The new federal government has raised the Eastern Commissioner to the rank of Minister of State. In fact, 32 years after unity, the office is superfluous and perhaps even counterproductive, says Gunnar Schupelius
The federal government’s new East German representative, Carsten Schneider (SPD), appeared on Monday to visit Prime Minister Woidke (SPD) in Potsdam.
He explained that the eastern federal states were still suffering from a bad reputation, and that he wanted to change that because these were regions that one could be “proud of”. Schneider made a similar statement shortly after taking office in December. He wanted to help “turn the image and achieve greater self-confidence”.
It sounds a bit like people in the eastern federal states are suffering from complexes and can’t help themselves. That may be the case in some remote areas, but it is by no means true of the entire East.
Deprived areas also exist to the north and west. Seen in this way, we would also need a representative for the Ruhr area and one for North Friesland.
But there isn’t, there’s only the Eastern Commissioner. This office is an invention of the 1990s, it was based in the Ministry of the Interior or the Ministry of Economics and bore the unwieldy title: “Federal Government Commissioner for Affairs in the New Federal States”.
At that time, there was concern that the economic development in eastern Germany would be neglected. This problem no longer exists today, but Federal Chancellor Scholz (SPD) upgraded the office and turned the “Commissioner” into a “Minister of State”.
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As such, Carsten Schneider is now based directly in the Chancellery and takes part in the meetings of the federal government. However, his area of responsibility remains just as vaguely defined as with all his predecessors.
To justify the office, the public is happy to explain that the eastern federal states are still in a very bad way: the eastern gross domestic product would only reach 78 percent of the western one, the average hourly wage is six euros gross below the western level, etc.
In these calculations, however, the western federal states are viewed as a unit, which they are not. They diverge in prosperity into South and West and North. If you were to compare parts of northern Germany or the Ruhr area with the eastern countries, the picture would be completely different.
It’s very similar in Berlin: the eastern districts are by no means worse off than the western ones, quite the opposite. If it stays that way, we’ll need a West representative here at best.
In truth, however, we do not need a commissioner for a region. 32 years after reunification, nobody in the East is waiting for a Minister of State to say how beautiful the countries east of the Elbe are and that one can be proud of that.
Today, the Eastern Commissioner seems like a nice but somewhat arrogant uncle. And his office may even be counterproductive. As if the people in the East had to be cared for forever.
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