Examining the consequences of the removal of some 15 million Germans from Central and Eastern Europe after World War II, this text explores the impact of this human influx on the political development of West Germany, where more than half of those expelled settled, and analyses the consequences for Germany's foreign policy throughout the Cold War.
Death at the Berlin Wall tells the stories of twelve individuals who lost their lives at the Wall between 1961 and 1989, and relates these tragedies to the evolving Cold War tensions between West and East Germany.
The book's conceptual framework is built upon an analysis of different varieties of rationality. A conception of political rationality is elaborated. First, orientations of contemporary administrative theory and research are analysed from the point of view of that rationality. Next, the same viewpoint is applied to an analysis of an entity called the 'administrative welfare state'. This concept is used to cover the typical institutional shape of the leading highly developed countries until the 1980s. The strengths and the weaknesses of the contemporary 'new public management' reforms are also evaluated from the point of view of political rationality. Finally, steps are taken to define elements of actual reform programmes in the terms of the political rationality.