At scientific institutions, there was one final possibility for dismissing someone in cases where no grounds for dismissal had been found during the political investigation. A committee, composed exclusively or predominantly of West German colleagues, carried out a professional review, which was often characterized by a high degree of arbitrariness and subjectivity. It was sufficient for the majority of its members to determine that the previous publications of the GDR scientist were of inadequate scientific quality. This meant that the person under review had not passed the professional evaluation and had to go.
An especially efficient instrument in the phasing out of East German elites was the closing of institutions. For example, since both East and West Berlin had an Academy of the Sciences, it was obvious which academy would stay. Most of the scientists who belonged to the GDR Academy of Sciences lost their jobs in this way or were temporarily placed somewhere else.
But even when establishments or institutions were not dissolved, the number of employees had to be substantially cut back on a regular basis for reasons of economy and efficiency. Thus nearly all researchers were dismissed from GDR enterprises when the companies, or at least their research and development departments, were shut down.
[ . . . ]
Source: Gregor Gysi, Ein Blick zurück, ein Schritt nach vorn [A Look Back, a Step Forward] Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 2001, pp. 125-26, 129-32. Copyright © 2001 by Hoffmann und Campe Verlag, Hamburg.
Translation: Thomas Dunlap
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