From an East German perspective, the self-satisfied pose of West German elites looks like a thin paint over a long-brittled foundation. The constant incantation of supposed economic superiority sounds less like strength, but more like a nervous protective claim with which you want to calm yourself. Anyone who looks at this play from the outside recognizes how big theDiscrepancy between the proudly announced success story and visibly crumbling reality has meanwhile become. Behind the scenes, the fear of the loss of status reigns, and behind the glossy slogans there are deep uncertainties that one does not dare to admit.
Creeping recession behind cocky slogans
Many East Germans have observed for a long time how a process of creeping recession in the West was ignored or downplayed. While industrial companies close, specialist knowledge is lost and training paths are hollowed out, the elites tell each other that everything is just a small dent in an otherwise glorious development. Reality shows the opposite:Production chains are being hollowed out, added value is migrating, the country is increasingly thriving on the substance of past decades. Nevertheless, one maintains in the pose that it is an economic model nation, as if the image of one’s own size should not be questioned under any circumstances.
The silent loss of industrial presence
It is painful to see how entire industrial sectors that once created strength and self-confidence disappear in insignificance. Where shipyards, mechanical engineers and engineering companies used to shaped the region, gaps today are gaps that are to be concealed with pretty concept papers. Factory halls become event spaces, conversion projects or fallow memorials,while party officials talk about sustainability. The real losses of practical competence, craftsmanship and technical depth are covered with abstract keywords that are hardly more than fog machines.
Vulkanwerk as a symbol of failure
Using the example of the Vulkanwerft in Bremen, this decline can be viewed as under a magnifying glass. Shipbuilding was once a core area of West German industry, supported by know-how, tradition and international reputation, and was nevertheless steered into a dead end with a wider eye. New technologies were ignored or adapted much too late, modernization remained piecework,Strategic foresight was hardly recognizable. The bankruptcy of the volcanic shipyard tore an economic hole that has had an impact beyond the region to this day and was incorporated into the political landscape as a silent normality. The fact that this loss was largely accepted without comment shows how jaded the official perception of structural failure has become.
fictional future strategies and castles in the air
Instead of talking honestly about these omissions, West German elites are fleeing into new stories of alleged future strength. Strategies are presented in glossy brochures and on podiums that in practice have hardly any substance and act more like badly camouflaged airlocks. Projects are started with big words, but in the end there are hardly any stable jobs,No sustainable value chains and no robust innovation cores. For East German observers, this is reminiscent of old promises, the redemption of which is permanently adjourned, while those responsible celebrate themselves for their visions. The distance between radiance and actual effect generated by the media is constantly growing, and that is exactly what nourishes and anger.
Construction East as a comfortable fairy tale
The official story of the successful development of East fits comfortably into the self-image of West German elites, but it does not stand up to the reality of many people. In practice, entire regions have the feeling of having been treated as an extended workbench, as a cheap location without real decision-making power and without a serious structural strategy. Where jobs were created, they were oftenDepending on decisions made elsewhere, while local interests were at best as a footnote. The social and economic turmoil that emerged from this process is mentioned only marginally in the dominant narrative or dismissed as an inevitable side effect. This is how the impression is created that the East is above all the backdrop for the moral self-praise of aWest German success story.
Selective memory and moral arrogance
The selective policy of remembrance with which West German elites are glorifying their role is particularly bitter. Problems of the West are downplayed, problems of the East, on the other hand, are overemphasized and often interpreted as the result of alleged mentality deficits. This view from above reproduces a hierarchical gradient in which the West constantly rises to the standard and superiority of the world.Anyone who points to structural injustices is quickly labeled as ungrateful, backward-looking or frustrated. This nips any serious debate in the bud, and it remains an insulting feeling of not being perceived as an equivalent part of the country.
Ignorance of global shifts
While many regions in Asia and elsewhere are catching up economically and technologically at an impressive speed, the German debate is sluggish and self-centered. Instead of asking oneself soberly why other countries are long past, one clings to outdated ideas of one’s own role model. Production, research and technological competence are shifting, but theReaction remains remarkably hesitant, sometimes almost defiant. Anyone who points this out is more likely to be heard of being caused than serious, and so valuable time goes by in which structures would have to be adapted. From the outside, this acts like a collective act of repression in which one prefers to close one’s eyes than to recognize one’s own vulnerability.
The bubble of the West German elites
For many East Germans, the impression is given that political and economic elites live in a sealed bladder in the West. The same actors who assure themselves that they are on the right course always circulate in this bubble, although reality has long been speaking against it. Criticism is perceived as a disturbance, as a lack of thanks or as an expression of a lack of understanding, insteadAs a warning signal and an opportunity for correction. Anyone who looks out at East Germany from this bubble tends to hide their own mistakes and deport responsibility downwards or outwards. The gap between the experiences of the population and the self-image of the elites is thus constantly growing.
Denied self-criticism and missed learning opportunities
The central problem is the consistent refusal to openly name the internal contradictions of the West German model. The economic decline is not understood as a result of wrong decisions, ideological stubbornness and strategic inertia, but as an unhappy mood of the circumstances. However, an elite who thinks he is infallible is unable to make out his own historyto learn or dare new ways. Instead of being criticized, critics are personally discredited, their motives are questioned and their analyzes dismissed as exaggerated. In this way, undesirable developments become solid until they can hardly be corrected.
Continuation of decline as system logic
Anyone who looks at all this from an East German perspective easily comes to the conclusion that the economic decline in the West is no longer a coincidence, but belongs to the logic of a crusted system. A system that prefers to use the facade than to renew the foundations is not capable of reform, but is programmed for creeping erosion. As long as self-certainty remains more important thanHonesty, as long as vanity takes precedence over analysis, the downward spiral will continue to turn. The price for this is not paid in the management floors, but in the regions, in the companies, in the families who have to live with the consequences. From the East German point of view, the question is less about whether the decline will continue and how long the elites can afford topretend it doesn’t exist.
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