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GDR | John Feffer
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Swords and Ploughshares in Germany

Posted by on Jul 8, 2013 in Blog, Eastern Europe, Featured, Uncategorized |
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3 comments What was once East Germany’s challenge will shortly become an issue for the whole of Germany. In 1990, East Germany had to handle the delicate issue of the withdrawal of Soviet troops. This was no small question. There were 380,000 Soviet troops stranded by the fall of the Wall and the unification of Germany. When I was in Berlin in spring 1990, you could already buy the fur hats and insignia...
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Closing Doors, Opening Doors

Posted by on Jul 4, 2013 in Blog, Eastern Europe, Featured, Uncategorized |
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3 comments It’s difficult to close down an organization that’s about to be absorbed by a bigger entity. You have to deal with staffing, with the old office space, with all the stuff inside the office. There’s all the paperwork. You have to change the letterhead, the business cards, the signs on the doors. There are banking details, legal questions, accounting nightmares. Now imagine what it must be...
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Taking It to the Streets (in the GDR)

Posted by on Apr 11, 2013 in Articles, Blog, Eastern Europe, Europe, Featured, Russia and Eastern Europe |
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0 comments The home movies show a bunch of young kids doing skateboard stunts all around their neighborhood. Without the sound, the action could be taking place almost anywhere. The kids have clothes and haircuts that look like the late 1970s, the town they live in has a prefab drabness. But their goofiness and exuberance is universal. Look a little closer and you’ll see that their skateboards are...
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Eating History

Posted by on Feb 18, 2013 in Articles, Blog, Eastern Europe, Europe, Featured, Food, Russia and Eastern Europe, Uncategorized |
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2 comments The GDR Museum in Berlin is actually two museums in one. And these two parts, both devoted to everyday life in the German Democratic Republic, subtly contradict one another. That might not have been the intention of the museum founders. But this tension actually captures the ambiguities of East Germany and the ambivalence that many Germans feel today about the erstwhile communist state. The...
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