From Central Planning to Markets: 20 Years of Post-Socialist Transformation in an Eastern German County

The Berlin Wall was one of the most visible symbols of two worlds that could not view each other. Thus, the fall of the Berlin Wall--and the fall of Communist regimes all over Eastern Europe, ultimately including the dissolution of the Soviet Union itself--removed the barrier to visibility. These ev...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Rural sociology 2011-03, Vol.76 (1), p.1-20
Main Author: Singelmann, Joachim
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Agriculture
Capitalism
Communism
Counties
Democracy
Federal Republic of Germany
Foreign Countries
German
German Democratic Republic
Germany
Group Unity
Market
Markets
Modernization
Pluralism
Post-communist societies
Postcommunist Societies
Privatization
Rural Areas
Rural development
Social Change
Social Systems
Social values
Socialism
Transition economies
Values
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Summary:The Berlin Wall was one of the most visible symbols of two worlds that could not view each other. Thus, the fall of the Berlin Wall--and the fall of Communist regimes all over Eastern Europe, ultimately including the dissolution of the Soviet Union itself--removed the barrier to visibility. These events were revolutions that resulted in the end of Communism as a political system. This article discusses the consequences of this revolution in Germany, where, as a unique feature, it resulted in the subsequent unification of the two Germanys--the German Democratic Republic (or GDR) and the Federal Republic of Germany (or FRG). Unification had far more consequences for eastern Germany than for the west. The main reason for this difference is the fact that for the east, unification involved a total system change from socialism to capitalism. Thus, the author examines how the transformation from socialism to capitalism played out in one nonmetropolitan county in eastern Germany. He addresses four research questions: (1) Is modernization theory an appropriate approach to analyze the transformation process?; (2) How soon and to what extent did values in support of pluralistic democracy emerge?; (3) How was agriculture privatized and restructured?; and (4) Is there a legacy of the GDR? Before turning to the four research questions, the author briefly describes the locale of his empirical work. (Contains 5 figures, 2 tables and 3 footnotes.)
ISSN:0036-0112
1549-0831
DOI:10.1111/j.1549-0831.2011.00048.x