ABSTRACT
In retrospect it appears that the East German ruling class experienced its greatest successes, and was at its most confident, during a period that began in the early 1960s, after the outcry over the building of the Wall had subsided, and ended in the late 1970s or early 1980s. From then on, difficulties began to stack up, some of which have been discussed in previous chapters: declining social mobility, consumer-goods shortages, and the constraints upon the regime’s freedom of manœuvre posed by the Helsinki process and closer integration with the West. These were compounded by developments to the east, with the fall of the Soviet-supported government in Afghanistan, a loss that the Red Army was unable to reverse, the Solidarnoée■sée■´c movement’s challenge to the Polish Communist Party, and growing tensions between Moscow and East Berlin in the early 1980s.1 On the economic front planners were beset by unforeseen problems caused by rising interest rates and their effect on foreign debt payments, and by soaring oil prices and foreign exchange shortages.2 A lack of funds available for replacing equipment or for investing in social infrastructure exacerbated problems of economic planning and public policy.
