A passionate and entertaining account of GDR socialism

A Socialist Defector: from Harvard to Karl-Marx-Allee

Author: Victor Grossman

Publisher:  Monthly Review Press, 2019

Book review by Tim Pelzer

VANCOUVER - Thirty one years ago the Berlin Wall came down and the working class in the GermanDemocratic Republic (GDR), or East Germany, voted to merge with capitalist WestGermany. In “A Socialist Defector: from Harvard to Karl-Marx-Allee” veteran journalist Victor Grossman provides insight into why the GDR’s 41 year experiment with socialism did not last. He describes the ups and downs of the former GDR, spicing it up with many interesting details of life before and after the Berlin Wall.

Grossman, an American, is in a unique position to comment on events in the former GDR. In 1951, he was drafted into the US army. He lied to recruiters about his long listof leftwing associations, including membership in the CPUSA. When he was sent toGermany, authorities found out that he had not told them the truth and ordered him to gobefore a military judge. To avoid a $10,000 fine and 5 years in prison, hedefected to the GDR and continued to live in eastern Germany even after the Berlin Wall camedown in 1990. Grossman trained in journalism and worked for the GDR media until1990. He continues to write for the international communist press.

Despite being smaller with fewer natural resources and industry than its western counterpart, the ruling Socialist Unity Party (SEP) government, with no help from outside, turned the GDR into an economic powerhouse and eliminated poverty. Initially theeconomy thrived and living standards surpassed those of the Soviet Union, withfull employment, cheap housing, free healthcare and education, adequate food and agrowing supply of consumer goods. Women gained full equality and control overtheir lives, in contrast to West Germany where women needed their husband’s permission towork outside the home until 1977.

In the late 1970s, government efforts to build an electronics industry,maintain a large army and keep prices low for food and housing meant reduced investmentto produce consumer goods. The Soviet Union raised oil and gas prices without offering more money for East German imports, further straining the economy. The top party leadership “feared” speaking openly about thecountry’s economic problem and how to deal with them.

Grossman notes that one of the GDR’s greatest failures was its lack of freedom of speech. The SEPdid not allow open debate about problems and criticism ofgovernment policies, which it viewed as helping the enemy on the other side of the wall. Though the party leadership tolerated dissident groups outside the SEP, at times itexiled vocal critics from the GDR. The leadership did not trust thepopulation which “was an important factor in the GDR’s decline,” writesGrossman.

He is also highly critical of the GDR’s weak democracy, in which the only electoral optionwasthe SEP and its five party coalition partners. The only way citizens couldinfluence the government was through its legal obligation to respond to written complaintsand many injustices were resolved. However, to itscredit the SEP coalition government did respond to demands from society, leading to the legalization of homosexuality in 1968 and abortion in 1972, and many other improvements.

Sadly, despite the SEP’s social and economic achievements, many EastGermans, especially the young, took for granted their cradle-to-grave economicsecurity and, bombarded by rosy images from West German television, believed that life was better in West Germany under capitalism. The US invested heavily in economically building upWest Germany to make life seem less appealing in the GDR and lurepeople west.

The leadership’s unwillingness to publicly address the country’s economic problems,restrictions on freedom of speech, its mistrust of the population, the lack ofdemocracy and the widespread belief that life was better in West Germany helped undermine support for the SEP and socialism in the GDR.

Grossman does not explore if democracy existed in the factories and workplaces. Did workers participate in production and management decisions or were all decisions made by management appointed by central planners? Did they feel that they were the true owners of the country’s publicly owned economy? Exploring these questions can also help understand why many workers came to reject GDR style socialism.

East Germans never expected the disaster that would unfold whenthey voted for reunification in 1990. The new Christian Democrat governmentwasted no time in selling off the GDR’s 8,000 publicly owned companies. Manycompanies, including high-tech factories,were sold for a song and then shut downbecause West German firms did not want new competitors. Many workers lost theirand social benefits and came to regret the GDR’s demise.

Grossman also explains why the Berlin Wall was built in 1961. US cold warriorsalways used it to demonstrate alleged communist inhumanity. Duringthe 1950s, West Germany along with the US tried to undermine the steady economicprogress and improving standard of living in the GDR. Their tactics ranged from incentives to lureengineers and technicians to the west, to the imposition of a separate currency, to acts of industrial sabotage and terrorism. The West German spy organization —composed of former SS and Gestapo members — and the CIA even tried to place poisonedfood in supermarkets to kill Soviet soldiers, a plot foiled by the EastGerman security agency (Stasi). At the same time, there were heightened militarytensions between US and Soviet forces in Berlin, accelerating immigration from theeast. All these factors led GDR leaders to order the construction of the BerlinWall in 1961 to save the country from disintegrating.

“A Socialist Defector” allows us to honestly assess and extract useful lessons from the GDR in going beyond capitalism. Grossman’s compelling,entertaining and passionate book is recommended for those wanting to know why socialism did not endure in the GDR.