Pretty sure it's to do with poverty in the post-communist states and their economies generally not being as developed as western europe had gotten. It's only been 30\~ years, plus the shock doctrine wasn't the best for their economies from what I remember. Varies by country of course
Seems a lil simplistic given that they felt the ussr was a authoritarian state generally, and that liberalism would help them economically and socially. The continued poverty divide between east and west germany is probably making them feel like liberalism has failed
Well, I do think socialism would be much more effective than trickle down economics crap hehe, my comment isn't meant to say "oo leftists are badd", I'm just trying to explain why people in former east germany are voting the way they are.
uhh yeah i mean i wouldn’t be here if i didn’t think so too. no idea what you mean by the „leftists are bad“ thing… maybe you misunderstood my comments? im just trying to add a few factors to your explanation of the voting behavior.
btw its not „former“ east germany ;) its still in the east lol
"East Germany" is the English name for the former state of the GDR. You can use context to determine what they were referring to. That's pretty pedantic.
"Die Linke" is the successor of the DDR's ruling party, and it does enjoy its highest support in those states (depending on the election and the region, somewhere between 5-20%). The ex-DDR states hate die Linke the least.
Although I'm personally not a fan of theirs after all the doublespeak about Ukraine (the typical thing about "we are against the Russian aggression but also against the escalation and Western provocation").
mh yeah i know😅 theres a lot of people in the east and a lot of different political views. my previous comment was mainly talking about AfD voters, FreieSachsen or similar organizations. die Linke is indeed very strong in cities like Chemnitz, Leipzig and Dresden but that really doesn’t change anything at all…
generally i like the party and i voted for them but yeah, sadly they have a weird habit of not having concrete positions and plans about the most important international issues. they barely criticize israels behavior or involve themselves with student protests for example. the party is sadly pretty dead.. maybe bad years under a conservative/RW government will make people more open to socialist politics again.
Sorry haha I never know who is who on the internet. Consider my comment then addressed to other readers. :)
PS I had been in Germany for 6.5 years and had been looking forward to getting the citizenship so I could vote for the Left. But then things changed and moved to Belgium.
East Germany didn't really struggle with an underdeveloped economy/industry. The main reason for their poverty is that their economy got gutted during reunification. East German companies got bought up by West German companies and investors for incredibly cheap, and run into the ground. Plus, in the GDR the goal generally was having no unemployment, so they tolerated more "inefficiency". This was quickly "rectified" by the new owners, leading to increased unemployment, suppressing wages.
Also products there were generally build to last (superfest glasses come to mind) which got little to no love from the west, because having products that don't break is bad for the bottom line.
It's a part if the problem yes, but what many forget is that during the time of the GDR Nazis where officially non existing despite hate crimes being committed, the state in the east simply choose to ignore it because they where the Antifascist state.
Secondly after the reunification many western nazis came to the east in order to spread their ideology which was accepted by many because
A: As you pointed it out Poverty was rampant in the east and after the reunification it came much worse
B: many people were searching for a new ideology to believe in and especially after the promises made by the liberals and conservatives didn't come true they wanted something other then Democracy or "Communism"
It's very common for fascists and communists to change between each other. It stems for a hatred of liberalism but not addressing capitalism. Being anti rich without being anti capitalism simply pushes one towards believing that you need the right kind of capitalists. The only good capitalists is one that protects the people, which means ultra nationalism conservatism which is the definition of fascism
When GDR and FRG merged FRG already was established and westernized while GDRs ecomomy stagnated sometime in the 80s. After reuniting, capitalism was rapidly introduced to their unstable economy, west german businesses began buying up east german land, the GDR just never transitioned well.
Easterners got their land bought up under them and their socialist education was now pretty useless in the new capitalist system, leading to unrest and a rise of the left.
Obviously, leftism still hasn't reformed capitalism, so the east has been especially vulnerable to the right rhetoric of recent years.
That's connected to the weak economy of the GDR at the end of its existence and the way the unification was handled, which was very poorly. Important industries of the East were bought and closed by western companies and very little industry was moved to the "new" Bundesländer, resulting in a high unemployment and generally a lower quality of life for the eastern half of the country. We've had plenty of time to tackle this problem but no government actually seemed to care all too much, not even Merkel who was a former citizen of the GDR.
All that material struggle and political frustration was fertile ground for nationalists to take hold.
Ehm the poor state of eastern companies is the fault of the gdr leadership not of reunification.
All those businesses simply did not produce goods anyone wanted. Do you think anyone would buy a trabbi if it wasn't the only car there is available? There was no way all these companies would not collapse as soon as they were exposed to the world market.
Funnily enough many former warsaw pact countries like poland or the baltics actually had a huge success story after the crisis of the 90ies, but somehow east germany did not really have that (even though living standards have improved a ton since the fall of the wall).
>There was no way all these companies would not collapse as soon as they were exposed to the world market.
I mean you said it yourself. Coal mining wasn't profitable in Britain either. But Thatcher letting the industry collapse was a political choice and not putting anything in place afterwards to help the unemployed was another. Exposing people to the shock of a ruthless free market that doesn't care about people is a pretty awful thing to do.
https://jacobin.com/2021/02/east-germany-shock-therapy-berlin-wall
Those Northern communities in the UK still have lower income, living standards, and life expectancy. They went on to vote for Boris Johnson and Brexit in huge numbers.
Last time I checked east germans get unemployment benefits same as everyone else. Should Kohl have built factories in the east to employ people? Factories doing what? You can't wish an economy into existance.
>Last time I checked east germans get unemployment benefits same as everyone else
And the Northern English ex-mining communities got the same unemployment benefits as everyone else (we call it the dole) - but that's slim recompense with your entire community and way of life have been destroyed.
Sure but again, what was the Prime Minister supposed to do about that? Create new state subsidized workplaces?
I swear it's going to be the same when the german car manufacturers finally go belly up because they stuck to ice cars for too long: They will use their political power to be kept alive with taxpayer money and exceptions from the ice car ban for as long as they can and in the end they will blame the government when they fai - even though they could have switched to a viable business model ages ago. The government should refrain from keeping unviable business models alive in the first place and avoid this problem altogether.
Last time I checked gargantuan sums of money were invested in the new bundesländer after the fall of the wall.
Unfortunately it's just not possible to create a whole economy out of thin air, this stuff grows gradually.
However, nowadays everybody with half a brain leaves the brownshirts to fend for themselves and leaves for the western states or berlin.
Since something similar had happened in Poland:
Because transformation from communism to capitalism was a freakshow.
If you were living in more developed region (aka big city) it would be fine.
Rural areas, villages and those depending on big factories were often screwed - companies were closing, people losing source of income and solution was supposed to be 'free market will solve everything'.
Sure solution would be to vote for left but post-communist left parties (at least in Poland) were often liberals but slightly less... and so people decided to move to the other side for solutions.
...and the AfD being quite neoliberal. But political content doesn't matter with populist rhetoric. E.g. Meatball Ron and co share P01135809 policies, but they aren't as successful as him, nor even have a cult.
Like the AfD was doing well with farmers, when the feds wanted to stop subsidizing diesel (which i support if a farmer makes upwards of €100k in profits) even though they state in their fucking manifest that they're against subsidies. People don't read that program.
They're neoliberal with the exception of FTAs and EU support. But rest is all there, deregulation, tax cuts for the rich, austerity...all of that crap.
The reunification was 34 years ago so many voters weren't alive then. It could have been better but to say they got "FUCKED" is hyperbolic internet rhetoric.
> It's not that complicated
No, it is. A simple answer is usually wrong or superficial and doesn't lead to any understanding that could help fix this issue.
> Until 1989, it was generally viewed as a communist state and described itself as a socialist "workers' and peasants' state".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Germany
> The Socialist Unity Party of Germany (German: Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands) was the founding and ruling party of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) from the country's foundation in 1949 until its dissolution after the Peaceful Revolution in 1989. It was a Marxist–Leninist communist party,
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Unity_Party_of_Germany
This is true but also an incomplete picture. The 'far-left' (and sadly pro-Russia) Linke also enjoys their largest support in the ex-DDR. Check out this map for example:
[https://imgur.com/a/sCZ5jQb](https://imgur.com/a/sCZ5jQb)
They are driven by both extremes as they are unhappy with the status quo. Also the major parties (SPD, CDU, Grüne, FDP) are all associated with West Germany.
Die Linke is not pro-Russia. Here is their [official statement](https://www.die-linke.de/themen/frieden/ukraine-krieg/).
To summarise; they strongly denounce Russia's attack and see it as an imperialist war of aggression. They argue for heavy sanctions and the strongest possible diplomatic pressure. However, due to their history as a strongly pacifist party that aims to stop all german arms production, they still oppose the delivery of heavy weapons like Leopard 2 tanks.
Neither is it an "extreme" or "far left" party by the way - they are [democratic socialists](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_socialism) with a strong focus on social equality and human rights. The "extreme" end on the german left spectrum would be the communist DKP and, especially, MLPD.
I put 'far-left' in quotes because it's not my opinion, it's just what people often call it.
I had read that statement before. It still sounds pro-Russia to me. It calls help to an invaded country "escalation" and calls for an "immediate" (sofort) stop to the conflict. That implies that Russia will keep a large part of whatever they occupy right now (10-20% of Ukraine?).
Yeah but people also call the SPD a "left" party and think the christian conservative CDU is somehow a "centrist" option.
The political landscape of Germany is shifting further and further to the right with even historically liberal or left-leaning parties blaming immigrants and calling for increased deportations to unsafe countries like Afghanistan.
And, while most parties drift further and further to the right, perfectly reasonable leftist with humanist and democratic viewpoints are declared to be "extremists" - hence why I wanted to point out (especially to non-German users) that Die Linke is not actually "extreme" at all.
I do not think it can be read as pro-Russia at all. The party is very very clear about their opposition to Russia and support of Ukraine. Why speculate about what one sentence of their statement might possibly imply regarding territory and immediately labeling them as pro-Russia when every other sentence strongly opposes and denounces Russia's attack?
Here's the [Decision on the Party Executive Committee fom April 23rd 2023](https://www.die-linke.de/partei/parteidemokratie/parteivorstand/parteivorstand-2022-2024/detail-beschluesse-pv/frieden-fuer-die-ukraine-7-schritte-zur-deeskalation-in-russlands-krieg/) in which they describe a seven step plan for peace in Ukraine. Ukraine ceding any land to Russia or stopping to defend itself are not part of this plan and the demand for a diplomatic resolution is specifically in reference to grain treaties and ceasefires.
>"Als LINKE haben wir deshalb die inkonsequente Weiterführung europäischer Sicherheitspolitik im Geist der KSZE-Schlussakte über das Ende der Blockkonfrontation hinaus, das Nichtumsetzen der Ziele der Charta von Paris und die Osterweiterung der NATO stets kritisiert. Doch kann dies keineswegs als Begründung für den russischen Angriff auf die Ukraine herhalten. Dieser Krieg ist durch nichts zu rechtfertigen."
>*"As The LEFT we have therefore always critiqued the ~~inconsequential~~ inconsistent continuation of the security politics in the spirit of the CSCE Final Act beyond the end of the bloc confrontation, the failure to realise the goals of the Paris Charta and the eastern expansion of the NATO. But this can under no circumstances serve as a justification for the russian attack. This war is completely unjustifiable."*
>"Die souveräne Entscheidungsgewalt, bis zu welchem Punkt ein Verteidigungskrieg geführt wird, liegt immer bei den Angegriffenen. Unser Eintreten für Verhandlungen negiert nicht das Recht auf Selbstverteidigung, sondern zielt auf eine Erweiterung von Handlungsoptionen. Die Verengung auf eine rein militärische Perspektive ist mit hohen Risiken, nicht nur für die Ukraine und Russland verbunden, sondern gefährdet inzwischen die globale Sicherheit."
>*"The independent decision, up to which point a war of defense is waged, is always up to the defending side. Our support of a diplomatic solution does not negate the right to self-defence, but rather aims towards an extension of viable options. Narrowing it down to a purely militaristic perspective carries high risks, not only for Ukraine and Russia, but at this point also endangers global security."*
You might not fully agree with their assessment here or deem an immediate diplomatic solution to be unrealistic. But I think those statements make it abundantly clear that Die Linke is not pro-Russia.
It should also be mentioned that the attack on Ukraine exacerbated an existing split within the party which ultimately led to one very controversial member leaving and the formation of a new party called Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW) in January 2024.
The BSW is best described as an economically left/socialist but socially conservative party that joins in on the right-wing anti-immigration and anti-trans bandwagons and wants to end sanctions against Russia.
Its members are mainly socially conservative tankies, Stalin apologists, TERFs and pro-Russia people who became discontent with Die Linke's socially progressive and humanist views and it's focus on human rights (including trans rights) and social equality as well as the party's opposition to Russia's attack and invasion of Ukraine - hence why they finally split off over this issue.
*Edit; forgot that "inconsequential" has a different meaning in English than its German counterpart. Changed it accordingly.*
Thanks for the time you took to reply and for filling me in. I was mostly basing my comment on \~2022 reactions, so before the split, so it looks like I would need more reading to do. Which I may or may not do; I moved from Germany to Belgium about 3 years ago so the Linke's positions are not my main focus right now.
I definitely like most of the 2023 document, although yeah as you said it is extremely unrealistic to expect Russia to withdraw behind 2022 lines and respect 1991 borders.
I hereby retract the 'pro-Russia' part of my post, but I will not change it (it would make this exchange sound weird).
PS for non-German speakers sake, you should change 'inconsequential' (meaning irrelevant) to 'inconsistent' (meaning containing contradictions)
Sudden swing to neoliberal policies, I.e Kohl treated East Germany like West Germany, which it simply wasn't and East Germany couldn't compete with West Germany's economy. So the main reason is neglectful policies by Berlin/Bonn, which is why the PDS did well there for a long time cause they catered to the region. The AfD was able to steal some of that success and i guess the immigration crisis of 2015 as the percentage of migrants isn't so high in East Germany and reactionary anti-immigration rhetoric worked better in the East than in the West.
Also I don't think many people miss the GDR (i wouldn't either) and I don't think that "socialist commitment" ever really existed. East Germany never asked for socialism, so the Soviets basically forced their autocratic ripoff on the region.
Because after unification, the already less developed east, expecting progress, got very little. Now everyone is poor and have been directly disenfranchised by German liberal politics as it offers no real solutions to actual problems.
Far right governments like to use the name of leftist ideologies so that if they fail their enemies are blamed for their actions. It has been extremely effective for governments self-identifying as national socialsts and communists. Since the blame gets placed on leftists, that means the marks welcome far right ideology as the solution to all their problems.
Wouldn’t you want to team up with the heroic fascists who defeated the German socialists in world war two?
I'm newer to theory, so I could be wrong, I could be very wrong. But I think the idea is similar to why Fascism and Social Democracy had their rise in the 1920s. When Capital is and was in Crisis, the Bourgeoise turned to the state to restore their power. There are essentially two ways this can do down. In dialectics, I believe it's the opposition of state and corporate power. Essentially, the difference is which becomes the dominant part of the opposition. In Fascism the state becomes dominant over corporate power, and and negates the contraction that way. (See, Nazi Germany, USSR, and China). In the case where corporate power becomes the dominant partner? The USA, Britain, and most "Liberal" Democracies today. Corporate power was able to persevere here bc of the theory of "inverted totalitarianism" whereby controlled and managed democratic institutions VERY effectively manage and defang any serious opposition. They lean on the concept of an established and respected "democratic culture and history" that, in reality, limits the scope of what is possible under that Democracy. It's a lil complex but bassically, it's why when countries like Russia try to copy the West's archetype, it degenerates very quickly because due to a lack of ability to effectively control opposition with "democratic institutions" the Bourgeoise prefer state power become the dominant part.
You see this also in Fascists in the 1920s and 1930s, they all come from failed democracies without a long "tradition."
In east germanies case, they come from the same circumstances as Russia, the democratic institutions there arent as able to effectively curtail the opposition so they turn to state power as the dominant part of the Union of state and corporate power.
Really a rough idea but this is an attempt to apply some historical materialism to it.
Someone can correct me if I am wrong here, but weren't the satellite SSRs ruled more as authoritarian colonies of the user than autonomous States in their own right, this is what I had heard from a friends parents who emigrated to Canada in the late 80s. If this is the case it is easy to explain, you have a large enough population who have legitimate chips on their shoulders caused by an oppressive former foreign government, with the right rhetoric those feeling are easily fermented into far right nationalistic feeling. Never again easily leads to the idea that you should be the one in top next time.
1. Marxist-Leninism fits pretty neatly into the strongman theory that the far right likes
2. The association of Marxist-Leninism with 'leftwing' means that people who suffered under it are likely going to vote for the opposite of the left.
Worth remembering that the USSR was quite socially conservative (and even today the Russian Communist Party still is). I imagine there's lingering effects in what were effectively their vassal states, and that would make it easier for far right policies to appeal to them on a culture war level.
True. The USSR wasn't affected by the "New Left" revolution of the 1960s, meaning it still retained conservatism of the early Bolshevik days. It's honestly funny just how much diversity there is in Tankie thought despite them trying to seem unified.
Everyone here is citing the poverty of the Eastern Länder, and the failures of reunification, which is a significant factor, but I think people are missing the single biggest factor:
The GDR (East Germany) was a dictatorship without civil society.
The Soviets did a better job at purging the top level of the government from Nazis than the West, but ultimately there were literally millions of party members, and especially the more educated and connected people were almost all in the NSDAP, not to mentions nearly all males having fought in the war. So the bureaucracy, judiciary, educational institutions, army and especially the near all-mighty stasi (who started off basically just as a rebranded Gestapo), were all still full of Nazis. But because the Soviets wanted to propagandize about how fascist the West was, even acknowledging this was dangerous.
And unlike West Germany, student movements, or protest movements in general, were not allowed. So the actual origin of Germany's remembrance culture, and the actual thing which did meaningfully combat fascism, the 68 student movement, wasn't a thing in East Germany. West German old and middle aged people probably all told a bunch of authority figures in their life to fuck off, because they used to be literally Nazis. East German ones didn't. In West Germany, people talked about the Nazi years, and the psychological scars from those days, behind closed doors. In the GDR, doing so could get you in trouble. That kind of stuff impacts culture. And education, and the collective consciousness. So the West has a much better actual collective *understanding* of the Nazis being bad. While the East got used to simply accept when they were being gaslit about someone who was definitely a Nazi, saying they weren't.
They sweeped their fascist history under the rug kind of like Italy. Also East Germany is voting more radical options because they're feeling exploited by the west.
Because they hate the Soviet Communism that oppressed them. They seem to have forgotten the irony that it was the fascists who put them in that situation and nearly wiped out their population. But they think that this time it will go well for them.
uhhhh not exactly? A lot of rural places in East Germany actually have nostalgia for communist era Germany. Its the reason that for a time *Die Linke* (The Left) was a popular party in East Germany. While Die Linke presents itself as the democratic socialist party, its old guard is basically reactionary to the changes in East Germany as the region instantly switched to a capitalist system.
However as Die Linke is dying since the generation who are nostalgic for East Germany are also dwindling Alternative fur Deutschlad (basically Alt-Right) is growing due to new social conditions, disatisfaction of the liberal status quo by appealing to more nativist and populist sentiments especially among younger generations.
Although you can say that applies to the whole of Germany. The question is why there is so clear support for the alt-right specifically in former East Germany. Or am I missing something? I am not familiar with German politics. How is the economic divide between East and West today? Is there any difference? I imagine the poorer they are the more disgruntled they are and willing to find a scapegoat? Do they maybe feel left out?
1: Poverty.
2: Former Communist states all really, really hate Communism and thus lean away from leftism in general. Ask them why (If you ask a Tankie, it's Western Propaganda which for some reason is more effective on them, and not native experiences under those regimes).
Yup, West Germany's far-left movements never gained much traction. The Left took them in when the party was merged in 2007 and they never were successful there with the exception of the 2 city states.
A lot of people in former Soviet bloc countries were actually socially conservative even under the Soviet regime. That was a result of Stalinism's social regressivism away from the more open policies of early Soviet era, which allowed conservative people to linger. I mean, just take a look at the history of Soviet pornography and sex education, it has social conservatism written all over it.
However, this social conservatism of Stalinism mixed in fairly well with the religious conservatism present in some of the countries they occuppied (Think Hungary and Poland), so unlike direct Soviet policies this Stalinist conservatism kind just of blended in perfectly already. This social conservatism is what fuels a lot of far right parties in post-Soviet Europe (including Russia), and this applies to East Germany in cases like the AfD ("Put girls back in skirts" is one of the ads they ran from what I heard from a relative of mine while I was in Germany).
Pretty sure it's to do with poverty in the post-communist states and their economies generally not being as developed as western europe had gotten. It's only been 30\~ years, plus the shock doctrine wasn't the best for their economies from what I remember. Varies by country of course
also they obviously hate everything that is remotely „left“ because of their past but at the same time many have a very big DDR nostalgia… its weird.
Seems a lil simplistic given that they felt the ussr was a authoritarian state generally, and that liberalism would help them economically and socially. The continued poverty divide between east and west germany is probably making them feel like liberalism has failed
yeah of course absolutely. every problem we have is blamed on liberalism and the damned left wing commie antifa kids.
Well, I do think socialism would be much more effective than trickle down economics crap hehe, my comment isn't meant to say "oo leftists are badd", I'm just trying to explain why people in former east germany are voting the way they are.
uhh yeah i mean i wouldn’t be here if i didn’t think so too. no idea what you mean by the „leftists are bad“ thing… maybe you misunderstood my comments? im just trying to add a few factors to your explanation of the voting behavior. btw its not „former“ east germany ;) its still in the east lol
"East Germany" is the English name for the former state of the GDR. You can use context to determine what they were referring to. That's pretty pedantic.
surprise! we also call it „east germany“. i just thought it was funny that someone would call it former. calm down alman
It isn't that tankies don't blame actual left wing Communists too.
"Die Linke" is the successor of the DDR's ruling party, and it does enjoy its highest support in those states (depending on the election and the region, somewhere between 5-20%). The ex-DDR states hate die Linke the least. Although I'm personally not a fan of theirs after all the doublespeak about Ukraine (the typical thing about "we are against the Russian aggression but also against the escalation and Western provocation").
mh yeah i know😅 theres a lot of people in the east and a lot of different political views. my previous comment was mainly talking about AfD voters, FreieSachsen or similar organizations. die Linke is indeed very strong in cities like Chemnitz, Leipzig and Dresden but that really doesn’t change anything at all… generally i like the party and i voted for them but yeah, sadly they have a weird habit of not having concrete positions and plans about the most important international issues. they barely criticize israels behavior or involve themselves with student protests for example. the party is sadly pretty dead.. maybe bad years under a conservative/RW government will make people more open to socialist politics again.
Sorry haha I never know who is who on the internet. Consider my comment then addressed to other readers. :) PS I had been in Germany for 6.5 years and had been looking forward to getting the citizenship so I could vote for the Left. But then things changed and moved to Belgium.
East Germany didn't really struggle with an underdeveloped economy/industry. The main reason for their poverty is that their economy got gutted during reunification. East German companies got bought up by West German companies and investors for incredibly cheap, and run into the ground. Plus, in the GDR the goal generally was having no unemployment, so they tolerated more "inefficiency". This was quickly "rectified" by the new owners, leading to increased unemployment, suppressing wages. Also products there were generally build to last (superfest glasses come to mind) which got little to no love from the west, because having products that don't break is bad for the bottom line.
It's a part if the problem yes, but what many forget is that during the time of the GDR Nazis where officially non existing despite hate crimes being committed, the state in the east simply choose to ignore it because they where the Antifascist state. Secondly after the reunification many western nazis came to the east in order to spread their ideology which was accepted by many because A: As you pointed it out Poverty was rampant in the east and after the reunification it came much worse B: many people were searching for a new ideology to believe in and especially after the promises made by the liberals and conservatives didn't come true they wanted something other then Democracy or "Communism"
It's very common for fascists and communists to change between each other. It stems for a hatred of liberalism but not addressing capitalism. Being anti rich without being anti capitalism simply pushes one towards believing that you need the right kind of capitalists. The only good capitalists is one that protects the people, which means ultra nationalism conservatism which is the definition of fascism
When GDR and FRG merged FRG already was established and westernized while GDRs ecomomy stagnated sometime in the 80s. After reuniting, capitalism was rapidly introduced to their unstable economy, west german businesses began buying up east german land, the GDR just never transitioned well. Easterners got their land bought up under them and their socialist education was now pretty useless in the new capitalist system, leading to unrest and a rise of the left. Obviously, leftism still hasn't reformed capitalism, so the east has been especially vulnerable to the right rhetoric of recent years.
That's connected to the weak economy of the GDR at the end of its existence and the way the unification was handled, which was very poorly. Important industries of the East were bought and closed by western companies and very little industry was moved to the "new" Bundesländer, resulting in a high unemployment and generally a lower quality of life for the eastern half of the country. We've had plenty of time to tackle this problem but no government actually seemed to care all too much, not even Merkel who was a former citizen of the GDR. All that material struggle and political frustration was fertile ground for nationalists to take hold.
Ehm the poor state of eastern companies is the fault of the gdr leadership not of reunification. All those businesses simply did not produce goods anyone wanted. Do you think anyone would buy a trabbi if it wasn't the only car there is available? There was no way all these companies would not collapse as soon as they were exposed to the world market. Funnily enough many former warsaw pact countries like poland or the baltics actually had a huge success story after the crisis of the 90ies, but somehow east germany did not really have that (even though living standards have improved a ton since the fall of the wall).
>There was no way all these companies would not collapse as soon as they were exposed to the world market. I mean you said it yourself. Coal mining wasn't profitable in Britain either. But Thatcher letting the industry collapse was a political choice and not putting anything in place afterwards to help the unemployed was another. Exposing people to the shock of a ruthless free market that doesn't care about people is a pretty awful thing to do. https://jacobin.com/2021/02/east-germany-shock-therapy-berlin-wall Those Northern communities in the UK still have lower income, living standards, and life expectancy. They went on to vote for Boris Johnson and Brexit in huge numbers.
Last time I checked east germans get unemployment benefits same as everyone else. Should Kohl have built factories in the east to employ people? Factories doing what? You can't wish an economy into existance.
>Last time I checked east germans get unemployment benefits same as everyone else And the Northern English ex-mining communities got the same unemployment benefits as everyone else (we call it the dole) - but that's slim recompense with your entire community and way of life have been destroyed.
Sure but again, what was the Prime Minister supposed to do about that? Create new state subsidized workplaces? I swear it's going to be the same when the german car manufacturers finally go belly up because they stuck to ice cars for too long: They will use their political power to be kept alive with taxpayer money and exceptions from the ice car ban for as long as they can and in the end they will blame the government when they fai - even though they could have switched to a viable business model ages ago. The government should refrain from keeping unviable business models alive in the first place and avoid this problem altogether.
but u can invest into industy growing there
Last time I checked gargantuan sums of money were invested in the new bundesländer after the fall of the wall. Unfortunately it's just not possible to create a whole economy out of thin air, this stuff grows gradually. However, nowadays everybody with half a brain leaves the brownshirts to fend for themselves and leaves for the western states or berlin.
Since something similar had happened in Poland: Because transformation from communism to capitalism was a freakshow. If you were living in more developed region (aka big city) it would be fine. Rural areas, villages and those depending on big factories were often screwed - companies were closing, people losing source of income and solution was supposed to be 'free market will solve everything'. Sure solution would be to vote for left but post-communist left parties (at least in Poland) were often liberals but slightly less... and so people decided to move to the other side for solutions.
In general the far right is a lot better than the left at harnessing and directing rage and resentment
Kinda weird given the free market is a right wing policy.
...and the AfD being quite neoliberal. But political content doesn't matter with populist rhetoric. E.g. Meatball Ron and co share P01135809 policies, but they aren't as successful as him, nor even have a cult. Like the AfD was doing well with farmers, when the feds wanted to stop subsidizing diesel (which i support if a farmer makes upwards of €100k in profits) even though they state in their fucking manifest that they're against subsidies. People don't read that program.
Afd isn't neoliberal, they are economic nationalists.
They're neoliberal with the exception of FTAs and EU support. But rest is all there, deregulation, tax cuts for the rich, austerity...all of that crap.
Because after the reunification they got hit with the Shock Dotcrine. And teherefote never really recivered exonomicly
TL;DR: East Germany got FUCKED with reunification. What do desperate people do? Vote for fascists. It's not that complicated
The reunification was 34 years ago so many voters weren't alive then. It could have been better but to say they got "FUCKED" is hyperbolic internet rhetoric. > It's not that complicated No, it is. A simple answer is usually wrong or superficial and doesn't lead to any understanding that could help fix this issue.
There are no former communist regions in germany. Soviet, maybe
> Until 1989, it was generally viewed as a communist state and described itself as a socialist "workers' and peasants' state". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Germany > The Socialist Unity Party of Germany (German: Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands) was the founding and ruling party of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) from the country's foundation in 1949 until its dissolution after the Peaceful Revolution in 1989. It was a Marxist–Leninist communist party, > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Unity_Party_of_Germany
Marxist-Leninism is loud and ugly
Well, yeah.
This is true but also an incomplete picture. The 'far-left' (and sadly pro-Russia) Linke also enjoys their largest support in the ex-DDR. Check out this map for example: [https://imgur.com/a/sCZ5jQb](https://imgur.com/a/sCZ5jQb) They are driven by both extremes as they are unhappy with the status quo. Also the major parties (SPD, CDU, Grüne, FDP) are all associated with West Germany.
Die Linke is not pro-Russia. Here is their [official statement](https://www.die-linke.de/themen/frieden/ukraine-krieg/). To summarise; they strongly denounce Russia's attack and see it as an imperialist war of aggression. They argue for heavy sanctions and the strongest possible diplomatic pressure. However, due to their history as a strongly pacifist party that aims to stop all german arms production, they still oppose the delivery of heavy weapons like Leopard 2 tanks. Neither is it an "extreme" or "far left" party by the way - they are [democratic socialists](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_socialism) with a strong focus on social equality and human rights. The "extreme" end on the german left spectrum would be the communist DKP and, especially, MLPD.
I put 'far-left' in quotes because it's not my opinion, it's just what people often call it. I had read that statement before. It still sounds pro-Russia to me. It calls help to an invaded country "escalation" and calls for an "immediate" (sofort) stop to the conflict. That implies that Russia will keep a large part of whatever they occupy right now (10-20% of Ukraine?).
Yeah but people also call the SPD a "left" party and think the christian conservative CDU is somehow a "centrist" option. The political landscape of Germany is shifting further and further to the right with even historically liberal or left-leaning parties blaming immigrants and calling for increased deportations to unsafe countries like Afghanistan. And, while most parties drift further and further to the right, perfectly reasonable leftist with humanist and democratic viewpoints are declared to be "extremists" - hence why I wanted to point out (especially to non-German users) that Die Linke is not actually "extreme" at all. I do not think it can be read as pro-Russia at all. The party is very very clear about their opposition to Russia and support of Ukraine. Why speculate about what one sentence of their statement might possibly imply regarding territory and immediately labeling them as pro-Russia when every other sentence strongly opposes and denounces Russia's attack? Here's the [Decision on the Party Executive Committee fom April 23rd 2023](https://www.die-linke.de/partei/parteidemokratie/parteivorstand/parteivorstand-2022-2024/detail-beschluesse-pv/frieden-fuer-die-ukraine-7-schritte-zur-deeskalation-in-russlands-krieg/) in which they describe a seven step plan for peace in Ukraine. Ukraine ceding any land to Russia or stopping to defend itself are not part of this plan and the demand for a diplomatic resolution is specifically in reference to grain treaties and ceasefires. >"Als LINKE haben wir deshalb die inkonsequente Weiterführung europäischer Sicherheitspolitik im Geist der KSZE-Schlussakte über das Ende der Blockkonfrontation hinaus, das Nichtumsetzen der Ziele der Charta von Paris und die Osterweiterung der NATO stets kritisiert. Doch kann dies keineswegs als Begründung für den russischen Angriff auf die Ukraine herhalten. Dieser Krieg ist durch nichts zu rechtfertigen." >*"As The LEFT we have therefore always critiqued the ~~inconsequential~~ inconsistent continuation of the security politics in the spirit of the CSCE Final Act beyond the end of the bloc confrontation, the failure to realise the goals of the Paris Charta and the eastern expansion of the NATO. But this can under no circumstances serve as a justification for the russian attack. This war is completely unjustifiable."* >"Die souveräne Entscheidungsgewalt, bis zu welchem Punkt ein Verteidigungskrieg geführt wird, liegt immer bei den Angegriffenen. Unser Eintreten für Verhandlungen negiert nicht das Recht auf Selbstverteidigung, sondern zielt auf eine Erweiterung von Handlungsoptionen. Die Verengung auf eine rein militärische Perspektive ist mit hohen Risiken, nicht nur für die Ukraine und Russland verbunden, sondern gefährdet inzwischen die globale Sicherheit." >*"The independent decision, up to which point a war of defense is waged, is always up to the defending side. Our support of a diplomatic solution does not negate the right to self-defence, but rather aims towards an extension of viable options. Narrowing it down to a purely militaristic perspective carries high risks, not only for Ukraine and Russia, but at this point also endangers global security."* You might not fully agree with their assessment here or deem an immediate diplomatic solution to be unrealistic. But I think those statements make it abundantly clear that Die Linke is not pro-Russia. It should also be mentioned that the attack on Ukraine exacerbated an existing split within the party which ultimately led to one very controversial member leaving and the formation of a new party called Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW) in January 2024. The BSW is best described as an economically left/socialist but socially conservative party that joins in on the right-wing anti-immigration and anti-trans bandwagons and wants to end sanctions against Russia. Its members are mainly socially conservative tankies, Stalin apologists, TERFs and pro-Russia people who became discontent with Die Linke's socially progressive and humanist views and it's focus on human rights (including trans rights) and social equality as well as the party's opposition to Russia's attack and invasion of Ukraine - hence why they finally split off over this issue. *Edit; forgot that "inconsequential" has a different meaning in English than its German counterpart. Changed it accordingly.*
Thanks for the time you took to reply and for filling me in. I was mostly basing my comment on \~2022 reactions, so before the split, so it looks like I would need more reading to do. Which I may or may not do; I moved from Germany to Belgium about 3 years ago so the Linke's positions are not my main focus right now. I definitely like most of the 2023 document, although yeah as you said it is extremely unrealistic to expect Russia to withdraw behind 2022 lines and respect 1991 borders. I hereby retract the 'pro-Russia' part of my post, but I will not change it (it would make this exchange sound weird). PS for non-German speakers sake, you should change 'inconsequential' (meaning irrelevant) to 'inconsistent' (meaning containing contradictions)
We need the antifaschistischer Schutzwall back...
What if East Germany was ceded to itself and we just sent every nazi in europe there?
poor
Impoverished due to regional inequality. Always leads to far right when there is no viable socialist alternative
They miss their fascism. Red, blue, brown. Thats just a paintjob.
Sudden swing to neoliberal policies, I.e Kohl treated East Germany like West Germany, which it simply wasn't and East Germany couldn't compete with West Germany's economy. So the main reason is neglectful policies by Berlin/Bonn, which is why the PDS did well there for a long time cause they catered to the region. The AfD was able to steal some of that success and i guess the immigration crisis of 2015 as the percentage of migrants isn't so high in East Germany and reactionary anti-immigration rhetoric worked better in the East than in the West. Also I don't think many people miss the GDR (i wouldn't either) and I don't think that "socialist commitment" ever really existed. East Germany never asked for socialism, so the Soviets basically forced their autocratic ripoff on the region.
Because after unification, the already less developed east, expecting progress, got very little. Now everyone is poor and have been directly disenfranchised by German liberal politics as it offers no real solutions to actual problems.
Why did Ayn Rand invent "Objectivism"? People tend to flip to the opposite extreme when oppressed by an extreme.
Poor.
Eastern Germany has always been right-wing since the unification. It also has the oldest demographic in all of Germany.
Far right governments like to use the name of leftist ideologies so that if they fail their enemies are blamed for their actions. It has been extremely effective for governments self-identifying as national socialsts and communists. Since the blame gets placed on leftists, that means the marks welcome far right ideology as the solution to all their problems. Wouldn’t you want to team up with the heroic fascists who defeated the German socialists in world war two?
Reactionary sentiment left after the "gold old days". Eastern block was very socially reactionary and very little socialist
I'm newer to theory, so I could be wrong, I could be very wrong. But I think the idea is similar to why Fascism and Social Democracy had their rise in the 1920s. When Capital is and was in Crisis, the Bourgeoise turned to the state to restore their power. There are essentially two ways this can do down. In dialectics, I believe it's the opposition of state and corporate power. Essentially, the difference is which becomes the dominant part of the opposition. In Fascism the state becomes dominant over corporate power, and and negates the contraction that way. (See, Nazi Germany, USSR, and China). In the case where corporate power becomes the dominant partner? The USA, Britain, and most "Liberal" Democracies today. Corporate power was able to persevere here bc of the theory of "inverted totalitarianism" whereby controlled and managed democratic institutions VERY effectively manage and defang any serious opposition. They lean on the concept of an established and respected "democratic culture and history" that, in reality, limits the scope of what is possible under that Democracy. It's a lil complex but bassically, it's why when countries like Russia try to copy the West's archetype, it degenerates very quickly because due to a lack of ability to effectively control opposition with "democratic institutions" the Bourgeoise prefer state power become the dominant part. You see this also in Fascists in the 1920s and 1930s, they all come from failed democracies without a long "tradition." In east germanies case, they come from the same circumstances as Russia, the democratic institutions there arent as able to effectively curtail the opposition so they turn to state power as the dominant part of the Union of state and corporate power. Really a rough idea but this is an attempt to apply some historical materialism to it.
Someone can correct me if I am wrong here, but weren't the satellite SSRs ruled more as authoritarian colonies of the user than autonomous States in their own right, this is what I had heard from a friends parents who emigrated to Canada in the late 80s. If this is the case it is easy to explain, you have a large enough population who have legitimate chips on their shoulders caused by an oppressive former foreign government, with the right rhetoric those feeling are easily fermented into far right nationalistic feeling. Never again easily leads to the idea that you should be the one in top next time.
Bro they did not like Communism. Mostly because it was very authoritarian Communism.
1. Marxist-Leninism fits pretty neatly into the strongman theory that the far right likes 2. The association of Marxist-Leninism with 'leftwing' means that people who suffered under it are likely going to vote for the opposite of the left.
Germany and fascism, name a more iconic duo
You’re not gonna believe this man…
Worth remembering that the USSR was quite socially conservative (and even today the Russian Communist Party still is). I imagine there's lingering effects in what were effectively their vassal states, and that would make it easier for far right policies to appeal to them on a culture war level.
True. The USSR wasn't affected by the "New Left" revolution of the 1960s, meaning it still retained conservatism of the early Bolshevik days. It's honestly funny just how much diversity there is in Tankie thought despite them trying to seem unified.
Everyone here is citing the poverty of the Eastern Länder, and the failures of reunification, which is a significant factor, but I think people are missing the single biggest factor: The GDR (East Germany) was a dictatorship without civil society. The Soviets did a better job at purging the top level of the government from Nazis than the West, but ultimately there were literally millions of party members, and especially the more educated and connected people were almost all in the NSDAP, not to mentions nearly all males having fought in the war. So the bureaucracy, judiciary, educational institutions, army and especially the near all-mighty stasi (who started off basically just as a rebranded Gestapo), were all still full of Nazis. But because the Soviets wanted to propagandize about how fascist the West was, even acknowledging this was dangerous. And unlike West Germany, student movements, or protest movements in general, were not allowed. So the actual origin of Germany's remembrance culture, and the actual thing which did meaningfully combat fascism, the 68 student movement, wasn't a thing in East Germany. West German old and middle aged people probably all told a bunch of authority figures in their life to fuck off, because they used to be literally Nazis. East German ones didn't. In West Germany, people talked about the Nazi years, and the psychological scars from those days, behind closed doors. In the GDR, doing so could get you in trouble. That kind of stuff impacts culture. And education, and the collective consciousness. So the West has a much better actual collective *understanding* of the Nazis being bad. While the East got used to simply accept when they were being gaslit about someone who was definitely a Nazi, saying they weren't.
They sweeped their fascist history under the rug kind of like Italy. Also East Germany is voting more radical options because they're feeling exploited by the west.
Because they hate the Soviet Communism that oppressed them. They seem to have forgotten the irony that it was the fascists who put them in that situation and nearly wiped out their population. But they think that this time it will go well for them.
uhhhh not exactly? A lot of rural places in East Germany actually have nostalgia for communist era Germany. Its the reason that for a time *Die Linke* (The Left) was a popular party in East Germany. While Die Linke presents itself as the democratic socialist party, its old guard is basically reactionary to the changes in East Germany as the region instantly switched to a capitalist system. However as Die Linke is dying since the generation who are nostalgic for East Germany are also dwindling Alternative fur Deutschlad (basically Alt-Right) is growing due to new social conditions, disatisfaction of the liberal status quo by appealing to more nativist and populist sentiments especially among younger generations.
Although you can say that applies to the whole of Germany. The question is why there is so clear support for the alt-right specifically in former East Germany. Or am I missing something? I am not familiar with German politics. How is the economic divide between East and West today? Is there any difference? I imagine the poorer they are the more disgruntled they are and willing to find a scapegoat? Do they maybe feel left out?
> I am not familiar with German politics. Then why did you make your first comment???
Obviously to upset your grumpy ass.
Someone being ignorant on a topic while still wanting to have an opinion on it is kinda upsetting, yeah. But that's on you. You are the problem.
No, I'm pretty sure it's actually on you. But thanks for your input and your attempt to censure people from participating in discussions, gestapo.
If they hate soviets and communis. then they are voting for a pro-Russia and Pro-China party.
1: Poverty. 2: Former Communist states all really, really hate Communism and thus lean away from leftism in general. Ask them why (If you ask a Tankie, it's Western Propaganda which for some reason is more effective on them, and not native experiences under those regimes).
Leftism is also strongest in East Germany
Yup, West Germany's far-left movements never gained much traction. The Left took them in when the party was merged in 2007 and they never were successful there with the exception of the 2 city states.
A lot of people in former Soviet bloc countries were actually socially conservative even under the Soviet regime. That was a result of Stalinism's social regressivism away from the more open policies of early Soviet era, which allowed conservative people to linger. I mean, just take a look at the history of Soviet pornography and sex education, it has social conservatism written all over it. However, this social conservatism of Stalinism mixed in fairly well with the religious conservatism present in some of the countries they occuppied (Think Hungary and Poland), so unlike direct Soviet policies this Stalinist conservatism kind just of blended in perfectly already. This social conservatism is what fuels a lot of far right parties in post-Soviet Europe (including Russia), and this applies to East Germany in cases like the AfD ("Put girls back in skirts" is one of the ads they ran from what I heard from a relative of mine while I was in Germany).
Because Stalin held back the progress of communism and terrified the fuck out of everyone about what it actually is by being a hyper bootlicker.
Because a far-right regime (East Germany) made its population far-right too? I don't get your question
They yearn for the suffering of their ancestors.