German Reunification Facts & Worksheets

• Simultaneously, the people of East Germany were becoming increasingly disillusioned with the repressive regime and were expressing their dissent through peaceful demonstrations and civil disobedience. The calls for social and political change were growing louder, and the long-standing grip of the East German government was beginning to loosen.
• One of the pivotal moments leading to the fall of the Berlin Wall was the mass exodus of East Germans to West Germany through Hungary. The Hungarian government relaxed border restrictions with Austria in the summer of 1989, allowing East German citizens to escape to the West through Hungary.
• This sparked a wave of defections and mass emigration that put immense pressure on the East German government.
• The protest movement gained momentum in East Germany, with citizens organising peaceful demonstrations and demanding political reforms. The demonstrations culminated in mass protests in East Berlin and other cities, where hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets, calling for freedom, democracy and the reunification of Germany.
• Under mounting pressure, the East German government was compelled to open the border crossings. On 9 November 1989, about 2 million East Berliners visited West Berlin to celebrate the collapse of the Berlin Wall. Most were equipped with hammers and picks, while others brought cranes and bulldozers to break down sections of the wall. On 3 October 1990, nearly a year after the fall of the wall, the reunification of East and West Germany was made official. The fall of the Berlin Wall marked the end of the Cold War. 

Path to Reunification

• Mikhail Gorbachev was a Russian politician who led the Soviet Union from 1985 until it was disbanded in 1991. He was the last leader of the Soviets and played an important role in the fall of the Berlin Wall and reunification of Germany. Gorbachev's policies and actions provided what was necessary for the reunification to happen. His leadership style was very different from previous Soviet leaders. In February 1986, he expressed the need for economic restructuring he called perestroika and glasnost.
• With perestroika, there was little government control over businesses, which allowed farmers and manufacturers to freely decide what to produce, how much to produce and the price of output. In May 1988, free-market capitalism existed in the USSR, which increased privately owned businesses such as restaurants, shops and factories. Moreover, Gorbachev encouraged foreign trade and investment by relaxing bureaucratic processes.
• Acceleration was the first stage in Gorbachev's perestroika. It meant acceleration of industrial output matching the US. Between 1985 and 1990, he targeted the expansion of machine building in the USSR.
• With glasnost, Soviet citizens were entitled to freedom of expression without the feeling of danger or punishment. This policy also opened up connections between the USSR and the West. Moreover, Soviet citizens were also allowed to revisit their history and have the freedom to express their opinions for or against the government.
• Gorbachev's reforms had mixed reactions from people. Although some saw the reforms as an opportunity to address the crimes made during the Stalinist era, communist hardliners still perceived them as a threat. Simultaneously, Gorbachev's policies, while unintentional, encouraged nationalism in the Soviet republics that contributed to the fall of the USSR in 1991. 
• Another political reform introduced by Gorbachev was democratisation, which inserted democratic elements of governance into the rigid Soviet system. To ensure support for his policy reforms, Gorbachev supported multi-party elections in the hopes of producing a new breed of politician. 
• Gorbachev extended these reforms to the satellite states of the USSR in Eastern Europe. He encouraged them to make their own changes, which was a departure from previous Soviet governance. This shift in foreign policy encouraged reform movements within the Eastern bloc, including East Germany.
• When protests erupted during the Peaceful Revolution in East Germany in 1989, Gorbachev refused to intervene militarily. By not using force, he prevented violence and allowed the Berlin Wall to come down peacefully on 9 November. Lastly, Gorbachev's active participation in the Two-Plus-Four Treaty helped reunite Germany in 1990. His support for peaceful change during the reunification process was a departure from traditional Soviet policy.
• With the fall of the Berlin Wall, reunification of Germany suddenly became possible. Nonetheless, the process was complicated, as East Germany and West Germany had been separated for 45 years. 
• Because they had contrasting economic and political systems, the two nations needed to negotiate before allowing reunification.
• West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl and East German Prime Minister Lothar de Maiziere were key figures during the negotiations. When the Soviet Union's control of East Germany ended, Kohl began to support the unification of the two German states. On 28 November 1989, he announced his 10-Point Plan to reunify Germany.

Kohl's 10-Point Plan:

1. Assistance for refugees and a new dimension of transit travel
2. Economic, scientific, cultural and technological cooperation with the GDR
3. Abolition of the SED's monopoly of power and demand for free and equal elections
4. Contractual association between two Germanies through the establishment of joint institutions
5. Development of confederate structures between the two states in Germany to create federal order
6. Development of inner-German relations
7. Enforcement of pan-European development
8. Employment of CSCE (Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe) as the core process in pan-European development
9. Acceleration of disarmament and armament control to keep political development 
10. Achieving reunification through self-determination

• The plan set in motion a rapid process that culminated in the first democratic elections in March 1990. Kohl emerged as the first Chancellor of a unified Germany, a position he would hold until 1998, making him the longest-serving Chancellor since Bismarck.
• Meanwhile, in East Germany, after the first democratic elections in West Germany, de Maiziere led a grand coalition that aimed to ensure that East Germans' concerns were considered during the reunification process. A major concern was the declining economic situation in East Germany due to evident flaws in its system.
• This necessitated immediate discussions on the merger of the two German economies. Negotiations regarding this resulted in the signing of the Treaty Establishing a Monetary, Economic and Social Union between the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany on 1 July 1990. In the treaty, the Deutsche Mark replaced the East German Mark to stabilise the East German economy.
• Another point of contention was NATO membership. Initially, the Soviets had strong reservations because they feared NATO was expanding eastwards. Ultimately, they reached a compromise where their security concerns were addressed and let a united Germany join the organisation.

Unification Treaty

• The reunification of Germany involved complex legal and political considerations. Instead of drafting an entirely new constitution, it used Article 23 of the Basic Law of West Germany. Under this article, and due to East Germany's economic and political difficulties, East Germany would dissolve itself and join West Germany. 
• Its land was divided into five new states, with West Germany's law applied to each. The formal reunification was achieved through the Unification Treaty, which officially ended the GDR and changed the Basic Law of West Germany to incorporate the East.
• It is noteworthy that the Reunification of Germany did not create a third state. Legally, West Germany absorbed East Germany. On 3 October 1990, East Germany ceased to exist, and its land became part of West Germany, with Berlin as its new capital. Since 1991, Germany has celebrated this date as a national holiday called German Unity Day.
• The Unification Treaty was not drafted in isolation. The international agreement, the Two-Plus-Four Treaty, signed on 12 September 1990, was closely connected to it. This treaty was between Germany and the four Allied powers of World War II: the United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union and France. On 15 March 1991, the treaty granted united Germany full sovereignty and settled the remaining issues brought by the post-war era.

Aftermath of the Reunification

• The reunification of Germany brought a mix of progress and challenges. One of the most immediate challenges was the economic disparity between the two Germanies. While the average living standard in the former East Germany saw a significant rise, thanks to a massive $2 trillion investment, it also brought about economic disorder, with unemployment in the East reaching double that of the West.
• Despite this, the gap in living standards between East and West Germany gradually narrowed. By the 2010s, surveys showed that levels of life satisfaction were similar in both parts of the country.
• Reunification also had a profound impact on Berlin. Despite hopes of the city reclaiming its former glory as a major European metropolis, it struggled to compete economically with cities like Frankfurt, which remained the country's financial capital.
• Nonetheless, the reunification brought about unexpected opportunities for Berlin. The city's unique blend of East and West unexpectedly fuelled a thriving creative scene, which has become a defining feature of the reunified Berlin.