Urbanities,
Vol. 3
·
No 2
·
November 2013
© 2013
Urbanities
71
The Construction of a Negative Heritage and the Condemnation of the GDR System in
the Berlin Landscape
After reunification, the local and federal authorities, anxious to cancel the GDR irrevocably,
sought to confine this recent past in certain appropriate spaces. The majority of these spaces
are memorials, museums and record and documentation centres established by citizen
initiatives and encouraged by public funds. These establishments focus on themes of
repression such as the Ministry for State Security,
1
the dictatorship of the SED
2
and the border
regime that was set up after the construction of the Berlin Wall. Here, in order to shed light on
this recent past, I shall mention several significant places which are part of the Berlin
topography of the places of remembrance and learning linked to the past of the ex-GDR
First, let us consider the
Erinnerungsstätte Notaufnahmelager Marienfelde
(Marienfelde Refugee Centre Memorial),
which traces the history of the Germans fleeing
from the east to the west. This former refugee transit camp for East Germans has been turned
into a memorial thanks to the action of a citizen initiative. Since 2009, it has been placed
under the responsibility of the
Stiftung Berliner Mauer
(Berlin Wall Foundation), whose
creation was voted in September 2008 by the Berlin Senate and which also encompasses the
Gedenkstättenensemble Berliner Mauer
(Berlin Wall Memorial on Bernauerstrasse). The
Berlin Wall Memorial recently received the support of the Senate for the reconstitution of the
part of the Wall located between Eberswalderstrasse and Nordbahnhof. This reconstitution
consists in a series of illustrated stations that link the history of the site to that of the partition.
The traces of the Wall are shown and explained along this itinerary. A commemorative panel
called
Fenster des Gedenkens
(Window of Remembrance) shows photographs of people who
were trying to flee to the west. This large information and commemorative network is
completed by an exhibition at the rail station Nordbahnhof on the ‘absurdity of the
separation’, evoking the effects of separation on the underground, tram and railway lines.
A second example is given by the
Museum Haus am Checkpoint Charlie
, established
by Rainer Hildebrandt shortly after the erection of the Wall (the museum officially opened to
the public in June 1963). This museum
is located near the border post (from which it takes its
name), between the former Soviet and American zones. The exhibits mainly concern the
Wall, the inter-German frontier and the different methods used by some East German citizens
to go over to the West clandestinely.
Another establishment which should be taken into account is the
Gedenstätte Berlin
Hohenschönhausen
(Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Memorial of the MfS prison)
3
which focuses
on the theme of oppression and social control in the former GDR. Established in 1992 by
former prisoners of the State security services, this initiative led to the establishment of the
Gedenkstätte Berlin-Hohenschönhausen
(Memorial Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Foundation),
which was partly financed by the Land and by the Bund following a vote by the Berlin Senate
in June 2000.
1
Ministerium für Staatsicherheit
, also known as Stasi.
2
Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands
– the Socialist Unity Party of Germany.
3
Ministerium für Staatssicherheit
– Ministry for State security.
