Republikflucht

Defection from East Germany

Republikflucht (German for "desertion from the republic") was the colloquial term in the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) for illegal emigration to West Germany, West Berlin, and non Warsaw Pact countries; the official term was Ungesetzlicher Grenzübertritt ("unlawful border crossing"). Republikflucht applied to both the 3.5 million Germans who migrated legally from the Soviet occupation zone and East Germany before the Berlin Wall was built on 13 August 1961, and the thousands who migrated illegally across the Iron Curtain until 23 December 1989. It has been estimated that 30,000 people left the GDR per year between 1984 and 1988, and up to 300,000 per year before the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961.

Republikflucht is a German term which translates to "desertion from the republic" or "flight from the republic" with migrants known as "Republikflüchtling(e)" ("deserter(s) from the republic"). The term was first used in 1945 almost immediately after World War II by officials in the Soviet Zone of Occupation, four years before the establishment of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany or GDR), in reference to the large number of Germans legally migrating westward to the American, British, and French zones of occupation. The establishment of the GDR in October 1949 saw the continued usage of the term by authorities to describe the process of, and the person(s), leaving for a life in West Germany and West Berlin, or any other Western or non Warsaw Pact countries. By the 1950s, the GDR began to tighten its emigration laws and stigmatize Republikflucht in an attempt to curtail legal emigration, including requiring de registration with East German authorities and permission to leave the country under threat of prison sentences up to three years. A propaganda booklet published by the GDR's ruling Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) in 1955 for the use of party agitators outlined the seriousness of "flight from the republic":

Some estimates put the number of those who left the East Berlin, the Soviet occupation zone, and the GDR between 1945 and 1961 at between 3 and 3.5 million people. Close to one million of those who left were refugees and expellees from World War II and the post war era initially stranded in the Soviet zone or East Berlin.

Republikflucht was effectively criminalized after the GDR began erecting the Berlin Wall on 13 August 1961, which saw the extreme tightening of emigration across the Iron Curtain. The large numbers of emigrants was regarded as an embarrassment for the GDR leadership, owing to its competition with the Federal Republic, and undermined its legitimacy as an independent state. West Germany allowed refugees from the Soviet sector of Berlin, the Soviet zone, or East Germany to apply to be accepted as Vertriebene (expellees) of the sub group of Soviet Zone Refugees (Sowjetzonenflüchtlinge) under the Federal Expellee Law (BVFG § 3), and thus receive support from the West German government. They had to have fled before 1 July 1990 in an attempt to rescue themselves from an emergency situation – especially one posing a threat to health, life, personal freedom, or freedom of conscience – created by the political conditions imposed by the regime in the territory from which they had escaped (BVFG § 3). The law did not apply to influential former supporters of the eastern political system or to offenders against legality and humanity during the period of Nazi rule or thereafter within East Berlin or East Germany, and finally it was not applicable to any who had fought against the democracy in West Germany or West Berlin (BVFG § 3 (2)).

In 1993, three years after German reunification, the former East German leader Erich Honecker was charged with having ordered soldiers to kill people trying to escape. The trial was postponed due to his bad health, and he died in 1994. Former Stasi chief Erich Mielke was also put on trial on the same charge. In November 1994, however, the presiding judge closed the proceedings, ruling that the defendant was not mentally fit to stand trial.

Volker Ackermann, Der "echte" Flüchtling. Deutsche Vertriebene und Flüchtlinge aus der DDR 1945 – 1961, Osnabrück: 1995 (= Studien zur historischen Migrationsforschung; vol. 1). Henrik Bispinck, ""Republikflucht". Flucht und Ausreise als Problem der DDR Führung", in: Dierk Hoffmann, Michael Schwartz, Hermann Wentker (eds. ), Vor dem Mauerbau. Politik und Gesellschaft der DDR der fünfziger Jahre, Munich: 2003, pp. 285–309. Henrik Bispinck, "Flucht und Ausreisebewegung als Krisenphänomene: 1953 und 1989 im Vergleich", in: Henrik Bispinck, Jürgen Danyel, Hans Hermann Hertle, Hermann Wentker (eds. ): Aufstände im Ostblock. Zur Krisengeschichte des realen Sozialismus, Berlin: 2004, pp. ?? Bettina Effner, Helge Heidemeyer (eds. ), Flucht im geteilten Deutschland, Berlin: 2005
Helge Heidemeyer, Flucht und Zuwanderung aus der SBZ/DDR 1945/49 1961. Die Flüchtlingspolitik der Bundesrepublik Deutschland bis zum Bau der Berliner Mauer, Düsseldorf: 1994 (= Beiträge zur Geschichte des Parliamentarismus und der politischen Parteien; vol. 100). Damian van Melis, Henrik Bispinck (eds. ), Republikflucht. Flucht und Abwanderung aus der SBZ/DDR 1945–1961, Munich: 2006.