ABSTRACT
With the re-unification of Germany in October 1990, the city of Berlin became in population terms by far the largest city within the newly created state. Occupying an area of 883 sq km the city has a population of circa 3.43 million while the next largest cities within Germany, Hamburg and Munich have populations of and 1.3 million respectively. In this context the decision to transfer the capital functions for Germany from Bonn has created certain fears that Berlin may become increasingly dominant and ultimately destabilize or at least lead to a rearrangement of the German system of cities (Krätke, 1992; Dangschat, 1993).
