the regime realized that this was one of its huge problems because it was always deeply unpopular.

That was the thing that people hated the most was not being able to travel, not least because

it meant the regime never trusted you. You know, a lot of people were saying, well, I just want

to see my family, you know, let me go and I'll come back and they weren't trusted by the regime

ever, no matter what they did.

And now the good fight with Yasha Monk.

As many of you who regularly listen to this podcast will know, I was born and raised in Germany,

more specifically in West Germany.

And even though the first seven years of my life were spent with a wall separating West Berlin from East Berlin,

and the countries then reunified, I have to admit that I know less about East Germany

than I would like.

That when I was growing up in the reunified Germany, it really was West German culture

and the West German constitution that had really kind of been imposed over East Germany.

I have recently spent a little bit more time in East Germany, but for big parts of my life,

I knew France and Italy and the United Kingdom much better than Leipzig or Dresden.

Well, I thought it would be interesting to talk today about the history of East Germany

and, of course, about how that is continuing to shape

the culture of unified Germany, how in particular it helps to explain the deep political division

between West Germany, where traditional and moderate political parties like the Christian Democrats

and the Social Democrats remain relatively strong. And East Germany, where those parties now come to be increasingly irrelevant

with the far-right alternative for Germany dominating in the polls instead. So to have this conversation,

I invited on the podcast Katya Hoyer.

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