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Germany in Transit

University of California Press

Contents

List of Documents.................................................................viiList of Illustrations.............................................................xvPreface...........................................................................xviiList of Abbreviations.............................................................xxiINTRODUCTION: A GERMAN DREAM?.....................................................11 WORKING GUESTS: GASTARBEITER AND GREEN CARD HOLDERS.............................212 OUR SOCIALIST FRIENDS: FOREIGNERS IN EAST GERMANY...............................653 IS THE BOAT FULL? XENOPHOBIA, RACISM, AND VIOLENCE..............................1054 WHAT IS A GERMAN? LEGISLATING NATIONAL IDENTITY.................................1495 RELIGION AND DIASPORA: MUSLIMS, JEWS, AND CHRISTIANS............................1936 PROMOTING DIVERSITY: INSTITUTIONS OF MULTICULTURALISM...........................2417 AN IMMIGRATION COUNTRY? THE LIMITS OF CULTURE...................................2858 LIVING IN TWO WORLDS? DOMESTIC SPACE, FAMILY, AND COMMUNITY.....................3319 WRITING BACK: LITERATURE AND MULTILINGUALISM....................................38310 A TURKISH GERMANY: FILM, MUSIC, AND EVERYDAY LIFE..............................425EPILOGUE: GLOBAL ALREADY?.........................................................469Chronology........................................................................497Glossary..........................................................................513Bibliography......................................................................517Filmography.......................................................................543Internet Resources................................................................553List of Credits...................................................................555Index.............................................................................561

Chapter One

WE BEGIN THIS VOLUME with documents tracing the turbulent itinerary of foreign labor recruitment in West Germany from the postwar era to the present. Though Italian seasonal workers had been employed in the southwestern province of Baden-Wrttemberg since 1952, recruitment on the federal level began in January 1956. Our first text is a 1955 contract between Italy and West Germany "in the spirit of European solidarity" that would place Italian laborers for a maximum term of nine months. Members of the center-left Social Democratic Party objected to the program, claiming that the government should reduce domestic unemployment before hiring foreign labor power. Many questioned whether the postwar German infrastructure was prepared to house, transport, and provide basic services for the 100,000 new recruits expected in 1956.

Despite the plan's detractors, the "guest-worker initiative" evoked a progressive vision of pan-European mobility, foreshadowing many of the transnational features of 1990s labor policy. The contract idealized a flexible, multifunctional laborer who, in contrast to unionized domestic wage earners, could be transplanted to new sites and milieus with ease. This mobile Italian worker would benefit from a symbiotic relationship with the capital-rich, labor-poor West German economy, while continuing to support family members in Italy. The logic of the contract precludes classical immigration by assuming the recruits would neither desire nor need permanent civic membership in the host country. This pro-European, transnational outlook among the contract's negotiators led them to ignore the concrete manifestations of the nation-state: borders, passport controls, xenophobia, and restricted visas.

In the late 1950s, as industry leaders dubbed Italian recruitment a success, the Labor Ministry began to explore similar possibilities beyond the European Economic Community, which then had only six member states. Texts such as "The Verona Bottleneck" (1960) and "The Turks Are Coming" (1961) announce the recruitment of Spanish, Portuguese, and Turkish workers. In these articles, government spokespersons and journalists question the prudence of expanding the guest-worker program beyond the European Economic Community. A 1961 press release from the Confederation of German Employers' Associations suggests that West Germany should consider expanding its economic aid to Turkey instead of expropriating that country's labor power.

Like the recruitment contract with Italy, several of the documents in this chapter exemplify the more "performative" artifacts of early labor migration-informational pamphlets, sociological and demographic research studies, and invitations for labor placement. For example, "How the Turkish Worker Should Behave and Defend His Character in a Foreign Country," a Turkish-language pamphlet distributed by the Istanbul-based Turkish Labor Placement Office in 1963, advertises West Germany as an anticommunist, nationalist country that values hard work above all. Recruits, it suggests, should honor and reflect the virtues of the Turkish Republic and its Ottoman predecessors at all costs. Another text, from 1973, "Invitation for Labor Placement," notifies the addressee of his pending placement in Western Europe and instructs him to present himself for transport at a specific date and time.

Other texts document the public image of immigrants in these early years-whether as caricatures, homesick displaced persons, or future citizens. Giacomo Maturi's 1961 lecture at a nationwide meeting of employers advanced a culturalist theory of guest-worker productivity, suggesting that mental and emotional differences between German and Italian workers required two distinctly different managerial approaches in the workplace. Conny Froboess's popular 1962 song, "Two Little Italians," illustrates this exoticized nostalgia, picking up on the romantic image of the homesick Italian worker.

Though the nine-month "rotation principle" was supposed to be one of the structural mainstays of labor migration in West Germany, it had been all but abandoned in practice by the mid-1960s. A 1965 text, distributed by the Nuremberg-based Federal Labor Placement Office and entitled "Support for the Foreign Employee," took initial steps to acknowledge the permanent nature of immigrant cultures in West Germany. This text asks politicians and citizens to support "coexistence" initiatives, occupational advancement, and cultural programs for guest workers.

A further group of texts index a corpus of political journalism in West Germany that critiqued the inequities and political foibles arising from the guest-worker program. These texts reveal the persistence of a fundamental ambivalence in the mainstream press about the sustainability of temporary, rotation-based labor. "Big Welcome for Armando sa Rodriguez" (1964) reports on an official reception ceremony for the country's 1 millionth guest worker. Later articles, including "Come, Come, Come!-Go, Go, Go!" (1970) and "Recruitment of Guest Workers Stopped" (1973), speak to the living conditions that had arisen from temporary recruitment, including workplace xenophobia and housing inequity. "The Turks Rehearsed the Uprising" (1973) documents a "wildcat strike" at the Ford factory in Cologne, where Turkish autoworkers led a sustained...