Graduation Year

2025

Date of Submission

12-2024

Document Type

Open Access Senior Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Department

International Relations

Reader 1

Hilary Appel

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Abstract

This thesis examines the Trabant, East Germany’s iconic yet inefficient automobile, as a critical lens through which to explore the enduring socio-economic and cultural disparities between East and West Germany in the aftermath of reunification. By tracing the Trabant’s trajectory from its inception within the GDR’s command economy to its rapid obsolescence in the face of Western market forces, this study reveals how the vehicle served as both a product and a symbol of East Germany’s industrial ethos, resilience, and identity. The Trabant, once a ubiquitous artifact of socialist life, embodied the constraints of a resource-scarce economy but also cultivated a shared cultural pride among East Germans. Its decline after reunification, alongside the dismantling of state-owned enterprises like VEB Sachsenring, mirrored the broader economic upheaval and cultural dislocation experienced by East Germans as they transitioned into a capitalist framework dominated by Western norms. This thesis contextualizes the Trabant’s story within the larger processes of reunification, analyzing how the privatization efforts of the Treuhandanstalt, the implementation of the Solidaritätszuschlag, and the rapid integration of East Germany into Western economic and cultural systems exacerbated regional inequalities and fueled a sense of alienation among East Germans. Through this lens, the Trabant becomes more than an emblem of industrial failure; it serves as a vehicle for understanding the socio-economic and psychological costs of reunification, particularly the marginalization of East German identity and the persistence of the “wall in the mind.”

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