In the years immediately following the 1990 reunification of Germany, an increase in anti-foreigner violence threatened the stability of reunification efforts and exacerbated tensions between the East and the West. This paper is concerned with analyzing the underlying causes of the increase in anti-foreigner violence in Germany in the 1990s by evaluating first the period of reunification and the corresponding rise in support for extreme right groups in the former-East Germany. In addition, the history of violence and anti-foreigner sentiment in both East and West Germany are analyzed in conjunction with tensions caused by reunification to ascertain the origins of the post-reunification rise in xenophobic violence. Through this analysis, I show that violence in Germany in the early-1990s cannot be connected to the National Socialist past but rather, that both increases in anti-foreigner sentiment and corresponding violence result from a history in East and West Germany of ethnocentrism and social-exclusion policies directed at foreigners. Finally, this paper focuses on evaluating whether the post-reunification rise of violence in Germany is a unique event or whether it can be better understood as a wider European phenomenon. / text

As a controversial and violent act of bombing a civilian city, the Dresden raids of 13 to 15 February 1945 persist in public memory and academic discussions as a symbol of destruction and whether strategic and/or area bombings are justified and necessary acts of modern war. The various ways in which the Dresden bombings have been remembered and commemorated has contributed a great deal towards this city’s enduring legacy. This thesis examines the wartime bombings of Dresden to investigate how the memory, commemoration and narrative of the Dresden raids have been shaped and framed in public and academic discourses since 1945. To do so, this study focuses on the city of Dresden during the phase of Allied occupation, the period of East Germany and briefly beyond reunification to demonstrate the ongoing and changing discursive legacy of this controversial event. / Graduate

Objective: This paper examines the propensity to retire in East and West Germany before and after the reunification from the year 1975 until 2005. The aim is to explain the period-trends in the retirement propensities in East and West Germany with special attention to gender. Conditions are discussed that may restrict an individual’s ability to retire. The ability to retire may for instance apply to the length of earnings-histories, which in turn may be affected by public child-care services, tax and retirement regulations. Method & Data: Event history analysis is applied using a multivariate piece-wise constant hazard model. The data comes from the first wave of the German Generations and Gender Survey (GGS) conducted in the year 2005. The sample size consists of 3698 individuals which produced 2070 events. Results: The results indicate that the propensity to retire was higher in East Germany than in West Germany. In West Germany, there was no significant difference in the propensity to retire for menand women. In East Germany, the propensity to retire was higher for women compared to men. In West Germany, no significant difference was found between married and single women. However, in East Germany, single women had a higher propensity to retire than married women. In West Germany, the propensity had increased after the reunification for men, but not significantly for women. In East Germany, the fall of the Berlin Wall in the year 1989 is clearly visible in the formof a highly elevated retirement propensity for especially women directly after the fall. However, the propensity quickly decreased and together with an increase of men’s propensity to retire since the reunification, the gender gap in the East eventually closed. Conclusion: For the period 1975 to 2005, it can be concluded that the propensity to retire was higher in East Germany than in West Germany. Environmental factors such as the breakdown of the East German economy, the division of paid and unpaid labour and the provision of child-care services probably have a significant effect on a person’s propensity to retire and lay the foundation for the different retirement patterns between the East and the West.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, Dept. of Sociology, 2001. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (p. 496-526).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 1995. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves [328]-360).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1972. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 463-471).

By May 1945, most major German cities lay in ruins, and a largely demoralised population struggled for subsistence in many areas. National Socialist remnants, Christian faith and communist ideology met in the rubble of the Third Reich. The Protestant and Catholic Churches attempted to ‘re-Christianise’ the Volk and reverse secularisation, while the German communists sought to inspire dynamism for their socialist project in Eastern Germany. This thesis recreates the religious world of Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia in the Soviet zone, 1945-9, and analyses ‘religio-politics’ (the interactions between the secular authorities and the Churches), the affairs of the priesthood/pastorate, and the behaviours, mentalities and emotions of ‘ordinary people’ amongst the pews. After the American withdrawal in July 1945, the Soviet authorities occupied the entirety of Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt, and they proclaimed a ‘freedom of religion’. The realities of this policy were different in each state, and the resolution or non-resolution of local-level disputes often determined Church and State relations. At the grassroots, though, many people engaged in a latent social revolt against all forms of authority. The Churches’ hopes of ‘re-Christianisation’ in 1945 were dashed by 1949, despite a brief and ultimately superficial ‘revival’. The majority of people did not attend church services regularly, many allegedly practiced ‘immorality’, and refused to adopt ‘Christian neighbourly love’ in helping often-destitute refugees. ‘Re-Christianisation’ also did not incur comprehensive denazification or a unified pastorate, and there was even a continuation of the Third Reich Kirchenkampf in some areas. Christian ideas of guilt for a popular turning from God, much less for Nazism and its crimes, rarely resonated amongst the population and some sections of the pastorate. This mentality encapsulated the popular rejection of authority, whether spiritual or political, that endured up to and beyond the foundation of the German Democratic Republic in October 1949.

Thesis--Munich. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 369-398).

No description available.

Das im folgenden vorgestellte Projekt Stabilitäts- und Flexibilitätsorientierungen in ostdeutschen Lebensverläufen wurde am Institut für Soziologie der Universität Leipzig im Rahmen eines Lehrpraktikums durchgeführt. In dem Projekt wurden berufliche Stabilitäts- und Flexibilitätsorientierungen ostdeutscher Beschäftigter vor dem Hintergrund individueller Ressourcen und Gelegenheitsstrukturen untersucht. Anhand von 68 biographischen Interviews älterer und jüngerer Kohorten sollte gezeigt werden, in welchem Maße individuelle Merkmale sowie familiäre, arbeitsmarktliche, sozialpolitische und betriebliche Gelegenheitsstrukturen die individuellen Handlungsorientierungen beeinflussen. Vor dem Hintergrund der \"Entstandardisierung\" von Lebenslaufmustern und der \"Flexibilisierung\" von Erwerbsverläufen wurde dabei nach den Ursachen und Veränderungen kohortenspezifischer Unterscheidungen berufsbiographischer Entwürfe gefragt.