PERTTI AHONEN
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199259892
- eISBN:
- 9780191717451
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199259892.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
This introductory chapter demonstrates the centrality of the expellee problem for West Germany's political development. As a means to that end, it provides a long-term case study of a policy field in ...
More
This introductory chapter demonstrates the centrality of the expellee problem for West Germany's political development. As a means to that end, it provides a long-term case study of a policy field in which the expellee issue's contribution was particularly significant: the Federal Republic's Ostpolitik — or policy toward Eastern Europe. The goal is to untangle a paradox that characterized West German Ostpolitik particularly until the early 1970s and, on a lesser scale, all the way to German reunification in 1990. The focus is on the complex interactions among expellee organizations, the main political parties, and Bonn's federal government. It examines the expellee lobby's efforts to pursue its revisionist agenda, highlighting the various channels through which the expellee activists exerted pressure on the country's political elites and the degree to which the latter responded to such pressure.Less
This introductory chapter demonstrates the centrality of the expellee problem for West Germany's political development. As a means to that end, it provides a long-term case study of a policy field in which the expellee issue's contribution was particularly significant: the Federal Republic's Ostpolitik — or policy toward Eastern Europe. The goal is to untangle a paradox that characterized West German Ostpolitik particularly until the early 1970s and, on a lesser scale, all the way to German reunification in 1990. The focus is on the complex interactions among expellee organizations, the main political parties, and Bonn's federal government. It examines the expellee lobby's efforts to pursue its revisionist agenda, highlighting the various channels through which the expellee activists exerted pressure on the country's political elites and the degree to which the latter responded to such pressure.
Pertti Ahonen
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199259892
- eISBN:
- 9780191717451
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199259892.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
This book connects two central problems encountered by the Federal Republic of Germany prior to reunification in 1990, both of them rooted in the Second World War. Domestically, the country had to ...
More
This book connects two central problems encountered by the Federal Republic of Germany prior to reunification in 1990, both of them rooted in the Second World War. Domestically, the country had to integrate eight million expellees forced out of their homes in Central and Eastern Europe as a result of the lost war. Externally, it had to reestablish relations with Eastern Europe, despite the burdens of the Nazi past, the expulsions, and the ongoing East–West struggle during the Cold War. This book shows how the long-term consequences of the expellee problem significantly hindered West German efforts to develop normal ties with the East European states. In particular, it emphasizes a point largely overlooked in the existing literature: the way in which the political integration of the expellees into the Federal Republic had unanticipated negative consequences for the country's Ostpolitik.Less
This book connects two central problems encountered by the Federal Republic of Germany prior to reunification in 1990, both of them rooted in the Second World War. Domestically, the country had to integrate eight million expellees forced out of their homes in Central and Eastern Europe as a result of the lost war. Externally, it had to reestablish relations with Eastern Europe, despite the burdens of the Nazi past, the expulsions, and the ongoing East–West struggle during the Cold War. This book shows how the long-term consequences of the expellee problem significantly hindered West German efforts to develop normal ties with the East European states. In particular, it emphasizes a point largely overlooked in the existing literature: the way in which the political integration of the expellees into the Federal Republic had unanticipated negative consequences for the country's Ostpolitik.
