Why Germany is still divided

The other side of East Germany's History.

Thanks a bunch to Katja for speaking with me. Her book 'Beyond the Wall' is great and you should read it.

Sources and further reading:

Ruud van Dijk, ‘De lange weg naar de Duitse deling. Over het internationale schaakspel 1945-1949’, in: Krijn Thijs, (red.), Duitsland 1918-1991.

Twintig vensters op een bewogen eeuw (Amsterdam 2021)

Herfried Münkler, Die Deutschen und ihre Mythen (Berlin 2009).

Herfried Münkler, 'Der Antifaschismus als Gründungsmythos der DDR', in: Reinhard Brandt en Steffen Schmidt (red.), Mythos und Mythologie (Berlin 2004)

Wolfgang Bialas, ‘Antifaschismus als Sinnstiftung. Konturen eines ostdeutschen Konzepts’, in Wolfgang Bergem (red.), Die NS-Diktatur im deutschen Erinnerungsdiskurs (Opladen 2003).

Harald Jähner, Wolfstijd. Duitsland en de Duitsers 1945-1955 (Berlijn 2019). Jens Schöne, Die DDR. Eine Geschichte des Arbeiter- und Bauernstaates (Berlijn 2014).

Erik Timmermans en Jaap Visser, Berlijn. Een gids door de hoofdstad van de DDR (Amsterdam 2019).

Martin Sabrow (red.), Erinnerungsorte der DDR (München 2009).

Hi there, my name is Jochem Boodt. I make the show The Present Past, where I show how the present has been influenced by the past. History, but connected to the present and fun!

Every episode I show how history has influenced and made a thing, an idea or event in our present time.

I make different content. You can find me on:

If you have an idea for an episode please fill in this form:

[Shahrdad]

My aunt was born and grew up in what became East Berlin. She had a friend who worked in the government office, and he told her, "Grab your son and leave and join your husband. I can't tell you why but leave now." A few days after she left, the wall started going up.

[FinianFhomhair]

I think an important point to explain the economic disparity between West and East Germany is how reunification was handled. Basically, almost all of the GDR's state property was privatized and sold off at horribly low prices. This made it possible for West German companies to essentially buy out the competition and simply dissolve them. This was partly intended by the conservative government in order not to endanger the West German economy, and it was successful. Within a few years, almost all companies in the East were either dissolved or integrated into West German companies. Basically overnight, the entire East German economy went down the drain and most East Germans have not forgotten that to this day.

[yhnmvyi]

It would be interesting to look into the economic and political differences between the ex Yugoslav states

[Velaguna]

As a citizen of South Korea which is one of the only countries still divided, Germany is the prime model of how unification of the south and north would look like in the future. It pains me to learn that even 30 years after the unification, Germany suffers from its decisions. Unification between North and South Korea would likely be worse, as the economic disparity between the two is far more profound than east and west Germany 30 years ago.

[arctix]

The biggest gap was always a mental one. West germans expected integration in the west german society. East Germans never wanted this, they wanted of course a free and democratic, unified Germany, but with some of the socialist achievements, a right to have a say in the development of East Germany. All of this achievements were wiped out within a year. Angela Merkel really made a point when she said "It was like the life before 1990 didn't count". That was the west german mentality, east germans were confronted with. There was no appreciation, no recognition. Mostly it was a lack of interest or sometimes even arrogance and capitalist chauvinism in a way like "You achieved nothing in 40 years". Which wasn't that wrong, many East Germans didn't had any savings or assets. But it was this downgrading mentality by the West Germans for 30 years, why we have a distant relationship. We live in a Germany, where East Germans are underrepresented and mostly are seen as a loud, grumpy and radical group, which is only relevant for german society as objects for sociologic and political research.

Our history, our social achievements, the usual ife of East Germans in the GDR were irrelevant for the unified Germany, it should be quickly forgotten after 1990. It never was and never will be, at least for us East Germans.

[momchilyordanov]

We, who lived east of the Iron Curtain, had a somewhat romantic view of the free, rich world on the other side. When the barriers fell and we started living "the new way", we realized that reality is not so black and white. The people were freer, but not as free as we thought and the life was richer, but not as rich as we imagined. Many people were disappointed. Especially those who did not find their place in the new conditions. It is a natural, human reaction to blame the system, even if the reasons lie in their own inability to adjust.

[kaseywahl]

As a child of German immigrants, these videos always hit close to my heart. I was born just two months before the Berlin wall fell. Thanks for making these.

[chrissmith-rwei]

I was an American soldier stationed up by the Czech/East German border and was there for the "reunification" celebration, but to me, it seemed the joy was short lived. The West Germans were very critical of the East Germans saying "they are lazy sheep". I did notice the stark differences between East and West infrastructure as many of the building and bridges still had bullet marks and nothing was really tended to as far as cosmetics. This was a great video highlighting many of the realities of the reunification. I pray someday all will level out and come together.

[MatthewTheWanderer]

As someone who can remember when East Germany still existed, it's weird to think that now I have lived longer than East Germany did!

[SpicyTurkey]

I worked in Frankfurt for a year as an engineer. People were amazing and friendly, unlike the typical German stereotypes. But I always felt that it was all surface level affection. Then I visited East Berlin one weekend with some co-workers and spent most of the time at bars. It was cold as s**t that weekend, but I can't forget how authentic and real the people were there. No fake BS friendliness, but raw, human emotions. This was early 2000's.

[AverytheCubanAmerican]

When the Berlin Wall was built, it wasn't just the wall that separated West Berlin from East Berlin, but also the trains. Ending freedom of movement didn't just mean building the wall, it also meant making changes to the U-Bahn and S-Bahn. There were three lines, the U-Bahn lines now designated U6 and U8, and the Nord–Süd Tunnel on the S-Bahn, that ran for the most part through West Berlin but passed for a short distance through the borough of Mitte (the historic city center), which was East Berlin territory. These lines continued to be open to West Berliners, but they did not stop at East Berlin stations, though they still had to slow down and these stations were heavily guarded. Thus, these became ghost stations

Trains on the U8 line had six stations in East Berlin before crossing from one part of West Berlin to the other. The U6 had to skip five stations as well as the S-Bahn having to skip four. Friedrichstraße on the other hand was an exception as it was a transfer point between U6 and S-Bahn lines. Wollankstraße as well because it had a West Berlin exit right on the border. At the closed stations, barbed wire fences were installed to prevent any would-be escapees from East Berlin from accessing the track bed, and the electrically live third rail served as an additional and potentially lethal deterrent.

[kodefood]

When I first moved to Berlin in 2010, I read about a case where a woman applied for a job and was rejected. When her materials were returned to her, the word "Ossi" was written on it. Clearly the employer didn't intend for her to see it, but it demonstrates that there was a sense of superiority and prejudice by people from the west toward the people from the east. In my opinion, there still is.

[martinmendl]

Regarding the employment: its was kinda illegal under communism to be unemployed. So the state just made up lots of useless positions to fill the quota. In Czechia they used to say: "We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us"

[sdeepj]

It’s been over 150 years since the American Civil War and the difference between the US South and other regions is still stark

[fatmanfaffing]

My mother escaped in 1957 by swimming the Elbe. We visited in 1986 and I am so grateful I saw it before unification. A great documentary.

[ohmypaper]

Nice. But the video failed to deliver what the title had promised. We all know how Germany WAS divided, thank you, Cap, but how and why IS it STILL divided, this is THE question

[DeadHawk]

Bit weird that the word rape had to be censored as if it shouldn't be talked about.

[wanderlust]

It's crazy, how our feeling of time changes as we grow older (and wiser haha). I was born in 1981 (in the GDR btw) and as a teenager, WW2 seemed to me a long time ago. But actually, I was born only 36 years after WW2. The fall of the Berlin Wall seems like not a very long time ago to me now, but it is over 34 years ago, almost 36 years!

It's nice and honorable that you present our history so well-researched and for an international audience. Well done! Next time I talk about my home country in English, I can just refer to your video.

[brickgos]

Thank you! As a child of both countries (mother east german, father from the west) I've always been able to see the effect of the reunion on both systems. I've heard both sides of the story. I wouldn't exists if this chain of events that lead to reunification hadn't happened. However, my mum speaks with much grief from her own personal experience when the wall fell: "Everything you thought you knew was suddenly incorrect." She and many others had to relearn their entire lives. With the GDR disappearing, a big chunk of their identies disappeared as well. Nowhere to be found. And the aftermath in Germany today is tremendous. There is nostalgia for the state from people who were born after the wall fell. "Ostalgie" is the term for that. Because modern remembrance culture still mostly remembers what went wrong, so other people feel the need to glorify the old system. It's a lot to unpack. People feel unheard, they have felt this way for a long time. It's interesting how you, as an outsider, portrayed the story. I have to add, however, that it should not be left to historians to change our perception of this state. It's something that comes from deep within society.

[BrownieGuy]

my grandma lived in east german, she flew with my dad, they were allowed to go to a "holliday in west german" but they never came back