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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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 Posted: Thu May 28, 2009 3:07 am Post subject: German Unification |
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I've ran into quite a number of Koreans who seem to have interesting ideas on how Germany came about being unified.
Not being well enough read on modern Germany, I was wondering if anyone here had any suggested reading for beefing up my info about German Unification. |
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Thiuda
Joined: 14 Mar 2006
Location: Religion ist f�r Sklaven geschaffen, f�r Wesen ohne Geist.
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| Posted: Thu May 28, 2009 7:50 am Post subject: |
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Have you tried Wikipedia? The article in English isn't particularly detailed but it provides the basic outline of what happened and some interesting links.
If you have any specific questions you can PM me, I lived in Germany most of my life. |
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soviet_man
Joined: 23 Apr 2005
Location: Seoul
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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Thu May 28, 2009 11:03 pm Post subject: |
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What I'm looking for specifically is this:
1. What actions or institutions were in place before reunification that are attributed with bringing it about?
2. What level of contact was in place prior to reunification?
3. What forces do the Germans feel were the biggest push towards unification (ie. The fall of trade with the former Soviet Bloc)? |
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visitorq
Joined: 11 Jan 2008
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| Posted: Fri May 29, 2009 12:07 am Post subject: |
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| Captain Corea wrote: |
What I'm looking for specifically is this:
1. What actions or institutions were in place before reunification that are attributed with bringing it about?
2. What level of contact was in place prior to reunification?
3. What forces do the Germans feel were the biggest push towards unification (ie. The fall of trade with the former Soviet Bloc)? |
The main difference is that East Germany was basically just run by the Soviet Union, whereas North Korea is a fully independent sovereign state. East Germany was also nowhere near as impoverished as North Korea is.
Korean unification would be far more complicated than German unification was imo. |
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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Sun May 31, 2009 1:23 am Post subject: |
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| anyone else? |
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b-class rambler
Joined: 25 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Sun May 31, 2009 2:34 am Post subject: |
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| Captain Corea wrote: |
What I'm looking for specifically is this:
1. What actions or institutions were in place before reunification that are attributed with bringing it about?
2. What level of contact was in place prior to reunification?
3. What forces do the Germans feel were the biggest push towards unification (ie. The fall of trade with the former Soviet Bloc)? |
I lived in Germany before, during and after unification and the events immediately leading up to it. I don't think that makes me an expert, but I'll try to come up with some kind of an answer to your questions.
Contact prior to unification - well, compared the the north Korea situation, lots & lots. Many forms of western media were relatively easily accessible in the GDR, particularly radio and tv. They weren't supposed to be accessed, of course, but they were by large numbers in the east who could pick it up with their radio and tv sets.
The 'island' of West Berlin being right bang in the middle of the GDR clearly also made a difference that's totally absent from the DPRK situation. There were designated "Transitstrassen" expressways when you had to drive through the GDR on your way from the Federal Republic to west Berlin and you couldn't leave those roads between the inter-German border and West Berlin. However, east Germans also used those roads and could plainly see how different western cars were to their Trabbis and Wartburgs. Also, whilst tourism to the GDR pretty much always involved being on an official government tour with a controlled itinerary, western day trippers to East Berlin had a much freer reign to go where they liked.
So it was by no means impossible at all for westerners to interact with east Germans. Indeed, when I was at school in the early 80s I had a couple of penfriends from the GDR. They often expressed criticisms of aspects of life in the GDR which reached me uncensored. Likewise, British football magazines and music tapes I sent to them got through no problem. I sent nothing controversial and they did both advise me not to, but the level of contact that was possible is something else that's miles apart form the Korean situation.
Ok, that was a stab at question 2. I'll deal with questions 1 & 3 together. What led to unification could probably be summed up in one word - Gorbachev. Actually no, it's not THAT simple at all, but it was really his change of policy with the Soviet Union no longer being willing to forcibly prop up eastern European regimes that led to the downfall of the GDR regime and the others. Obviously, any fall of the GDR was always going to lead to it being joined up with the Federal Republic. Things were certainly speeded up by the fact that at that time, the FRG was led by Helmut Kohl who very much wanted to be remembered as the man who reunified Germany and didn't really care about what it would cost or the other problems of proceeding too fast.
I don't think any fall of trade with the Soviet Bloc was either a factor nor particularly happened at all. People were fed up with their lives under the GDR regime and what the Federal Republic offered seemed so much better. That had been the case for a long time with some east Germans, but leading up to the fall of the wall the numbers of these people got bigger and bigger and the state's ability to suppress them less and less.
Hope that helps. I think people should be very careful with comparisons between German reunification and potential Korean unification. IMO there are far more differences than similarities.
Incidentally, CC, what have you heard from the Koreans you mentioned about German unification? |
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Thiuda
Joined: 14 Mar 2006
Location: Religion ist f�r Sklaven geschaffen, f�r Wesen ohne Geist.
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| Posted: Sun May 31, 2009 5:08 pm Post subject: |
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| b-class rambler wrote: |
Ok, that was a stab at question 2. I'll deal with questions 1 & 3 together. What led to unification could probably be summed up in one word - Gorbachev. Actually no, it's not THAT simple at all, but it was really his change of policy with the Soviet Union no longer being willing to forcibly prop up eastern European regimes that led to the downfall of the GDR regime and the others. Obviously, any fall of the GDR was always going to lead to it being joined up with the Federal Republic. Things were certainly speeded up by the fact that at that time, the FRG was led by Helmut Kohl who very much wanted to be remembered as the man who reunified Germany and didn't really care about what it would cost or the other problems of proceeding too fast.
I don't think any fall of trade with the Soviet Bloc was either a factor nor particularly happened at all. People were fed up with their lives under the GDR regime and what the Federal Republic offered seemed so much better. That had been the case for a long time with some east Germans, but leading up to the fall of the wall the numbers of these people got bigger and bigger and the state's ability to suppress them less and less.
Hope that helps. I think people should be very careful with comparisons between German reunification and potential Korean unification. IMO there are far more differences than similarities.
Incidentally, CC, what have you heard from the Koreans you mentioned about German unification? |
German unification was also aided greatly by the opening of the Czechoslovak border to Austria. East Germans were then able to travel through Czechoslovakia into Austria and from there into West Germany. This in turn diminished the ability of the East German government to keep its population imprisoned and was one of the major factors that led to its downfall. |
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catman
Joined: 18 Jul 2004
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| Posted: Sun May 31, 2009 6:15 pm Post subject: |
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| The situation with North Korea is so much worse. Reunification would also be far more complicated. |
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shifter2009
Joined: 03 Sep 2006
Location: wisconsin
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| Posted: Sun May 31, 2009 6:31 pm Post subject: |
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| catman wrote: |
| The situation with North Korea is so much worse. Reunification would also be far more complicated. |
You have to imagine the cultures have widely diverged in the last 60 years. I mean, their not even the same height any more due to the lack of nutrition in the north. |
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Robot_Teacher
Joined: 18 Feb 2009
Location: Robotting Around the World
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| Posted: Sun May 31, 2009 7:04 pm Post subject: |
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| catman wrote: |
| The situation with North Korea is so much worse. Reunification would also be far more complicated. |
It's like comparing apples to oranges. The situation is not only so much worse with North Korea, Korean and Northeast Asian culture is not modernized enough to develop a come togethor liberal viewpoint like the Europeans embraced. The Europeans went through this same sort of hostile thing back in the 1930's and 1940's. I see Korea being at 1935 culturally speaking, but clearly at 2009 technologically speaking. I see Germany to be 2009 in both areas as it's culturally advanced today. South Korea has open minded western looking style in visual appearance, but what you see is not what you would typically think from a Western perspective. It's far more conservative and closed minded than what it looks like in visual style. Korea has a long way to go...
Europe is more conservative in dress and materialism today, but more open minded in their ideology and culture by far. |
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Neil
Joined: 02 Jan 2004
Location: Tokyo
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| Posted: Sun May 31, 2009 11:38 pm Post subject: |
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| Theres a good tragicomedy called Goodbye Lenin about an East German family during the fall of the wall. |
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bluelake
Joined: 01 Dec 2005
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| Posted: Mon Jun 01, 2009 12:09 am Post subject: |
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Last night, my wife and I had dinner with a Korean lady and her German fiance. The fellow and I talked quite a bit about Germany, reunification, and even what it means to Korean reunification.
In a nutshell, he believes German reunification has largely been a failure, as the social system in place allows for too many to abuse and milk the welfare system, especially those from the former East Germany (but also foreigners in the country, as they get the same benefits). He says there is a lot of hostility between Easterners and Westerners, as the latter feel they are footing the bill for the Easterners. As I've never been to or lived in Germany, I have no personal knowledge.
He believes it would be many times worse for Korean reunification. Over the years, I've heard pretty much the same thing about Korean reunification from many sources.
Again, that is just what I heard and I have no personal knowledge. |
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b-class rambler
Joined: 25 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Mon Jun 01, 2009 12:27 am Post subject: |
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| Thiuda wrote: |
German unification was also aided greatly by the opening of the Czechoslovak border to Austria. East Germans were then able to travel through Czechoslovakia into Austria and from there into West Germany. This in turn diminished the ability of the East German government to keep its population imprisoned and was one of the major factors that led to its downfall. |
Yes, absolutely right and one of probably a few things I could've mentioned myself but didn't remember to.
| bluelake wrote: |
Last night, my wife and I had dinner with a Korean lady and her German fiance. The fellow and I talked quite a bit about Germany, reunification, and even what it means to Korean reunification.
In a nutshell, he believes German reunification has largely been a failure, as the social system in place allows for too many to abuse and milk the welfare system, especially those from the former East Germany (but also foreigners in the country, as they get the same benefits). He says there is a lot of hostility between Easterners and Westerners, as the latter feel they are footing the bill for the Easterners. As I've never been to or lived in Germany, I have no personal knowledge. |
There's a lot of truth in that. Not everyone in Germany thinks reunification has been a failure or regrets it or both. However, a significant number of westerners feel that the easterners are lazy, lack basic skills, have sapped the west's wealth because of this and resent them for it. A number of easterners find their western compatriots arrogant and feel some nostalgia for the better social, welfare and employment security that the old GDR did provide, all its bad points notwithstanding. |
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