Poverty in Germany 1950-1990

近年来，社会政策和福利国家的历史一直是备受关注的主题。然而，自1950年以来的贫困问题基本上被德国研究人员所忽视。因此，当前项目（“1950-1990年德国的贫困”，自2010年以来由德国联邦政府资助）的目标是从三个不同的角度解决这一问题：对衡量贫困的统计工具的调查，对国家辩论的分析和当地贫困历史。所有三个子项目都关注于被先前研究忽视的方法。他们专注于超越国家层面上众所周知的政治和法律争议的辩论部分：前两个子项目分析了学术专家和慈善组织的讨论。第三个子项目致力于在三个德国城市采取具体措施消除贫困。此外，特别强调了德国内部的比较。该项目试图追溯共同的传统是如何被不同的政治制度所改变或在不同的政治制度中得以延续的。例如，第一阶段的研究表明，在20世纪50年代和60年代，德国两个州的贫困形象一直非常持久。对于根据工作能力和意愿对穷人进行传统分类来说尤其如此：这在很长一段时间内仍然是中心问题，并对行政战略产生重大影响。然而，对西德来说，该项目的初步结果表明，这种共识在20世纪60年代末开始瓦解。新一代的专家和行政人员从根本上拒绝了以前的社会政策方法。同样，东德和西德的发展也开始出现分歧：虽然“贫困”这个词之前在两个国家都被回避，但从20世纪70年代初开始，它慢慢地回到了西德的辩论中。类似的发展并未出现在德意志民主共和国。可以肯定的是，无论是执政的SED还是政府或学术界都不可能完全忽视自己国家的社会不满。然而，他们的措施和辩论往往集中于劳动人口。这不仅符合社会主义意识形态，而且旨在提高政权的合法性。然而，这也意味着生产过程之外的边缘群体被忽视，甚至被定为犯罪。从所有三个分项目可以明显看出，在整个调查期间，贫穷问题仍然十分严重。即使在以缺乏公开辩论而臭名昭著的东德，也可以证明，至少就国家而言，关于对社会问题作出适当反应的谈判过程是司空见惯的。这一假设已经在子项目1和3的情况下得到验证。

The history of social policy and the welfare state has been the subject of much attention in recent years. The issue of poverty in the period since 1950, however, has by and large been ignored by German researchers. Consequently, it is the aim of the current project ("Poverty in Germany 1950-1990", funded by the DFG since 2010) to tackle this issue from three different perspectives: an investigation of statistical instruments for measuring poverty, an analysis of national debates and a local history of poverty.All three sub-projects share a focus on approaches that have been neglected by prior research. They concentrate on sections of the debate which go beyond the well-known political and legal controversies on the national level: The first two sub-projects analyse discussions by academic experts and charity organisations. The third sub-project is devoted to concrete measures against poverty in three German cities.Additionally, special emphasis is placed on the inner German comparison. The project is trying to trace how common traditions were transformed by or continued in diverging political systems. For example, the first phase of research has shown that images of poverty in both German states have been remarkably persistent during the 1950s and 1960s. This is particularly true for the traditional classification of the poor based on their ability and willingness to work: It remained central for a long period of time and had a major effect on administrative strategies.For West Germany, however, the preliminary results of the project show that this consensus began to fall apart at the end of the 1960s. A new generation of experts and administrators radically rejected previous approaches to social policy. Similarly, developments in the East and in the West began to diverge: While the very term "poverty" had previously been shunned in both states, it slowly crept back into West German debates since the beginning of the 1970s. Similar developments did not appear in the GDR. To be sure, neither the ruling SED nor the administration or the academics could completely ignore social grievances in their own country. However, their measures and debates tended to concentrate on the working population. This not only corresponded well with socialist ideology but also aimed at increasing the legitimacy of the regime. Yet it also meant that marginal groups beyond the production process were neglected or even criminalized.It is obvious from all three sub-projects that the issue of poverty remained virulent throughout the entire period under investigation. Even in the case of East Germany which is notorious for its absence of public debates, it can be shown that bargaining processes concerning adequate reactions to social problems were commonplace, at least as far as the state is concerned. This hypothesis has already been verified in the case of the sub-projects 1 and 3.