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History is replete with examples of scientists and social scientists working under the yoke of oppressive regimes. In The Closed World of East German Economists, Till Düppe tells the story of a generation of economists whose entire careers coincided with the forty-one-year existence of the German Democratic Republic (GDR). In a micro-historical fashion, he examines the world of East German economists through the formative episodes in the lives of five different economists from this “hope” generation. Using both the perspective of the actors as expressed in interviews and archival material unknown to the actors, the book follows East German economics from the early days of the acceptance of Marxism-Leninism through to its interaction with Western economics and its eventual dissolution following the collapse of the Berlin Wall. It is fascinating insight into the challenges faced by economists in a unique period of European history.
‘Recommended.’
M. J. Frost Source: Choice
‘Düppe’s book is undoubtedly a labor of love, based as it is on exhaustive multi-archival research supplemented by extensive interviews conducted with relatives and colleagues of the men he covers. The author has also mastered a very sizable literature on the GDR and the history of economic thought, including the published writings of the economists in question. Indeed, the book is the most thorough analysis to date on this subject and is likely to become definitive … It is a book about a generation of men who formed the core of the GDR’s intelligentsia, revealing how the SED manufactured consent and generated stability, two areas where it undoubtedly excelled.’
Erik Grimmer-Solem - Wesleyan University
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