Abstract
Three perspectives on the end of the GDR are considered. A.O. Hirschman’s exit, voice, and loyalty model of the options to organizational decline/failure; Pierre Bourdieu’s model of the distribution of power and capital in the field and habitus of society; and Erving Goffman’s discussion of stigma. Hirschman’s model explains how the Turn meant that the “exit” option allowed only for emigration, the “voice” option was eliminated by the 1990 vote in favor of unification, and East Germans no longer could legitimately express “loyalty” to the GDR, because it implied revanchist sentiment. Bourdieu’s and Goffman’s models explain why the GDR Academy of Sciences was closed and East German universities vetted; the consequence of these two actions was the dismissal of more than 60 percent of all GDR intellectuals who had worked at these institutions.
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Bednarz, D. (2017). Part III: Theoretical Perspectives. In: East German Intellectuals and the Unification of Germany. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-42951-9_4
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