This election map from the FAZ shows that the AfD in light blue dominates the former East Germany.
@jeffjarvis.bsky.social Is there a good analysis anywhere about why the former East Germany is so fascist?
@ajsadauskas @jeffjarvis.bsky.social A lot.
As someone who was born in East Germany and witnessed the changes of 1989/90 up close, this article touches on all the salient points:
Or this one: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-11-14/far-right-alternative-for-germany-afd/104573296
@ajsadauskas @jeffjarvis.bsky.social Key quote from the ABC article:
"What happened was not really a reunification, but the East German regions joined the West German state," Dr Kiess says.
East Germany was looted for parts and labor, systematically bled dry, and nearly 35 years later there is still massive inequity between the former East and West.
@ajsadauskas @jeffjarvis.bsky.social Just one of many examples:
In 1989 East Germany was the world's third largest producer and exporter of potash ore and products.
West Germany was 4th.
By 1993 most potash mines in former East Germany had been closed down, despite there still being rich, high-quality deposits. Thousands of jobs were lost. In some places, the deposits were basically destroyed by flooding the mines.
The West German companies didn't want the competition.
@ajsadauskas @jeffjarvis.bsky.social This article from the New Statesman makes a compelling case on how East Germany basically got a speed run through Thatcherite politics.
Thousands of enterprises and factories, formerly state-owned, were being sold off for literal pennies. Most of them ended up being parted out and closed down.
@rainynight65 @ajsadauskas @jeffjarvis.bsky.social all of ex-soviet countries experienced the collapse of industry. That's because the soviet industry was rubbish. The closing of East German factories is not special here, nor would keeping them alive would have been any good.
@dominykas @ajsadauskas @jeffjarvis.bsky.social that's neither accurate nor can you generalise it.
East Germany's potash industry had reliable and solvent clients demanding specifically their product, because it was of higher quality.
Even Australian farmers wanted in on it.
And that's just one of many eastern bloc industries producing things the West wanted and preferred.
@rainynight65 @dominykas @ajsadauskas @jeffjarvis.bsky.social potash industry? Oh, yeah, that's definitely an exciting source of national pride... One might've thought that by now there would be broad agreement that mining natural resources cannot be the motor of a healthy economy.
"Excessive respiratory disease due to environmental hazards, such as radon and asbestos, has been a concern for potash miners throughout history. Potash miners are liable to develop silicosis. Based on a study conducted between 1977 and 1987 of cardiovascular disease among potash workers, the overall mortality rates were low, but a noticeable difference in above-ground workers was documented."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potash
@rainynight65 @mapto@qoto.org @dominykas @ajsadauskas @jeffjarvis.bsky.social your ideology-loaded polemics is so persuasive that it almost makes me forget that the civil rights and environmental movements (health issues were a big problem in industrialised regions) were the only ones that pushed through the totalitarian curtain. You're right in one thing: our life back then was very different from what someone living in the West could conceive.
@mapto @dominykas @ajsadauskas @jeffjarvis.bsky.social any time you want to stop viewing the economy of a country that ceased to exist over thirty years ago through a modern capitalist lens, works for me.
Just send up a flare when you're ready.
At the time, it was a sought after product in many western and developing countries. Fertiliser ring a bell? Agriculture? Food?
Yeah, that.