![Sample our Politics & International Relations journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5947/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Politics-International-Relations.jpg"})
Abstract
This article investigates the relationship between Transylvanian Saxons (Siebenbürger Sachsen) and their perceived “external homeland.” The authors consider the history of German minorities in East-Central Europe and, more specifically, briefly outline the history of Transylvanian Saxons. Against this backdrop, this article examines the changing nature of minority policies promoted by the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) until the present day, whilst juxtaposing this with Transylvanian Saxon discourses on identity and nationhood. In so doing, this article argues that the discrepancy between the mutual expectations of the FRG and Transylvanian Saxon émigrés became very pronounced after 1989. This then has led to what appears to be the end of the Saxon community, as émigrés have found themselves torn between assimilation and a longing for a return to Transylvania.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers as well as Dr. Claire Sutherland and Dr. Elena Barabantseva for their very helpful comments and suggestions. James Koranyi would like to thank the Royal Historical Society and Ruth Wittlinger would like to thank the British Academy for their financial support.
James Koranyi is an historian at the University of St Andrews. He works on southeastern Europe, the history and legacy of minorities, and contesting memory cultures in Romania and Serbia.
Ruth Wittlinger is Senior Lecturer in the School of Government and International Relations at University of Durham. She has published widely on post-unification Germany, European integration, British perceptions of Germany and the Germans, and politics and literature. Her monograph German National Identity in the Twenty-First Century: A Different Republic After All? was published by Palgrave in 2010.
Notes
1. See also Stefan Wolff, The German Question since 1919 (Westport: Praeger, 2003), 7 and Stefan Wolff, “From Colonists to Emigrants: Explaining the ‘Return-Migration’ of Ethnic Germans from Central and Eastern Europe,” in David Rock and Stefan Wolff, eds., Coming Home to Germany? The Integration of Ethnic Germans from Central and Eastern Europe in the Federal Republic (Oxford: Berghahn, 2002), 4.
2. Wolff, German Question since 1919, 6.
3. These include, for example, the Bessarabiendeutsche. On ethnic German minorities in general, see Mariana Hausleitner, ed., Vom Faschismus zum Stalinismus: Deutsche und andere Minderheiten in Ostmittel- und Südosteuropa 1941–1953 (Munich: IKGS, 2008).
4. Harald Roth, Kleine Geschichte Siebenbürgens (Cologne: Böhlau, 2003), 30–33.
5. See for instance Tudor Sălăgean, “Romanian Society in the Early Middle Ages (9th–14th Century),” in Ioan-Aurel Pop and Ioan Bolovan, eds., History of Romania Compendium (Cluj-Napoca: The Romanian Culture Institute, 2006), 162–165.
6. The settlement area was declared as a Königsboden (fundus regius) or “Royal Lands,” which gave the Saxons a high level of autonomy. Furthermore, the so-called Andreanum of 1224 was one of the first constitutions in Europe, which set the Saxons apart from other groups very early on. See Harald Zimmermann, “Die deutsche Südostsiedlung im Mittelalter,” in Günther Schödl, ed., Deutsche Geschichte im Osten Europas: Land an der Donau (Berlin: Siedler Verlag, 1995), 41.
7. Balázs A. Szelényi, The Failure of the Central European Bourgeoisie (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), 43–51.
8. See Ibid.; Konrad Gündisch, “Die ‘Geistliche Universität’ der siebenbürgisch-sächsischen Kirchengemeinden im 15. und 16. Jahrhundert,” in Volker Keppin and Ulrich A. Wien, eds., Konfessionsbildung und Konfessionskultur in Siebenbürgen in der Frühen Neuzeit (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2005), 105–114; and Gustav Binder, “Die Reformation in Siebenbürgen,” Siebenbürgische Semesterblätter 1(1): 37–55 (1987).
9. Roth, Kleine Geschichte Siebenbürgens, 49–51. The official setup was as follows: The aristocracy (the Hungarians), the Szekler (administration), and the Saxons (economic and financial sectors) were classified as three equal groups, while the Romanians remained serfs and unrecognized as a group. See also Chris Hann, The Skeleton at the Feast: Contributions to East European Anthropology (Kent: CSAC, 1995), 78.
10. Robert John Weston Evans, Austria, Hungary, and the Habsburgs: Central Europe c. 1683—1867 (Oxford: OUP, 2006), 218–225.
11. This included the standardization of language in education. See Anton Sterbling, “Minderheitenprobleme und interethnische Konflikte in Siebenbürgen nach 1867,” Siebenbürgische Semesterblätter 10(2): 109–124 (1996).
12. Roth, Kleine Geschichte Siebenbürgens, 105–122.
13. Ibid., 125.
14. See Karl M. Reinerth, Zur politischen Entwicklung der Deutschen in Rumänien 1918—1928: Aus einer siebenbürgisch-sächsischen Sicht (Thaur: Wort und Welt Verlag, 1993), 108–296 and Roth, Kleine Geschichte Siebenbürgens, 132–134.
15. See Reinerth, Zur politischen Entwicklung der Deutschen in Rumänien, 133. See also, Thomas Şindilariu, “Sportpolitische Impulse aus dem ‘Dritten Reich’ und der Strandbadbau in Siebenbürgen 1936—1939,” in Marina Hausleitner and Harald Roth, eds., Der Einfluss von Faschismus und Nationalsozialismus auf Minderheiten in Ostmittel- und Südosteuropa (Munich: IKGS Verlag, 2006), 163–182.
16. Valdis O. Lumans, Himmler's Auxiliaries: The Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle and the German National Minorities of Europe 1933–1945 (Chapel Hill: UNCP, 1993), 109.
17. Ibid., 107–113.
18. Paul Georgescu, “‘Volksdeutsche’ in der Waffen-SS,” Südostdeutsche Vierteljahreshefte 53(2): 117–123 (2004).
19. Roth, Kleine Geschichte Siebenbürgens, 142.
20. For an excellent study of the deportation of Transylvanian Saxons, see Georg Weber et al., eds., Die Deportation der Siebenbürger Sachsen in die Sowjetunion 1945—1949, vol. I, II, and III (Cologne: Böhlau, 1995).
21. Michael Kroner, “Zwei aufschlussreiche Zeitungsurteile über die Behandlung der Siebenbürger Sachsen im Jahre 1946,” Südostdeutsche Vierteljahreshefte 53(1): 31–36 (2004).
22. The last wave of internal deportations occurred in 1951, as Banater Schwaben and other groups near the Yugoslav border were deported to the Bărăgan Plain for up to five years. See Smaranda Vultur, Germanii dîn Banat: Prin Povestirile Lor (Bucharest: Paideia, 2000) and Hannelore Baier, “Arbeitslager für die deutsche Bevölkerung im Innern Rumäniens nach 1945,” Südostdeutsche Vierteljahreshefte 54(4): 379–387 (2005).
23. Stefan Wolff, “The Politics of Homeland: Irredentism and Recognition in the Policies of German Federal Governments and Expellee Organizations toward Ethnic German Minorities in Central and Eastern Europe, 1949–1999,” in Kirsta O’Donnell, Renate Bridenthal, and Nancy Reagin, eds., The Heimat Abroad: The Boundaries of Germanness (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2005), 287–313.
24. Roth, Kleine Geschichte Siebenbürgens, 147–151 and Anton Sterbling, “Die Aussiedlung der Deutschen aus Rumänien in die Bundesrepublik Deutschland und andere Migrationsvorgänge in und aus Südosteuropa,” in Edda Currle and Tanja Wunderlich, eds., Deutschland—ein Einwanderungsland? Rückblick, Bilanz und neue Fragen (Stuttgart: Lucius, 2001), 206, 207.
25. Anton Sterbling, “Dazugehörende Fremde? Besonderheiten der Integration der Rumäniendeutschen in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland,” in Christoph Köck, Alois Moosmüller, and Klaus Roth, eds., Zuwanderung und Integration: Kulturwissenschaftliche Zugänge und soziale Praxis (Münster: Waxmann Verlag, 2004), 109–124.
26. In line with the Cold War's alliance system, victim status was not granted to those suffering at the hands of socialist neighbors and particularly the Soviet Union. Accordingly, refugees and expellees were called Umsiedler, that is, “resettlers” rather than refugees or expellees.
27. For an insightful study that traces the relationship between the expellees and their organizations and the West German government within the wider context of its relations with Eastern Europe, see Pertti Ahonen, After the Expulsion: West Germany and Eastern Europe, 1945–1990 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003); see also David Rock and Stefan Wolff, eds., Coming Home to Germany? The Integration of Ethnic Germans from Central and Eastern Europe in the Federal Republic (Oxford: Berghan, 2002).
28. Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany. http://www.iuscomp.org/gla/statues/GG.html (accessed 2 May 2009).
29. Rogers Brubaker, Citizenship and Nationhood in France and Germany (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992).
30. Marc Morjé Howard, “The Causes and Consequences of Germany's New Citizenship Law,” German Politics 17(1): 42 (2008).
31. Joyce Marie Mushaben, The Changing Faces of Citizenship: Social Integration and Political Mobilization Among Ethnic Minorities in Germany (Oxford: Berghahn, 2008), 89.
32. See also Eli Nathans, The Politics of Citizenship in Germany: Ethnicity, Utility and Nationalism (Oxford: Berg, 2004), 254–257.
33. Christoph Bergner, “Herausforderungen und Perspektiven zukünftigen Aussiedler- und Minderheitenpolitik,” in Christoph Bergner and Matthias Weber, eds., Aussiedler- und Minderheitenpolitik in Deutschland: Bilanz und Perspektiven (Munich: Oldenbourg, 2009), 237–260, 251–252.
34. This is Rogers Brubaker's concept of a triangular relationship between a minority, its “actual homeland” (in this case Romania), and its “external homeland” (in this case the FRG). See Rogers Brubaker, Nationalism Reframed: Nationhood and the National Question in the New Europe (Cambridge: CUP, 1996).
35. See Christian Härtel and Petra Karbus, eds., Das Westpaket (Berlin: Christian Links Verlag, 2000).
36. Anneli Ute Gabanyi, “Die Deutschen in Rumänien: Exodus oder Neuanfang?” in Hans Rothe, ed., Die Siebenbürger Sachsen in Geschichte und Gegenwart (Cologne: Böhlau, 1994), 89–104.
37. Ibid., 94.
38. Interview with Johann Simon (pseudonym), Sibiu, Romania, 24 Feb. 2005.
39. See, for instance, Annemarie Weber, Rumäniendeutsche? Diskurse zur Gruppenidentität einer Minderheit (1944–1971) (Cologne: Böhlau, 2010) in which the author charts the development of German-language newspapers in Romania during the Cold War period and thereby draws out the mythical images of an imagined historic Germany. See also Bénédicte Michalon, Migrations des Saxons de Roumanie en Allemagne: Mythe, Interdépendance et Altérité dans le Retour (thesis, Université de Poitiers, 2003) for a useful discussion of the construction of Saxon group identity in the web of migration, imagined Germanness, and otherness; many thanks to the anonymous reviewer for recommending this thesis.
40. This is based on research for a doctoral thesis. Forty-one out of 79 interviewees were émigrés living in Germany. Almost uniformly the respondents presented their imagined Germany prior to emigration precisely in notions of a historic Germany—a Kulturnation—which is also reflected in contemporary sources of the Cold War period—be it in publications or correspondence. See James Koranyi, Between East and West: Romanian German Identities since 1945 (doctoral thesis, University of Exeter, 2009).
41. Rainer Ohliger, “Vom Vielvölkerstaat zum Nationalstaat—Migration aus und nach Rumänien im 20. Jahrhundert,” in Heinz Fassmann and Rainer Münz, eds., Migration in Europa: Historische Entwicklung, aktuelle Trends und politische Reaktionen (Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 1996), 287–296.
42. Rainer Münz and Rainer Ohliger, “Deutsche Minderheiten in Ostmittel- und Osteuropa, Aussiedler in Deutschland: Eine Analyse ethnisch priviligierter Migration,” Demographie Aktuell: Vorträge, Aufsätze, Forschungsberichte 9:7–11 (1998). http://www.demographie.de/demographieaktuell/da9.pdf (accessed 17 April 2010).
43. See Maria Müller, “Die Vertreibung aus der Heimat,” Siebenbürgen Institut, B 1 51, Vol. 2 [2].
44. See, for instance, Andreas Möckel, ed., Gerhard Möckel: Fatum oder Datum? Aufsätze und Briefe (Munich: Südostdeutsches Kulturwerk).
45. See, for instance, Liviu Chelcea, “The Culture of Shortage during State-Socialism: Consumption Practices in a Romanian Village in the 1980s,” Cultural Studies 16(1): 16–43 (2002).
46. Bergner, “Herausforderungen und Perspektiven zukünftigen,” 251–252.
47. For a detailed discussion of the changes, see Amanda Klekowski von Kloppenfels, “The Decline of Privilege: The Legal Background to the Migration of Ethnic Germans,” in David Rock and Stefan Wolff, eds., Coming Home to Germany? The Integration of Ethnic Germans from Central and Eastern Europe in the Federal Republic (Oxford: Berghan, 2002), 102–118.
48. Bergner, “Herausforderungen und Perspektiven zukünftigen,” 252.
49. Wolff, German Question since 1919, 123.
50. See, for instance, Christoph Cornelißen, Roman Holec, and Jiři Pešek, eds., Diktatur-Krieg-Vertreibung: Erinnerungskulturen in Tschechien, der Slowakei und Deutschland seit 1945 (Ústí nad Labem: Albis International, 2007).
51. The full petition can be viewed in German at “Petition,” ResRo, http://www.resro.eu/dokumente/petition.pdf (accessed 14 April 2010) or in Romanian at “Petiţie,” ResRo, http://www.resro.eu/dokumente/petitie.pdf (accessed 14 April 2010).
52. See Koranyi, Between East and West, 96–154.
53. See, for instance, Jeffrey Herf, Divided Memory: The Nazi Past in the Two Germanys (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997) and Ruth Wittlinger, German National Identity in the Twenty-First Century: A Different Republic After All? (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2010), 26.
54. See, for instance, SiebenbürgeR.de [sic], the Web site of the main Saxon émigré newspaper, which hosts dynamic online discussions, http://www.siebenbuerger.de/forum/ (accessed 17 April 2010).
55. For details, see http://www.siebenbuerger.de/benutzer/benutzer.php (accessed 17 April 2010).
56. This is referring to the European Capital of Culture in 2007; for details see Sibiu 2007, http://www.sibiu2007.ro/ (accessed 17 April 2010).
57. Annina Braumann, Kulturtourismus—Möglichkeiten der Imagemodifizierung am Beispiel der europäischen Kulturhauptstadt 2007: Sibiu/Hermannstadt (Norderstedt: GRIN Verlag, 2007).
58. See “Peter Maffay will Kirchenburg kaufen,” Siebenbürgische Zeitung, 24 March 2008, http://www.siebenbuerger.de/zeitung/artikel/interviews/7588-peter-maffay-will-kirchenburg-kaufen.html (accessed 17 April 2010).
59. See, for instance, Brian Graham, G. J. Ashworth, and J. E. Tunbridge, A Geography of Heritage: Power, Culture, and Economy (London: Arnold, 2000) for a good overview and discussion of cultural heritage and its relation to identity—national or otherwise.
60. The main publication for Transylvanian Saxons, Siebenbürgische Zeitung, reflects this trend in the articles it publishes on the aforementioned individuals. Since the subscription rates are relatively high (26,000 in 2004) and the number of hits on its Web site even higher (3,600 a day in 2005), the influence this has on raising awareness of developments in Transylvania is quite high.
61. That said, the physical makeup of Saxon Transylvania with its fortified churches and Saxon villages conjures up in itself notions of a “Golden Age.” For more on the phenomenon of Ostalgie see Paul Cooke, Representing East Germany Since Reunification: From Colonization to Nostalgia (Oxford: Berg, 2005).
62. See, for instance, Arne Frank, Das wehrhafte Sachsenland: Kirchenburgen im südlichen Siebenbürgen (Potsdam: Deutsches Kulturforum Östliches Europa, 2007) and Harald Roth, Hermannstadt: Kleine Geschichte einer Stadt in Siebenbürgen (Cologne: Böhlau, 2006).
63. For an early example of this process of reimagining, see Gustav Zickeli, Bistritz Zwischen 1880 und 1950: Erinnerungen (Munich: Verlag Südostdeutsches Kulturwerk, 1989).
64. See Brubaker, Nationalism Reframed.
65. See Lucian Boia, History and Myth in the Romanian Consciousness (Budapest: CEU Press, 2001), 162–165.
66. See, for instance, Peter Pastior, “Die Not der Landsleute in Siebenbürgen halt an,” Siebenbürgische Zeitung Online, 23 Oct. 2007. http://www.siebenbuerger.de/zeitung/artikel/drucken/index.php?id = 7115 (accessed 17 April 2010).
67. See “Kemper zum Heimattag der Siebenbürger Sachsen,” http://www.bmi.bund.de/nn_898278/Internet/Content/Nachrichten/Archiv/Reden/2005/05/BA_Kemper_Heimattag.html (accessed 17 April 2010).