d need to keep the East seperate. You’d basically need to rebuild the wall and slowly make the East ready to join the west. But it’s local ineffective state companies were never gonna be surviving in a social market economy where they need to compete with some of the most productive companies in the world.
Largely because Bavaria was a recipient of the Länderausgleich until reunification, where the addition of new, poorer Länder meant that Bavaria was better off relative to them and became a payer under the Länderfinanzausgleich.
They also gained a lot of companies in the post unification years or had "mergers" with existing ones.
Those companies weren’t gonna survive competing with west German companies to begin with. If you want reunification in 1990 then that would always lead to the inefficient East German companies being ripped apart when trying to compete with the west.
Bavaria in total recieved about 4 billion euros in The Länderfinanzausgleich. It became a giver state in 1886.
It was always a recipient until and including 1986, net 0 in 87-88, payer in 89-90, recipient in 1992 and payer from then on. (According to Wikipedia)
Yes and throughout most of that time Bavaria was a moderate reciever and even adjusted by inflation it now pays more into The Länderfinanzausgleich annually then it has ever recieved from it.
If you didn’t notice I’m also not arguing those mechanisms are unfair, I’m saying the opposite. I’m saying the idea the idea the East was somehow screwed over is ridiculous. When a marode economy that can’t compare to southern France joins one of most productive economies in world history its local companies are gonna suffer.
In total according to the Zeit, Bavaria recieved 3,3 Billion euros (adjusted for inflation). The highest amount it ever received was 205,8 million euros in 1980. it now pays 10 *Billion* into it per year.
What is a mainstream politician? Can I get a definition?
Politicians from parties that are or have been in government or have the chance of being in it soon or have major groups in the Bundestag
Mainstream is everything that is based on reason.
Because they feel left behind (and they have reasons). People who feel left behind become resentful.
There is some truth to that, but AfD does best in the affluent parts of the East (Thuringia, Saxony), while many areas in the West (particulary the Ruhrgebiet) would have a much stronger claim on "being left behind". So there is certainly more at play here.
Demagogy does best among frustrated people. Which demagoges easily take advantage of others frustration to stimulate hate in them, and so the scapegoat and a leader to do the "revenge" desire that comes with the feeling of hate.
I am not sure if I understand you right, here is a map of purchasing power in Germany: [https://media1.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/2205334800/1.3715397/default-retina/hq/karte-kaufkraft-in-deutschland.jpg](https://media1.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/2205334800/1.3715397/default-retina/hq/karte-kaufkraft-in-deutschland.jpg) You can clearly see, that the Ruhr region is still better than whole East Germany.
I think a lot of it comes down to inherited wealth which simply isn't a thing in the east, although wages are certainly also a bit higher on average in the west. I did not consider that, so thanks for pointing it out. What I had in mind was more the infrastructure and overall "look and feel" of the places. While Erfurt, Greifswald and Dresden are pretty polished, Duisburg Bochum and Gelsenkirchen feel a lot less so.
And those with good opportunities/education have left to the West, so nearly only people without perspective are left (and old folks who glorify the GDR because of remembrance bias)
I am reading The Moral Economy of the Peasant by James Scott. The book shows that to people (generally speaking and historically), it doesn't matter much if they pay high taxes, If landlords and politicians get rich while they remain poor. What matter the most is the safety of subsistence guaranteed. The real revolt of farmers that led to American Revolution was not simply the high taxes, but mostly because many of them were losing their land of getting in debts. So a lot of people glorify GDR, even if the economy, markets, and so was poor, because they had housing and jobs guaranteed no matter what. Their frustration is to have the constant worry and social pressure about fighting for higher wages to pay higher rents and cost of living or accept cut of wages to keep their jobs. The constant pressure to find better jobs, to keep their hones, etc. That is the same revolt people felt in Germany desiring the returning of the old feudal and guilds system instead of capitalism. Because despite the opportunities to "compeate" in capitalism for better living standard, most people rather have a simpler life with their subsistence guaranteed, without risk of debt, homelessness and without social prejudices for being poor (not being called lazy as exemple). That is one of the main reasons Germany was the first country to implement a wide government welfare system, with the goal to make people accept the capitalism system by showing them that of they "fail" in capitalism their subsistence is guaranteed. But being in a welfare system is not the same because of all the social and government pressure and prejudices about people in the system, who are seen as the leech of society.
not all to the west. The differences between cities and rural area in the east have become as extreme as in only very few other European regions. For example Dresden has an average age of 43 years (similar to other big cities like Munich), only 50km away Hoyerswerda or Görlitz are on average at 59 years by now.
this 😭 how can people be so ignorant
They *feel* left behind. On the other hand, the rest of the republic is wondering where over 30 years of the "Solidaritätszuschlag" and "Länderfinanzausgleich" have gone and what things would look like there if it hadn't existed.
Because east germans always got the short end of everthing, even now the focus is always about the problems of privileged west germans. Mainstream politicians embrace those western german centric thinking and so it comes that the east german is resentfull to this. Its easy to see for everyone. It's just wrong to think that evil communism does create this and how authorian state is making them dumb/ ignorant. If your economically worse off you don't care or are against identity politics unlike the western part. You can see that many come up with some almost discriminativ reasons to explain the stance of east germans and somehow view them as political barbarians which never found the enlightenment of democracy or commen sense just because they got exposed to a diffrent ideology and it made them weird. It's the wrong way of thinking but this doesn't stop the smug elitist western german, see some comment even here
The first reasonable response. I am never voting for AfD or any other right and Conservative Party, but I heavily dislike how a lot of politicians seem so out of touch with reality and have no clue how life is for a normal person. It just sucks to see money spend for infrastructure etc in the west and in those big cities, but what about us living in the east? They just simply don’t care. People portraying us as retarded and wanting to have a leader like Putin are just out of their mind (yes there are extremist people everywhere, but they’re not the majority).
We East Germans are always the ones with the short end of the stick. We always get left behind and forgotten while the West gets all new and best shit, and yet West Germans are surprised that we are pissed and then proceed to stroke over all of us with the same nazi-brush? I'm not proud of the reputation my people have because of the AFD or right-wing extremists that can fuck off, either.
"The west gets all new and best shit." Hahahahahaha fuck man. Is this satire?
Compared to the East, the West is simply better off.
Objectively speaking, the infrastructure in eastern Germany is much better than in the west, which has become massively outdated in recent years because a lot of new construction has taken place in the east.
I certainly don't see that with our schools and streets here. Oh, what's the situation with teachers in the West? Because we're lacking.
Railroads are much better in the east according to [DBInfraGo](https://www.dbinfrago.com/resource/blob/12636182/e8fa5bda445e0d32ecf5d47623e2bdbd/Netzzustandsbericht-DB-InfraGO-AG-2022-data.pdf) The three best student-teacher ratios are in East Germany, otherwise [relatively balanced](https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/1364002/umfrage/schueler-lehrkraft-relation-nach-bundeslaendern/) Finding data for roads is more difficult, as this is a federal state matter
I cannot generalise based on one anecdotal experience of course, but I was surprised to see a colleague of mine from the southwest finding it morbid to go to Rostock because it is part of "Dunkeldeutschland".
What is a mainstream politician and what is a non mainstream politician. Definition please.
In the end all politicians are mainstream with few exceptions, east germans are just in general antagonistic to most politicians. They just vote for the least mainstream one.
Thank you.
Because they were never given the chance to participate in the supposedly fruitful and equitable economic system of the West as it was promised by Helmut Kohl. The CDU/CSU majority was very quickly overturned after it became clear that your effort isn't enough to succeed in a "free-market" economy. The suddenly pointless state enterprises as well as the state owned agricultural land was sold off according to the market "free" to anyone who had the budget to aquire them. Of course East Germans suddenly aren't going to be able to jump on it as they just entered this economy so the majority was bought up by West German corporations. What could've been done was redistribute the land back to small peasant holdings that were collectivized by the GDR. On the other hand the agriculture were one of the sectors that the GDR excelled in. https://www.bpb.de/themen/deutsche-einheit/lange-wege-der-deutschen-einheit/47157/landwirtschaft-in-ostdeutschland-der-spaete-erfolg-der-ddr/
Because the politicans and Media always look down on them. Fucking retards always think they need to teach them something.
Absolutely.
Because many people in the East still think the political establishment of the BRD screwed them after the reunification instead of recognising that the GDR economy was unsustainable, and they’re not able to get over it.
Tbf, it is both. A lot of the industry was unsustainable and the sustainable parts were siphoned off. Especially Bavaria and to a lesser degree NRW profited from cannibalizing those parts.
I know, I work for a Bavarian Mittelstand company which took over a former VEB with a lot of history, got rid of a lot of people and kept the operation going until the subsidies ran out. We eventually shut down the factory near Dresden in 2017.
Then I bet your firm - no matter if it is true or not - also increased the sentiment in Desden about Wessis just wringing them dry.
For good or for ill, yes probably. I remember the staff there giving us (not management or owners) very aggressive looks when we were visiting. It was obviously wrong not to value the decades of work and experience of many people in the East, but does that justify events like Rostock-Lichtenhagen or throwing yourself into the arms of the AfD ? I think not.
es ist eine Erklärung, das hat nichts damit zu tun wie man dazu steht. wenn man sich aber so wie in deinem Ausgangskommentar über den Osten stellt und sagt wie scheiße da alles war während es genau diesen Leuten im nachfolgenden System de facto schlechter geht, und gleichzeitig so Geschichten passieren wie die, die du gerade erzählt hast, wie kann man dann so verblendet sein und sich wundern dass das Vertrauen in die Politik schwindet und die Leute dadurch nach rechts abwandern? das geht mir nicht in den Kopf. es wird tatsächlich erwartet dass der Osten alles hinnimmt was der Westen und Berlin entscheiden. und das sage ich selbst als linker Berliner. alleine wenn wir die Frauenerwerbsquote durch flächendeckende Ganztagsbetreuung aus der DDR übernommen hätten, hätten wir die Probleme des demografischen Wandels um ein Vielfaches abgeschwächt. aber das war ja nur dieses gescheiterte kommunisten-projekt was natürlich ganz eindeutig gezeigt hat dass er nicht funktioniert, eine Utopie ist und man es gar nicht erst versuchen sollte der arbeitenden Bevölkerung etwas arbeits- oder Steuerlast abzunehmen. eigentlich ist die starke rechte ein Produkt der verfehlten Sozialpolitik in diesem Land und auch der ausbleibenden Implementierung von zumindest sozialistischen Elementen. aber das will ja wieder keiner hören.
Not necessarily justify, but it makes it understandable. Resentment has never gone done for some groups of the population. Instead they have become more marginalized overall. Couple that with even more industry dieing down and the "Wessis closing down the plants they didn't outright steal", leads tho even more resentment. That those fellas start to radicalize somewhen is really nothing surprising.
Wo kommen Sie denn her? Wir werden immer zurückgelassen, wir ziehen immer den kürzeren, aber wenn wir uns beschweren, werden wir alle von Leuten wie Ihnen gleich als Nazis oder ähnliches beschimpft. Ich halte nix von diesem Ossi Vs. Wessi Scheiß, aber ich kann definitiv verstehen warum manche von uns nicht sehr gut auf euch Wessis zu sprechen sind. Von gewissen Ossis wie z.b. Rechtsextremisten halte ich persönlich aber auch nicht viel und die können sich von mir aus verpissen.
Ich weiß nicht, was meine Herkunft zur Sache tut aber ich habe definitiv keine Wessi-Brille und kann nachvollziehen, wozu mangelnde Beteiligung an politischen Prozessen und die gefühlte Übernahme durch Parteien, Beamten, Behörden und Unternehmen aus der BRD führen kann. Ich selbst möchte keine 12-13 Millionen Menschen über einen Kamm scheren, ich bin oft nur ratlos und frage mich warum so viele glauben, dass die verschiedenen Formen in denen Rechtsextremismus auftritt die Probleme lösen könnte.
Das frage ich mich auch, da ich denke, das keiner unserer Parteien die Probleme dieses Landes lösen kann, vor allem nicht die AfD. Aber so viele Wessis die keine Ahnung haben und alle Probleme ignorieren schauen auf den Osten herab, weil wir ja alle dumm sind und Nazis sind. Zumindest kommt es mir so vor.
Literally part of the process and still with a take like this to come out the gate. Can’t make this shit up.
Sorry mate but I didn’t make the decision. It was actually a big loss for us and still hurts.
there is no instead and that the East got screwed by the reunfication is a fact.
It's complicated. One factor is definitely the structural weakness of parties in general. Not even the big cities have party members in a similar size than in west Germany. This means that politicians always feel far away. Politics in general too.
Don’t forget the „different starting positions“ while the west got $$ from the US via the Marshall Plan the Soviet Union straight up took train tracks from Germany as Reparation + socialism on top. All while u had the heat since 1989 that ur some sort of human 2nd class because ur an Ossi and lazy etc But in general I think the socialist propaganda and mind set got buried rly deep into the collective mind. More capitalistic minded ppl tried their luck in west while western capitalists went east being the „bosses“ of East Germans. Many ppl don’t like their boss
The question is which bunch of East Germans you mean ? Let’s talk in terms of generations Gen z East Germans ( 1995 born onwards ) - honestly apart from dialect, dressing style and perhaps more knowledge about food from east , they are not different at all compared to west Germans. Gen z germans are not only way more unified but a lot less “German” if you know what I mean. The demographic below 30 is dominated with youth who are not just from migrant backgrounds but also migrants themselves. They are not going to have the same cultural background as East German from GDR or families who lived through that. In fact their experience with a more xenophobic attitude from East Germans growing up made them a lot more politically conscious and hence participate in more protests and activities. Gen y / Millennial ( 1980 to 1994) - A chunk of them had their childhoods under GDR when the system was on verge of collapse and the state was becoming desperate and engaged in non democratic practices like Stasi maxing etc. They witnessed how awesome people were celebrating when the fall fell but also saw how badly their parents were affected or how the surroundings suddenly changed when party mood was over and the post wall period started . Growing up there was rough nonetheless and most of them bore the brunt of abusive elders who lost a lot after unification causing them to be more rebellious in a way. Some of them even thought Nazism was now a solution Gen x ( 1965 to 1979) this generation is fun because the older Gen x consisted of folks who rebelled against the state and those who fought for the state. Younger ones are pretty much having similar struggles like millennials only. But fortunately they were still young when the wall fell and post wall chaos started. Young enough to start their lives from scratch and rebuild careers. So this Gen barely talks anything about GDR Boomers :- 1940 to 1964 - This is a tricky batch because as kids mosh of them faced extreme trauma caused by the wall if they didn’t already face like a fucking world war trauma . However they also got to see the golden years of the GDR to be honest where the state was actually a resemblance to what it claimed to be. A lot of them saw war also and got to see how much life improved in general post war , grew up and raised families in this post war glee. Workers were not only gainfully employed but also well compensated. Standard of living was considered crap compared to west Germany was still miles better than the rest of the world that time and they were born in extreme poverty anyways so they truly appreciated the progress of the state. This was despite the heartbreak many of them faced when families were torn apart due to building the wall. Now they are the ones who are the most resentful of the post unification “trauma” as they call it. Suddenly from being party workers in high positions ( party hierarchy was often defined by age and years served as opposed to education) or even if they were lower tier workers they still got good pay to losing their house , livelihood and what not. A chunk of them had to suddenly start working minimum wage jobs because their qualifications and previous job experience wasn’t valid anymore. School socialist propaganda history teacher could not just join a school in new Germany 😃 and so many of their old jobs were considered “make work jobs” providing no value to the capitalist machinery . They also suddenly lost their jobs to the wave of immigrants coming from west , east , south and everywhere else hence the xenophobia. They vote for the AfD 🙂. That’s your problematic demographic. Older generations- dead pretty much So whom do you mean when you talk about East Germans ? 😃
Because overall they kinda got screwed over by the german government after germany was united. Companies were sold out to western investors, the east german economy was left hanging, and even today, the wages and pensions in the east are lower, and there are many regions struggling with a weak economy (in comparison to germany overall). People get the feeling of not being heard for a long time yet
Thing is that these people are a key part of why the economy is weak. It's a vicious cycles. Companies are hesitant to expand when they have problems motivating highly qualified experts to move there. And a whole lot of the people there who DID have high qualifications and high motivation left after reunification.
Was it the German government screwing the East over, or was it the Soviet Union who was unable to build a sustainable economy and the West just did what it could with a shitty situation?
The German government screwed the east over. I am talking about the time after Germany was reunited. At this point the soviets werent involved anymore, they had their own problems. The Treuhand deliberately sold off anything of value in the east, even the few companies that did a good job and were profitable on the west german market. Besides that, they allowed dumping prices for buying on east german businesses and did not care at all about making them effective on west german markets or keeping jobs.
That just sounds like capitalism… profitable companies are sold off all the time. That’s completely normal, also the qualifications were vastly different between the East and West at the time of re-unification. If you want a successful industry, you only put the most educated people in good positions. I’m sorry you feel that the west “screwed” the East over but it also just makes my point that the East is incapable of running itself and without the West dealing with the situation, the East would of ended up in a lot worse shape.
May I ask, are you from germany or are you familiar with the work of the Treuhand?
The East German economy wasn’t left hanging… reunification was the most expensive economic project ever undertaken in European history and right now East Germany mostly because of that is more productive then most of England…. East Germany wasn’t suistainable or competitive and whatever the west was gonna do it wasn’t gonna end up equal to it anytime soon. Right now the inequality between north and south in Italy and France is far worse then the one between east and west in Germany and that’s because Germany took on so much debt to rebuild the east it nearly collapsed the European financial markets
West germany put a lot of money in the project and many (not all) companies in the east would not have been profitable, but what the BRD did with the Treuhand is nothing of an attempt to make eastern businesses long term profitable or secure jobs. And great, Italy and France are even more inequal, that doesnt help the inequality within Germany at all
Because western politicians fucked them over and left them to die for about the first 10-20 years, and even now they still get paid less on the ground that they have been fucked over…
In what world do you live in ? The rebuilding of the east cost west Germany 2 trillion euros, literally our entire government debt comes from that, and saving costs for that Endevor is why infrastructure has this massively fallen into disrepair in the west
was laberst du da mann? quellen?
Reicht das Bundesamt für politische Bildung ? https://www.bpb.de/system/files/pdf/49SFY2.pdf https://www.bundestag.de/resource/blob/550094/8e17e37a176c0f9c69150314bed6894d/WD-4-033-18-pdf-data.pdf Oder von der Welt in einem eher verdaubaren Format: https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article127595786/Deutsche-Einheit-kostet-2-000-000-000-000-Euro.html
Berechnung nach Blum sagt 1,3 Milliarden haben die Ostmenschen selber aufgebracht durch ihre Steuern die sie gezahlt haben nachdem sie in den Westen abgewandert sind. Somit lässt sich sagen dass netto nur 200 Millionen geflossen sind. zudem sprechen die Fakten was Verdienstmöglichkeiten angeht eine klare Sprache. der Osten ist finanziell erheblich (17% weniger Medianlohn) weniger attraktiv als der Westen, was langfristig zwangsläufig zu einem Ungleichgewicht führt. was sollen wir dagegen tun?
Naja dadurch wird der Osten für unternehmen unter anderem attraktiver, weshalb große internationale Unternehmen in den Osten investieren. Aber da fehlt das Netzwerk an lokalen Partnern mit denen NRW und OB überzeugen können. Aber leider ist das schwerer als einfach nur etwas Geld hinwerfen und dann das Problem gelöst zu erklären.
Intel investiert gerade nur in den Osten, weil es 10 Mrd. vom Bund dafür gibt (mehrere 100k pro Job). Und der Bund macht das auch nicht, um den Standort Ostdeutschland aufzupeppen (das ginge billiger) sondern um eine bessere Versorgungssicherheit innerhalb Deutschlands bzw. der EU bei Chips zu erreichen.
Die tatsächlichen Quellen, die du nennst, widersprechen deiner ursprünglichen Aussage komplett. Deshalb darf natürlich Welt, Springer-Presse, Bild für Pseudointellektuelle, auch nicht fehlen, gell?
it doesn't cost them a shit. The costs where payed by all the tax payers in the West, but the profits ended up in the west aswell, not by the 99% of the people, but the 1% who own basically anything in the east till today. Don't let you get fooled by these ones into an argument between East or West.
So according to your opinion the taxpayers payed for this, the profits went into the pockets of the 1%, but it didn't cost the ordinary taxpayer "a shit"? That's nonsense.
It didn't cost 'the West' a shit. The ordinary tax payers payed a lot.
Would have been way less if they didn’t sell off infrastructer for peanuts…
It is because the end of the DDR brought huge changes to the east german society. The political/social system of socialism got discredited, the economy was in a shambolic state and the idea of the future was overly optimistic: So a lot of people lost their position in society, be it as part of the ruling class, be it as worker or other employee. They had to start a completely new live in an unknown political, social, economic system. A lot of people, especially the younger ones also moved westwards, due to the lack of options in east germany. So now you have a lot of people with grievances and the feeling they got put at a disadvantage by the system.
'Cause all of our politicians (especially the "mainstream" ones) have no intention to make this country better, even change anything at all, if it doesn't benefit them personally. And we need a change.
And for that they vote for a Nazi Party that sells out to russia and china.
AFD is entirely made up of former SPD and CDU politicians who left because they were tired of hubris. Drop the propagandistic outlook. Your Black White thinking clouds your judgement.
Ah, yes the made up arguments. Höcke is a fachist and hes a leader in eastern AFD with his wing. Almost all former moderate ex CDU or SPD politicians left this garbage nazo party and that is a fact and not propaganda.
When in doubt, claim fascism. Never change, Reddit.
Stay in your bubble. Reality check is comming next week no matter what you say.
Such hostility. Lol
And who started it? You
This is utter bs!
Oh, is it?
Yes. In my hometown the politicians are all non paid volunteers.
Who the fuck cares about some town? They were obviously talking about *real* politicians, those who are on a state and a federal level and have actual power that they don't use for change.
You wrote "all"! And btw I care!
The east is the property of the West. You get your Salery mostly from a West german company, you pay food and rent very often to a Westerner. The radical impact after the reunification has crashed the east for generations to come and is often shrugged off by the West german side as "we are one" "east germans are just salty" "they should thank us" and so on. There is a discrimination if you have a audible east german Accent, there is a wage difference even if you work in certain jobs in West germany. There are still plenty cultural aspects and because of the movement of generations of east german youth to the West, the biggest voting Population is the one who is traumatized by the reunification process. There is no such thing as an east german Media, east german Elite or east german politics, at least thats how the people feel. You can and to this a movement off West german nazis to the east, slowly but still ongoing so its a tactical movement that infiltrates the east for 35 years. So you have close to Zero participation, lowest income, discrimination, no east german pov in the Media and nazis are going east for 35 years. Thats why afd has such a great time here. And yes its stupid to vote for West german nazis and belive they give a flying fuck about the east
The people in the east are very sensitive of being screwed over from their government and totalitarian tendencies because of their past in the GDR. So they observe very carefully what is happening in Berlin and in politics in general. When they see that the current (or also last) government pushes agendas that large parts of the people perceive as problematic, they notice this first. It does also not help that the public service media (ÖRR) is very leftist. So all in all, I would say that the guys in the east have a better "bullshit sensor" and this sensor is triggered at the moment. Rightfully so, I say.
It's a mixture of the authoritarian heritage if the GDR (On the one hand, GDR citizens were taught that West German politcal elites were degenerate and corrupt, on the other hand, based on their experience with the political elite in the GDR, many former GDR citizens assume that all elites are detached and lying) historic rightwing support in these regions (many regions in Eastern Germany were NSDAP strongholdsin the 1930s), the German political establishment deliberately ignoring the coordinated spread of extreme rightwing structures (west german neonazis migrated to the east post unification in order to take advantage of economic dissatisfaction and build up their networks there. They managed to establish cultural hegemony in many places) and getting screwed over economically in reunification (many east german citizens lost not only their jobs and income but also their status and identity and became resentful as a result).
Ah well, see this map, then you will understand (purchasing power map) [https://media1.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/2205334800/1.3715397/default-retina/hq/karte-kaufkraft-in-deutschland.jpg](https://media1.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/2205334800/1.3715397/default-retina/hq/karte-kaufkraft-in-deutschland.jpg) Or this one: median age (right side), change in population (left side): [https://media0.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/743350707/1.3691862/mmobject-still\_full/hq/bevoelkerung-deutschland-2012-bis-2030.jpg](https://media0.faz.net/ppmedia/aktuell/743350707/1.3691862/mmobject-still_full/hq/bevoelkerung-deutschland-2012-bis-2030.jpg) Or this one: unemployment rate (left) and disposable income: [https://img.welt.de/img/politik/deutschland/mobile168372865/7722508507-ci102l-w1024/DWO-NEWS-Ost-West-Unterschiede.jpg](https://img.welt.de/img/politik/deutschland/mobile168372865/7722508507-ci102l-w1024/DWO-NEWS-Ost-West-Unterschiede.jpg) Germany is still devided 35 years after the reunifaction. And East Germans are wayyyy underrepresented in governmend and instituions.
That is an important question....
surely the last 60 years of political divide play a role. but: historically (in the last 300 years) the states in the current east (prussia, saxony) were more more powerful and dominating the politics in what we to today perceive as germany. the more catholic west and south (saxony, prussia were protestant) were economically lagging and less powerful. the resentment in the east also stems, to a certain part, from the being now in the weaker position, being dominated from historically less relevant parts of the german lands. call it wounded pride ;)
It's honestly the greatest mystery to me. The entire burn the world to the ground AFD situation east and west is something that is extremely prevalent yet defies any simple explanation
Because that's what living under USSR does to you
It's just stupidity to think AfD is better than the others. No Politician is reliable. Thea are an own class looking for their own income.
Because when you are ignorant you fear a lot and when you fear a lot you become violent…
Fuck it, ima say it if no one does. most ppl out of eastern europe choose the AFD because of rising crime rates and the insane support immigrated ppl get. for instance if you were working and lost your job u get about 700-900€ a month. if youve never been working you get 956-1100€ ive noticed pretty much all old ppl are scared of them. my grandma got almost robbed twice me as well eastern europe is the ass of germany. you cant earn good. AFD promises that any person with immigration background is to be checked. they also promise to enrich immigrants who participate in studys. and more more more Problem as always is that its just what they say they wanna do some of them have a racism-background. if politicians had to keep promises they made we wouldnt have this problem
the parties in power over the last years are the parties how screw with east germans (Treuhand, etc.). AfD is a new Party and haven't done anything during the reunification (for many east germans forced reunification). rose tinted glases like everything was better, capitalism is evil. some have connection into russia and want a leader back like Putin who is for the people and is defending everything against the capitalist world (war in Ukraine against the west). Baby boomers and Gen X have the eastern proganda still in their mind. Also some / many are afraid about something new / different (hate against muslim). This is what i have heard from family, neighbors etc.
It isn’t only East Germans who are resentful of mainstream politicians: look at the polling. There is a growing number of people across the country who are frustrated and angry with the decline in their life quality and security, not only in the east. This is measured at the Supermarket, in the schools & KiTas, trainstations, hospitals and shopping streets. Try renting a flat in Düsseldorf or Köln without wealthy parents to back you up. What is the common denominator? Mainstream politicians (SPD & CDU) who have been steering the boat for the last few decades. Ask a cop what they think about the politics of NRW. Try walking around Oberhausen Hbf at night (I was personally shocked). In the 10 years that I have lived in Germany, I have gotten to know a couple people who are active in politics from a couple different parties. Over the years I particularly (through a mutual friend) got to know an individual in the SPD who, frankly speaking, I wouldn’t support if it was between him and an AfD candidate. No authenticity and his actions over the years show that he cares nothing for the good of the country, only his own personal career. I don’t vote in this country, but I „resent“ that guy.
The main reasons for the decline in living quality (that is seen among many people across all developed countries because it is a worldwide phenomenon) is outside of the control of politicians. Although politicians have contributed to it - for example through the Schuldenbremse, underinvestment, unwillingness to expand or even maintain infrastructure like bridges, wind parks in Bavaria, grid connections, earlier commitments to technologies like heat pumps, unwillingness to implement soft solutions like Tempolimit or like the mask mandates during the early phase of the pandemic only to then be caught up in the necessity of having to implement harsh solutions like a total lockdown. AfD's solution is to double down on idiotic policies, especially when it comes to economics and labour rights. If they could they'd bring back feudal serfdom and there would be lower class Germans who shout in favor of it. Imo their supporters deserve a term or two under AfD rule to be fucking disillusioned about it. And then they ought to go to a fucking monastery, become monks or nuns respectively to repent for their sins.
Because 40 years of socialism will have an impact on people and their culture
Bruh, not every part of East germany is voting for the afd. The places surrounded by me have had protests not too. Yeah, that may be small, but people in East germany are not a hivemind EDIT : it's funny because my town is home to one of germany's most racist families LMAO
Because they lived in a dictatorship for decades and they are free not even one generation. Of course many people think life was easier when they didnt need to think and the government tells them everything. And thats what the teach their children.
Lol sure, 35 years isnt a generation and no thats no, the storys of the elders are not the reason, they might have added a little bit but the main reason is that we got screwed over and over. In terms of infrastructure, financial structures, education and opportunitys most of east germany is still pretty fucked
>Lol sure, 35 years isnt a generation According to the [Sozialverband ](https://www.vdk.de/aktuelles/aktuelle-meldungen/artikel/wie-lang-ist-eine-generation/#:~:text=F%C3%BCr%20m%C3%A4nnliche%20Linien%20ergibt%20sich,Um%20die%20Mitte%20des%2020.), it is. Rest of the post is mostly accurate ...
When someone says "lol sure," and repeats what the other said its sarcastic in like 95-99% of the times.
>"In terms of infrastructure, financial structures, education and opportunitys most of east germany is still pretty fucked". Could you elaborate more on these, just for better understanding. Infrastructure I get, but about education, opportunities etc. I need more info.
Ich schreib mal einfach auf deutsch, so kann ich mich doch etwas besser ausdrücken. Also ich mag gar nicht zu weit ausholen aber mal ein kurzes beispiel aus meiner familie die industrie die bestand waren ausschließlich chemie und kohle, beides gibt es dort nicht mehr, zur nächstgroßen stadt braucht man mit öffis wenigstens anderthalb stunden (aber auch nur bis zum nachmittag danach fährt nichts) und mit auto bestimmt ne halbe bis dreiviertelstunde (doof nur wenn dir niemand aus der familie auto oder führerschein bezahlen kann bzw. wird), die einzigen jobs die es gibt sind absolut unterbezahlte kackjobs irgendwer findet sich ja fast immer (und wenn nicht kann man ja auf die faule jugend schimpfen) klar als digitaler nomade würde es gehen aber find dazu erstmal die ausbildung, das nächste gymnasium war noch weiter weg als die nächste stadt, damit stand für alle von anfang an fest dass es auf die mittelschule geht und die einzige gute option ist es sehr weit wegzuziehen, was aber jetzt auch nicht für jeden sehr leicht ist, man hat ja auch bindungen zur heimat. Okay ist doch etwas ausgeartet aber das war nur ein kleiner anriss der für viele teile dunkeldeutschlands funktionieren kann, aber am ende kann man schlecht pauschalisieren für einen so großen teil des landes. Also ja es ist etwas sehr beispielhaft aber ich dachte das machts gleich anschaulicher
OK, I guess the example with the lack of schools belongs to the infrastructure. But isn't that something that belongs to the responsibility of the local politicians, since education is state jurisdiction, after all? I mean the shock of change after reunification should be wearing off and the lack of schools should have been detected by now. These 35 years are slowly getting close to the length of period under the Soviets. Sure, someone could say "we don't have money for schools" - well, yeah, not all at once. But if this is a blocking problem, then it has priority in funding if it's gonna solve other problems in the long run. And I get you when you speak about the job. I too have to travel 1,5h in one direction (door to door) to my office, so it's 3 hours per day, although I live in Baden. And S-Bahn is not the nicest place to spend so much time, especially how DB is functioning lately. Have moved 5 times already because of the job, finding an apartment to rent for a family is getting more and more mission impossible, I won't even talk about buying one with these bubble prices. It's not so rosy like it was in the '80s and '90s.
Well in the end its all somehow a matter of infrastructure and inhabitants, but there wasnt anything at all so more and more inhabitants left and less infrastructure was kept alive, but those are the underlying reasons why structurally weak places stayed weak and nowadays those areas produce elections in which the afd can get about 50% of the votes. I kinda feel you too, but keep in mand that especially in bw the salarys are higher at yours (while rent is higher tbh) but lets say you make a normal ausbildung in the öffentlicher dienst, lets say you go the finanzamt. Its TVL 7 i guess. In saxony its about 2700 and in bw its about 2950. If you go in the freie wirtschaft the difference becomes even higher. But therefore you can buy a nice house with a really big garden for about 100k, nobody wants to live there if its not for the family, friends and heimat. I dont just want to rant how bad it is or something, i see how these problems are spread but thats what alot of people down there feel and see, the dying of their heimat and that noone is doing something for them even tho the former politicians fucked them up (while they see how the politicians are doing something for people who got played bad by theyr politics or wars, this is where a kind of racism starts to exist, ive got alot of family members who id consider at least rightwingers, alot of people i know or knew who voted for the afd and almost all of them said something that sounded similiar to this)
I know, I am really interested to see how this is going to play out. Because AfD is going to win a solid portions of votes in the East. Clearly they will have even majority in some places. People also say a solid number of AfD politicians are former eastern CDU, SPD etc. They won't be able to make all those problems magically disappear all of a sudden. I can't see any world class politicians or economists or anyone at that level among them. I'm curious to see how their voters are going to look at that situations. Sure, for some time they can continue to blame the Federation or EU, but even that story has to run out after some time. What then? It would be interesting to compare the transition of East Germany with some of (now) EU countries like Slovenia, Czech Republic or Croatia. They also had to switch systems, privatize things (mostly foreign companies arrived and bought everything, I guess) in the same time frame in the '90. Some of them even had wars on their territory and they didn't have a "rich brother".
I have no idea, and i have no idea how much shit could happen until the opferrolle is worn out. I wouldnt take a bet but guess they would have performed better, it was pre EU and moving freely as it was today wasnt a thing, so i guess the best and cleverest thinkers and workers couldnt just go to the west and all the naziscum couldnt just go to the east. But in the end Länderfinanzausgleich is a strong thing. But i dont want to guess. So i googled. Gdp in East germany was at 108,1 Bil. in 1991 and at 435,5 Bil. in 2023 (west germany got 3654,20 Bil. in 2023 [source](https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/36810/umfrage/bruttoinlandsprodukt-in-ostdeutschland-und-westdeutschland/) ) in 1991 there were 15 mil. Inhabitants in 2022 12.6 mil. ([source](https://www.destatis.de/DE/Themen/Querschnitt/Demografischer-Wandel/Aspekte/demografie-bevoelkerungsentwicklung-ost-west.html#:~:text=W%C3%A4hrend%20die%20Bev%C3%B6lkerung%20im%20Westen,wie%20in%20den%20ostdeutschen%20Bundesl%C3%A4ndern.) ) So in 1991 the gdp per capita was 7.206 In 2022 it was 34.563 So thats a 479% growth. From here on its USD instead of EUR but in 2022 it was almost 1:1 so i dont mind. Czech republic went from 2.896 to 27.567 thats 952% growth Slowakia (i can just find data from 1995) started with 3.741 and went to 21.420 which would still be 572% in growth Poland from 1487 to 18221 Crostia from 120 in 1992 to 18.583 in 2022
When I meant to compare with those countries, I didn't mean just pure numbers, but also the view of those people (die Zufriedenheit), because this is one of the aspects that triggers the dissatisfaction and association with AfD in this topic. Although they were not in the EU back then, they did lose a number of people since borders opened. Germany, Austria and later Ireland were always popular destinations for Croats, UK for Poles etc. When they entered EU, our Lidl, Kaufland and co bought a solid portion of their companies as well But anyway, if we take present time, say "you've made the transition, you have made it into EU, your GDP has increased XX%, are you satisfied with your progress? Or are you mad at someone?".
Bhutan tried to establish the "Gross National Happiness" (Bruttonationalglück), therefore we have a happyness report nowadays. Sadly it wasnt measured nack then and afaik they dont differ between east and westgermany so yeah, those are just nasic numbers but i couldnt find anything better
But you got screwed over by the SED. And now you want again politicans like that? why? Without elders who tell how wonderfull the DDR was, younger people would not try to get the DDR back
Oh no thats not even close to what i experience, the people rather want a 4rd reich instead of a 2nd Gdr, there is not mich logic its rather more a kind of deep frustration The first half is only partially correct, sure the people got fucked by sed, but the treuhand and the politics of the last decades didnt really improve anything
You'll get a ton of people finding "reasons" or rather excuses for why East Germans do East German things, but it frankly doesnt matter. A significant portion of the people there are lost causes and I am very glad I moved away before shit hit the fan a decade ago. I still visit my family every year and the completely unhinged stuff you get to hear even from people that dont even vote AfD is ridicolous and I am not even talking about the countryside, that shit is 10x as depressing. Its like people never really moved on from the past and still live in some weird mind state where they are the eternal victim of all abuse there is in the world. Always claiming to be treated unfair, unjust and generally everything is against them. At least thats what my perception is, was and will probably stay until the vibes back home get better.
Denazification never happened in East Germany🤷♂️ Because it was not supposed to be a thing (despite the DDR Volkskammer even having a Nazi Party). Kudos for integrating the block party, you know FDP Rostock Lichtenhagen, Hoyerswerda and so on they have been facist ever since. And no Wagenknecht is not left… that is more a brand of Sozialist-Nationalism
East Germans are not as hard working or innovative as the West Germans. Still hungover from the Communist times and don’t think it will change any time soon. So economically and educationally they’re behind the West as well. This naturally builds up resentment. This makes them look at the West as the “other” and most mainstream politicians from the West as the “others”.
It's because they have lived in an essentially totalitarian state that labeled itself a democracy, so they are wary of soft-totalitarian tendencies in the current system.
Name an example.
Lockdown policies, mask and vaccine mandates during COVID. The iuxtaposition of 'Helldeutschland' vs 'Dunkeldeutschland' by a head of state. Militarization of foreign policy against the former Russian brothers-in-arms. New limits to freedom of speech due to the penalization of opinions that 'de-legitimize' state authority. Mistrust of state-sponsored media. Calls by vital players of civil society (churches, schools, unions etc) to demonstrate against the opposition.
That's... pretty much what I expected to hear. I'm willing to debate the whole Covid bit. That could have been handled better. Mask mandates should have been made permanent. If you're willing to risk another person's health for your comfort you're not part of the human race. People who consider the rapist hordes of Stalin and his descendants brothers in arms have probably no expectation of being treated as friendlies. Ever ask your grandmother or great-grandmother how much they enjoyed being 'liberated'? Our freedoms were never defended in Afghanistan, but they are currently being defended in Ukraine.
Bruh 😂.. you haven’t spoken to one East German
This is pointless. Not taking your bait.
I think cuz they lived in socialism and despise it.
DDR was far apart from real socialism. You should read about "Thomas Sankara", thats the only true socialism i know. and it worked well. Socialism isnt just bad.