North Korea Through the Lens of East Germany's Past: The Korean Peninsula's Future in German Reunification

Since Germany's peaceful reunification on October 3, 1990, the term "preparation for reunification" has become a common part of South Korean discourse. For South Korea, long aspiring to reunite with the North, Germany's example served as a valuable model. It brought both a sense of shame for not having achieved reunification, as well as hope that Korea, too, could follow Germany’s path to reunification.

As demonstrated by the political situation in the former East Germany 34 years after reunification, the process of post-reunification integration is a long-term undertaking that cannot be achieved through economic integration alone. In other words, social and cultural integration is just as important as economic efforts. 

Broadly speaking, Germany's integration process can be divided into two phases: the first half was dominated by economic integration, while the second half exposed issues in social and cultural integration due to the incomplete embedding of democracy. In the immediate aftermath of reunification, more than 9 million economically active East Germans faced unemployment, leading to an existential crisis. 

The internal conflicts within reunified Germany, particularly in the former East, were initially overshadowed by the urgent need to resolve this economic crisis. Furthermore, with reunification led by West Germany, where East Germany was regarded as an illegal state under the Stasi regime and shaped by 40 years of dictatorship, it was difficult for East Germans to voice their concerns during the early stages of reunification.

Consequently, social and cultural conflicts built up internally, and, as Ralf Dahrendorf predicted in 1990, the transplanted democratic system has shown signs of instability, shaken by both internal and external pressures.

In the state elections on September 1, 2024, in Saxony and Thuringia, both located in the former East Germany, the far-right populist party Alternative for Germany (AfD) emerged as the second-largest party in Saxony and the largest in Thuringia. In Thuringia, the AfD secured over one-third of the seats, allowing them to single-handedly veto important decisions. 

In Saxony, Die Linke, the successor to East Germany’s Communist Party, garnered only 4.5% of the proportional vote, making it unlikely to secure seats in the state parliament. However, with two candidates winning direct elections, Die Linke retained six seats and managed to remain a parliamentary party. 

Die Linke now faces the risk of extinction, challenged by both the AfD and the new left-wing party BSW (Bündnis Sara Wagenknecht), which has distanced itself from traditional left-wing politics. This shift indicates that the former East Germany, despite its origins, is transforming into a different society. 

At the same time, perspectives like that of Professor D. Oschmann, who referred to East Germany as a "West German invention" (Der Osten: Eine westdeutsche Erfindung), persist, framing reunified Germany as a continued conflict between the West and East.

Through its reunification, Germany not only offers South Korea a vision of potential unification for the Korean Peninsula but also reflects the current reality of division on the peninsula through its own past. 

At the Central Committee Plenary Meeting on December 30, 2023, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un declared that inter-Korean relations were "no longer a relationship between compatriots" but rather "a hostile relationship between two states." Furthermore, during the Supreme People's Assembly on January 15, 2024, he asserted that the concepts of "unification" and "compatriots" should be entirely eliminated. 

This shift in North Korea's stance mirrors East Germany's response in the past. When West German Chancellor Willy Brandt, on October 28, 1969, renounced West Germany's claim to sole representation and effectively recognized East Germany as a state, emphasizing the need to "maintain national unity" for future reunification, East Germany responded by asserting the existence of two separate nations and peoples (West Germany as a capitalist state, East Germany as a socialist one). 

Similarly, just as East Germany banned the singing of its national anthem due to specific lyrics ("Germany, one fatherland": "Deutschland, einig Vaterland"), North Korea has modified the lyrics of its anthem, which once referred to the entire Korean Peninsula, and has erased South Korea from its weather maps.

North Korea's future actions, in rejecting the concept of a "single nation," can similarly be inferred from the case of East Germany. 

Much like East Germany's reinterpretation of historical figures such as Frederick the Great and Martin Luther, North Korea is likely to pursue cultural initiatives to strengthen the notion of a "socialist nation." However, such attempts would essentially be an internal acknowledgment that unification based on North Korea's own system is unattainable. Efforts to artificially alter the course of history are unlikely to succeed.

Following its assertion of the "two-state theory," North Korea eliminated the concepts of "unification" and "compatriots" internally and disbanded departments dealing with South Korea, cutting off contact and dialogue, which led to a deterioration in inter-Korean relations. Similarly, in 1984, East Germany renamed and concealed its Central Committee's West German Department (ZK-Westabteilung) as the Department for International Politics and Economics (ZK-Abteilung Internationale Politik und Wirtschaft).

On August 15 of this year, the South Korean government announced its unification doctrine, clearly outlining a vision for reunification grounded in the values of freedom. However, unlike in the past, North Korea has remained silent in response to this development. 

While a breakthrough in dialogue between the two Koreas has yet to be found, one thing remains certain: all Koreans, both in the North and South, long for the day when, as Chancellor Willy Brandt once said, "What belongs together grows together" ("Jetzt wächst zusammen, was zusammen gehört"). In this spirit, I also hope that Germany, which serves as a model for Korea's unified future, will achieve full integration.