EAST GERMANY
FROM NOW ON nigh AFTER suffering reverses in regional elections on May 13, West German chancellor Helmut Kohl is pushing all the harder for the rapid absorption of East Germany by the West. On May 18 a transitional agreement was signed by the East and West German governments, concentrating power over the financial affairs of both parts of Germany in the hands of the West German federal bank.
In the autumn the East German parliament (the Volkskammer) is
NO MORE WALLS
BETWEEN US!
PANCHO expected to vote the country out of existence. Chancellor Kohl hopes to transform the West
German federal elections on December 2, 1990 into all-German elections - and beat off the challenge of his
Social Democrat rival Oskar Lafontaine with East German votes.
In the two articles below, taken from SoZ, the paper of the
German United Socialist Party (VSP), Marxist economist
Winfried Wolf analyzes the May 18 agreement and the history of the GDR's economic failure.
WINFRIED WOLF
WHETHER unification comes a year sooner or later, is of no importance".
expert on East Germany from the German
Industry and Trade Conference (DIHT) in the face of the existing and already signed
"State Agreement" between the FRG and the GDR. This agreement is, from a political point of view, nothing but a diktat by
West German capital and business for the unconditional annexation of the GDR. The document of total surrender was signed on the East German side by the parties of a
"great coalition". On the federal side, there is a similarly broad coalition.
The West German government has not held back from symbolically underlining the character of the state agreement.
Although Kohl has presented this document as "the birth of a free Germany" - which is true if he means the freedom to exploit - the text of the agreement was received by the governments 18 hours before they were to sign it. The GDR delegation was taken to the signing in a jet plane of the West German airforce. The agreement is emblazoned with the insignia of the Federal Republic. And already CSU
(Christian Social Union) and CDU (Christian Democratic Union) parliamentarians are demanding that the East German interior minister, himself a fully-blown conservative, "kindly remove the flag of division from the negotiating room" (CDU General Secretary Volker Rühe).
Striking confirmation of
Marxist theory
The base, that is the capitalist econoclaimed Karl Marx; Friedrich Engels added "in the last analysis". And the Bonn coalition has concretized this with regard to the GDR — on the double! On the double! Get the base into line by July 1, 1990! The expected all-German elections will then give some form of superstructure after the State Agreement has laid down the base. And, while the formulations in the agreement concerning the superstructure are vague ("thanks to the fact that in autumn 1989 a peaceful and democratic revolution took place in the GDR, the leaders of the parties to the accord have reached an agreement"....) the stipulations about the economic base
• On July 1, "the Deutschmark will become the common currency" of the
FRG and GDR. It is made clear where the coins will be minted, the notes printed and the circulation of gold controlled. "The Deutsches Bundesbank (the West German central bank) in Frankfurt am Main is the currency and note bank for this currency region." The question of whether the GDR should have some kind of seat in the central banking activities of the high temple of West German capital does not get a mention.
• On July 1, proclaims the agreement, the "social market economy will become the common economic order of both parties to the agreement." And the unsocial character of this "social market" is spelt out. "Private property, free prices, and unrestricted activity of labour, capital, goods and services" (article 1). All "opposing prescriptions of the GDR's constitution" especially those that flow from the "pre-existing Socialist social and state system" are declared invalid. (article
• The agreement hints that in some cases of industrial branches that are in danger of immediate collapse as a result of the currency union, shock-absorbing transitional measures, such as a GDR tax on FRG products, are possible. However the fictional nature of these rules and their shock absorption is demonstrated by the talk of the "discontinuation of controls on the inner-German frontier" (article 12), in the face of a border that can in fact no longer be controlled, especially with West Berlin in the middle of the GDR. The currency union is also a customs union, that means: direct competition from July 1, 1990.
This applies implicitly also for the world market. Article 13 rules: *Through the establishment of free foreign trade, the GDR is establishing the basis for free text notes that the FRG will "extensively June 4, 1990 • #186 International Viewpoint
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The end is
EAST GERMANY offer their own experiences for the broader integration of the GDR into the world market."
• Finally, in article 17, we read that "freedom of association, free collective bargaining, freedom of workers' struggle" and so on are to be established "according to the rights established in the FRG." The Socialist Party (SPD) in both East and West rejoiced at this, because the right of employers to lockout did not appear here as emphatically as in the first draft. Pure cosmetics! In West Germany the right of employers to lockout their workers is a part of the legislation on industrial conflict. Furthermore both here, and thus after July 1 also in the GDR, political strikes are forbidden, including those opposing the anschluss. Even purely economic strikes are subject to restrictions (for example through the new anti-strike paragraph 116 of the Labour Support Law).
• Article 24 explicitly limits collective bargaining rights in public employment Wage agreements in this area must "correspond to the general economic and financial conditions in the GDR." No money, no salary, no collective bargain-
• And finally, articles 25-28 lay down the principle that the last word with regard to all the public spending and above all with regard to new credits lies with...the West German finance minister.
The state agreement is an agreement between two parties, one of which is the buyer and the other of which wants to be bought. On this level, that of the governments, the "game is played out". The FRG has all the trumps and the GDR government has nothing to offer, because they have not wanted to bring forward the very strengths that made autumn 1989 happen — the people of the GDR and their interests.
Now those in power both in Bonn and Berlin are coolly calculating the consequences of the agreement. Towards the end of 1990 there will be a massive reduction in jobs. The GDR's interior minster Diestel spelt it out, talking of "three or four million unemployed." In order to be prepared for this eventuality, Diestel is demanding the rapid arming of the police and the setting up of special units from what still exists of the Stasi (secret police). After all these are "wholly new people; the bodies are still the same, but the heads are different." It is to be feared that not even the head is any different. And it is to be hoped that the really existing process of brain washing can be stopped for a large proportion of the GDR's population so that a broader resistance to the state agreement, the annexation and its consequences can be mobilized. *
The failure of the
East German economy national income was 4.2%, the growth of available national income was only 2.2%. The difference between produced and available national income, representing the losses on foreign trade, developed from 27 billion marks (sum from 1970 to 1979) to 325 billion. More than one sixth of the net product of the GDR's enterpris-