By Catherine Brown
The German economy is in deep trouble, and so also is Chancellor Helmet Kohl's coalition government. Green Left Weekly recently spoke to Angela Klein, a leader of the United Socialist Party (VSP), and Andrea Lederer, a member of the Bundestag (parliament) representing the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS).
One of the key reasons the Kohl government is so unpopular, explains Andrea Lederer, is that "it promised that no-one in Germany would be worse off after unification. Yet today everyone can see that is not true. The situation in east Germany is critical — unemployment is 50%, two-thirds of jobs have been lost. So people feel there has been a lie. In west Germany people feel they have to pay for east Germany."
Wages in east Germany, for those lucky enough to have a job, are only 60% of west German wages. In addition, rents in January 1993 are expected to rise again by up to 100%.
"East Germans feel like second-class citizens in Germany; official politics don't recognise them. They want to have a kind of identity because of their history. There were a lot of faults with the former German Democratic Republic, yet in several aspects it was more progressive than capitalist West Germany." Lederer pointed to the examples of women's rights, child-care and housing.
"People are very angry. They don't want to stay at home and suffer. So some east Germans are now starting to reject this sort of politics." Lederer explained it was from this sense of anger and desire to struggle for change, that the Committees for Justice were formed.
Sixty-nine leading east German politicians and intellectuals initiated these committees in July. The PDS was the inspiration behind them. There are committees in at least 12 east German cities, with a network of more than 2000 people.
A congress is planned for March 1993 to discuss a program for the committees. The committees have been consistently attacked by the main parties, including the Greens, who are threatened by the increasing support the PDS is building in east Germany.
The strength of the committees, Lederer elaborated, was "people organising and struggling for their own interests, taking that responsibility into their own hands; people coming out of their houses and together finding their common aims and organising towards them. The response has been positive, people feel so badly treated by the west."
The PDS, says Lederer, sees another important role for the committees — not to leave the social situation to the extreme the committees' appeal explains that they want a democratic society, in which people can live together with those from other countries.
Lederer admits the PDS has far fewer members in west Germany, but says it has increasing acceptance in the east, especially since the PDS is starting to fight for social rights in the east, to pose as a real alternative.
"There is no proposal coming from the west — in terms of politics or organisation at any level, trade union, party and so on — that is credible in the east, not on the left or the right", explained Angela Klein. The VSP is largely based in the west.
The boom in Germany ended in the summer of 1991. Since then the economy has been in decline. The Kohl government is faced with its biggest crisis in its 10 years as it tries to figure out how to pay for the ongoing costs of unification.
Just as east Germans were promised no drop in living standards, west Germans were promised they would not have to foot the bill through taxes. This promise has already been broken.
President Richard von Weizsacker, on the second anniversary of unification, October 3, made a sweeping appeal for" national solidarity and understanding". He called on west Germans to forgo any real increase in their incomes for the next five years to finance transfers in spending to the east.
Polls taken a week earlier indicated that only 15% of west Germans were prepared to accept wage reductions to help finance building the east.
"Feeling in the west is that this was all a mistake", explained Klein, "and that you better rebuild the wall again. In the east they say we need more representation, but at the same time we need your money. In the west they say we don't care for your representation and we don't want to give you our money."
A recent cover of the influential Der Spiegel portrayed a well-off "Wessi", with a glint in his eye, back to back with a poor "Ossi", the two bound by red, black and gold rope so that neither could escape. The headline read, "The new division: German against German".
There has been speculation in the media on a possible "grand coalition" between the government and the opposition Socials Democrats (SPD). Bjorn Engholm, leader of the SPD, has offered to work with the government around specific issues.
Lederer argues the SPD has shifted so far to the right it is not a real opposition any more.
"We had a discussion in the Bundestag about Maastricht on September anged the speeches of Kohl and Engholm; they were almost the same."
The SPD, said Lederer, has a conference in November. There is a strong opposition in the ranks of the party — many members are saying "no" to the retreat on the right of asylum and the expanded use of German troops.
Kohl has raised the prospect of "a solidarity pact" between the unions, industry and central and local governments (many are SPD-controlled). On September 16 Jurgen Mollemann, minister for the economy, outlined its proposed basis: extensive cuts to education and welfare, revised labour laws to reverse the trend to shorter hours, meaning more shift work and more work on Sundays and public holidays, and enterprise taxation.
Union leaders expressed anger at the government's talk of wage cuts and attacks on working hours, health and social insurance. The unions have threatened "an autumn campaign of mass action".
"October action days are planned around the proposed cuts", said Klein. "There is enormous pressure on the budget; the public debt is now one and a half trillion deutschmarks."
Earlier this year, when it became obvious there would be another
big budget deficit, "employers came out saying the unions hadn't the right to demand more than a 3% wage increase. This came at a time of negotiations. The unions were obliged to respond; there were big strikes.
"There is now a very acute government crisis. The coalition parties are now saying we need solidarity, we need a package, an agreement. That is, they want the unions and the SPD to agree. The SPD is saying 'yes'.
"It is a worse situation than in the spring. Then you had a strong response by the unions — strikes etc. Now many unions are divided. The more the situation worsens, the more the pressure on the unions increases, the more they retreat. Important gains won in the '60s and '70s could be taken back."
Lederer attacked Kohl's CDU and the SPD for proposing to change the constitutional guarantee of asylum. "This is one of the aims of the extreme right and those disillusioned who applauded at Rostock. So there is a difference in the instruments used, but in the aims there is a real similarity.
"It is very dangerous when you give up principled positions that have been held for over 40 years. They have been held for important reasons because of Germany's history, also because of the power of this country.
"Germany is the centre of power economically, it's becoming more and more the political power in western Europe and also becoming a military power in western Europe. Germans always want to be the best. e the centre of western Europe."
The Greens, Klein explained, do support individual asylum. But "the Greens' position on immigration quotas is open to many interpretations. Their position is not clear; that is, from what countries do you accept what quotas".
Lederer said that people are disillusioned with parties and politics. "It's dangerous because people expect very simple answers to very complicated questions at the moment. This is also the basis for the extreme right wing, who say throw out the foreigners and you will get an apartment, a job — it's complete nonsense, it's untrue. It's difficult to get people interested in the more complicated answers. It is not a good situation."
"The real challenge for the left", concluded Klein, "is our need for an alternative to capitalism. It's completely in crisis in the east and more and more in crisis in the west."