Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
45
40
35
30
25
ALL
PDS/LINKE
20
15
10
5
0
1990
1994
1998
2002
2005
2009
FIGURE 6.5. The Growing Leverage of Smaller Parties in the Federal Parliament.
Source:
Statistisches Bundesamt Deutschland
Economically, the strategy to uplift capitalism in the East as a way to
secure employment opportunities and prevent mobility was of limited suc-
cess. The East did emerge after all as a low-productivity, subsidy-dependent,
low-employment area, where lack of opportunity drove people away. With
the possible exception of Thuringia, the outmigration rate in all other east-
ern l ander trends upwards. In three cases (Mecklenburg-Pomerannia, Saxony-
Anhalt, and Brandemburg), the outmigration rate at the end of the period
(2000-2002) is actually higher than the outmigration rate observed during the
1990-1992 period (Heiland
2004
; Statistische Bundesamt, several years). The
initial strategy to bring the East up to standard at a fast pace proved to be far
too optimistic. Market incentives in the West were far too strong, and the eco-
nomic reconstruction of the East far too slow, to prevent people (particularly
young skilled workers) from migrating (Parikh and Van Leuvensteijn
2002
).
These developments fed back into the political motives underpinning efforts
toward the East. As passive transfers, rather than active measures, constitute
the bulk of the effort by regional governments in the East as well, the incentive
to add resources for ultimately failed initiatives (such as local public employ-
ment programs) becomes less and less obvious for tax payers and political
parties in the West.
These concerns had their immediate political correlate as the much feared
East-West divide in terms of party systems and competition unfolded through
the 1990s.
Table 6.8
provides an overview of the regional elections results in
unified Germany since 1990.
Figure 6.5
displays the increasing share of Par-
liamentary seats other than the CDU/CSU and the SPD. Together, they convey
several changes in the structure of political incentives in the new Germany.
Table 6.8
portrays significant transformations in Germany's patterns of
political support. During the second half of the 1990s, the CDU becomes
