Getting together - German reunification

National Review, July 9, 1990 by Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn

Getting Together

AS ONE MIGHT have expected, the reunion of the two Germanies, although desired by the vast majority of people in both parts, presents an endless number of problems. What is happening, to start with, is the merging of a predominantly Lutheran and Low German-speaking country and one that is half Catholic, and whose population is four times as large. (Low German is spoken where the big rivers reach the sea; among the Low German dialects only Dutch has become a literary language of real importance. It was only because of Luther's translation of the Bible into a High German dialect that this became standard German, just as Dante's poetry made the Tuscan dialect the basis of standard Italian.)

THE GERMAN Democratic republic (GDR) also contains two genuinely Prussian fragments, not the most popular thing in the rest of Germany. By 1871 two-thirds of Germany was Prussian-ruled, much of it annexed by the Prussian dynasty, the Hohenzollerns. Rhinelanders used to call themselves "Muss-Preussen" (have-to-be Prussians). Within the dying German Democratic Republic the former Kingdom of Saxony, the Province of Saxony, Thuringia, Necklenburg, West Pomerania, and West Brandenburg are re-emerging; the last two are truly Prussian.

Whether a reunited Berlin--historic seat of the Hohenzollerns--will again become the German capital remains to be seen. From an all-German point of view it is far from central, either geographically or politically. It is only about 25 miles from the present border with Poland, and in the recent free elections 37 per cent of East Berlin voters chose the "Democratic Socialist" (i.e., Communist) Party. But what alternatives are there to Berlin! Culturally Munich is the leading city in Germandom today, with hamburg as its main competitor. Frankfurt also has its claims; and as one looks further ahead in time one can imagine the field widening--to include Vienna, perhaps, and even Prague.

There are, however, more immediate problems, many of them having to do with the monetary system. The procedure for melding the two countries' currencies is complicated. The currency of the GDR, commonly called the East Mark, will be converted to Deutsche Marks at different rates in different situations: one to one for wages, salaries, and pension, and for savings accounts to four thousand East Marks; for everything else the ratio will be two to one. But that still represents a gigantic gift from West Germany to their socialist neighbors, as the black-market exchange rate last year was ten to one.

The economy of the GDR is a disaster, outmoded and backward. To make matters worse, the country is ecologically ruined. Countless factories should be closed immediately because they are destroying the landscape and creating serious health hazards. The forests of Thuringia and Saxony are practically dead. as are those in many parts of Czechia and Slovakia. Closing and dismantling these factories will create colossal unemployment. In this context, it is hard to remember that East Germany's has been the leading economy in the Red Empire, admired and envied by all the other satellite nations, and by the Soviet Union itself.

The purely managerial and commercial problems of the volkseigene Betriebe, the enterprises "owned by the people" (a pious phrase) are made more acute by the diminished work ethics of a people once known for its diligence. The present-day northeastern German is not a go-getter like so many poles, Hungarians, and Czechs. He will have to wait for western and southern Germans to put his country on his feet. And, indeed, the West German press, West German banks, and "prospectors" of all kinds--and from other countries as well as West Germany--are making their appearance in the fading GDR.

But as the Western companies come in, buying up ramshackle enterprises and establishing new ones, their managers will have to face the problems of the new East German work habits. The East Germans, in time, although "exploited" by their new capitalist bosses and shareholders, will earn much more, but all this implies a different way of looking at things. The majority realize (as the elections showed) that economic theory and practice (i.e., Marxist dreams and capitalist facts) are poles apart, but some still dread the "brutalities" of capitalism.

The farmers are a special problem because they have been demoralized to an amazing extent. (The bulk of the Red vote in March came from the semi-intellectualized middle class, and from the farmers in the north.) Deprived of their land and their ties to the soil, the farmers became a drifting urban proletariat with only feeble religious bonds. (The same problem will arise in Russia as the peasants cease being neo-serfs.)

The fears harbored by many--even by solid anti-Communists--are not entirely unfounded. I mentioned unemployment and the continued flight of skilled labor to the West. But what about the former owners of real estate confiscated by the state? If they get their property back, will they be able to ask Western rents for their houses and apartments? Will they be able to turn out the current tenants? (This is less of a problem with confiscated farmland, since it was turned over not to individual farmers but to collective units.)