Table of Contents

1: Introduction
Part I: Before the Wall 1945-61
2: East Germany's Dual Crisis: Politics and Economics on the Eve of the Wall
3: Crossing the Line: Republikflucht between Defection and Migration
4: Holding the Line: Policing the Open Border
Part II: Behind the Wall 1961-89
5: Walled In: 13 August 1961
6: In the Shadow of the Wall
7: Wanderlust: Travel, Emigration and the Movement
Part III: Beyond the Wall
8: The Fall of the Wall: 9 November 1989
9: Seeking Closure: Remembering the Wall

About the Author

Patrick Major studied as an undergraduate and postgraduate at the University of Oxford. He came to know East Berlin during a year living in West Berlin in 1985-86, and was one of the first western researchers allowed into the East German communist party's archives after the fall of the wall in February 1990, for a PhD on The Death of the KPD: Communism and Anti-Communism in West Germany, 1945-1956 (OUP, 1997) which won the Royal Historical Society's Gladstone Prize.

Reviews

Major's mastery of the archival sources is most impressive...a model of a truly integrated history...indispensable for anyone seeking to understand the origins and reality of the modern 'State With the Wall'.
*Diethelm Prowe, German History*

Major succeeds in producing a truly integrated, readable, and thought-provoking history of politics and people that adds significantly to our understanding of the GDR.
*Bill Niven, Central European History*

This study offers such a wealth of data, information, insights, and judgements
*Michael Kubina, German Historical Institute London Bulletin*

provide[s] a fascinating and astute insight into the workings of East German communism.
*Josie McLellan, English Historical Review*