Reading and reviewing Diefendorf In the Wake of War Essay

In 1945 acuate bombing gave the Germans a unique fortune comprehensively to redesign their t possesss and cities. The distress to the urban fabric was so great that reconstructive memory was judge to take lx years. It took ten. thus far, the bland architecture of many cities today suggests that the Germans senseless their fall outs. They certainly demolished too much and arguably recompensed to small-minded pre- struggle life and spirit of many of their finest townspeoples. They could fetch done better further, as In The awake of cont block.The reconstructive memory of German Cities after World contend II, by Jeffry Diefendorf shows, they confront constraints which were as complex and faultfinding as those affecting their economic rec all everyplacey. The scale of the damage was staggering. The rubble from the ten worst-affected extended cities lone would collect c overed Hyde Park to a depth of d feet. Moreover, capable planners and architects were scarce. Diefe ndorf, a professor of history at the University of New Hampshire, has written an excellent, longly look intoed carry on the reconstructive memory of fight-damaged German cities after 1945.This reconstructive memory manif ancient in part the loudnessive clearance of rubble from avenues and building sites except it as well as required a comprehensive rethinking of grooming, architecture, and building virtue. German city planners had to fade divulge several dilemmas. First, they c completely fored to distance German cities from their kingdomal socialist late(prenominal), yet also restore legitimate architectural landmarks. Second, German planners alliance with the growe international modernist crusade deviationed with this concern for historic preservation. Finally, the grand hopes of comprehensively redesigning the modify city centers were constrained by the urgent need for basic caparison.In this scholarly study address to students of history, architecture, city plan, and development, Jeffrey M. Diefendorf makes two abundant and inter cerebrate contributions. He delineates the activities, ideas, and institutional extremityes that accompanied the redoing of many of west most(prenominal)(prenominal) Germanys ruined cities after World fight II and he shows that the unsophisticateds urban reconstructive memory between 1945 and 1955-60, when reviewed structurally, was influenced by manifest genuine exigencies as intimately as notable preceding urban cooking and design traditions. Many had emigrated in the 1930s.Those who worked down the stairs the Nazis were now distrusted or dismissed. These difficulties were compounded by shortages of power, equipment and transport and by the Allied requisitioning and dismantling of intrinsic equipment. There were further problems. Each city had had a distinctive pre- state of war character. Each was unalikely affected by bombing. Thus, to each one brass sectiond different reconstructive memory problems and proposed different solutions. There was no central administration, and Nazi provision arrangements were in abeyance so co-ordination and planning accountants were weak. Nor could municipalities appear with a clean slate.Buildings, building lines and ripety rights unperturbed existed crimson the rubble belonged to roundone. Moreover, the best course of serve was unclear. Prussian, Weimar and Nazi planning and architectural traditions remained strong yet were now unacceptable and no agreed alternatives existed. Were they to restore the old or build virtuallything fresh? Architects, lanners, topical an aesthetic councils, the Allied occupation authorities and the local states all had divergenceing preferences. Aspects of the Reconstruction The primary focus is on the too soon postwar years, from 1945 through the late mid-fifties.though reconstructive memory elbow greases continued well into the 1960s (and some level to the present day), Diefendorf arg ues that by the late 1950s the explicit reconstruction of bombed cities gave way to a grander process of growth and modernization. In fact, Marshall Plan economic aid and the western get together States German economic miracle accelerated what many in 1945 thought would be a forty-year reconstruction period. Diefendorf wisely examines the events leading up to 1945, from the Bauhaus architectural influences of the mid-twenties to war judgment of conviction bombing and planning (including plans to build under underseal, bomb-proof fortress cities called Webrstadte).He spends an entire chapter on prewar German planning, and an oddly interesting chapter on postwar planners both be single-valued functionful references for comparative work on the craft and its intellectual history. Diefendorf reminds us that urban reconstruction is a very complex and emotionally charged subject, since so many concerns, both practical and psychological, need to be satisfied. Right at the end of the war reconstruction would keep back to take place immediately in order to the major cities of Germany to recover and get sustain on its tracks.The need for structures from the wide sort of sectors in German cities would reasonably come from the German population eager to start their lives anew. Apart from the fiscal limitations and some other hindrances in terms of resources, the reconstruction of the whole German cities and the German pride would befool to come at a pricea substantial where the stakes encompass not further the physical but, more(prenominal) meaning(a)ly, the emotional and psychological aspects of the planners, builders, and of the entire population.At the end of the war, the depression desperate need was for shelter for the unhoused, tired, and disappointed civilian population, augmented by refugees, expellees, and returning war veterans. This was the time of clearing the rubble by the celebrated Trummerfrauen, as it was also a time of conflict betwe en private initiative and public control, a period of vast black market activities and widespread il intelligent building. These things, on a larger perspective, conjure to be huge hindrances to the restoration of the integrity of the country as well as for the physical reconstruction of Germanys major cities.Conditions changed as soon as the currentness reform of 1948 had taken hold. There were, of course, solace problems of expropriation and compensation of private property and there was no generally applicable agreement as to who had legal power over the construct process. As the book sheds shed light on on the disparity over the jurisdiction rights over the reconstruction process, the struggle between the public control and private initiative nevertheless emphasized the match aim of reconstructing the fallen country.And although the town, the state, and the federal official government had conflict in determining precisely who is trusty over certain atomic design 18as a nd aspects of the reconstruction process, funds were eventually provided by a special equalization of nitty-gritty tax. bottom the Pages Redefining the postwar German Reconstruction Focusing on the experience of over thirty of Germanys largest cities, this is the first general account in English of the decently efforts to rebuild urban Germany after 1945.The research effort and the command of detail atomic number 18 impressive and Diefendorf tells the pertain tale with clarity and style. However, the treatment is uneven. It covers only the West Germany and concentrates on solely four cities Munich, Cologne, West Berlin and, especially, Hamburg. The book, in general, is excellent history, thorough, documented, well organized, and readable written. On its own terms, there is little to criticize although at some point the aspects worthy of criticism shelve out the idea of discrediting the whole book.The illustrations be excellently chosen, with collision before-and-after photos , although some city plans would slang helped. The organization by subject rather than chronologyrubble clearance, architectural style, diachronic preservation, housing, city planning, law, and administrative organizationsworks well, even if it now and then demands separating one event into pieces in different chapters. The research apparently occupied the author for fifteen years, took him to many archives, and led him to interviews both of key participants and of other researchers.Its immersion shows in the resultshows perhaps too much, when we are given lists of planners or names of streets occasionally burden the text without adding to understanding. Newly found sources tend to involve economic aid out of proportion, but everything is clear, and by and large a suitable degree of skepticism is sprinkled over the self-serving quotations from participants. The distinctive East German reconstruction effort is omitted East Berlin and Dresden rate only passing mention.Furthermor e, the detailed discussion of architectural and planning principles, wartime planning and the local politicking is a trifle microscopic. I should have preferred fewer endnotes and a briefer bibliography, which together build over one quarter of the book. But the reconstruction of West Germanys cities after 1945 remains a tale worth telling. In his structuralist perspective, the post war reconstruction of West Germanys battered cities mark neither a radical damp with the past nor a completely new beginning.He emphasizes that signifi open firet continuities linked the periods before and after 45 (p. xvi). The tension on continuities does not, however, keep him from sketching the signal discontinuity created by the wartime war against the cities. The war had been awesome and awful 45 percentage of the housing stock had been destroyed or damaged. urban Germans needed to clear mountains of rubble, to procure scarce materials and toil for reconstruction, to rebuild both legally and illegally in order to survive.The legal and illegal ways in which the Germans engaged themselves into all for the name of salvaging whatever they can from the ruins of the war is partially discussed in the book. The very creation of these twofold activities meant that by any possible pith the reconstruction of the major German cities, towns, and the entire nations would have to be met. barely this is the part where the book gathers the assent to assert the idea that such an objective was not an easy task as it may have sounded.A lot of hindrances would have to be faced along the way such as financial constraints and conflict over who is going to be responsible for which specific areas are to be reconstructed, and on what buildings are to be erected. Diefendorfs accent, however is on the face of reconstruction on such issues as architectural styles and historic preservation and such problems as old an new housing, town planning, and building laws. These topics take up most of th e book, and he derives credible conclusions in each case. Throughout, he shows the importance of the long-term historical context.The ties of the book with history is both necessary and interesting isolated from the reason that postwar Germany is a good demonstrate for substantiating on the idea of how a nation faces the most wretched conditions and is able to stand on its own, recovering almost immediately from a mistreat hardly achieved by any other country. In architecture, he suggests that a broadly conceived modernist style, although struggling with traditionality and bowing to expediency, survived into the postwar period, becoming dominant in the late 1950s.As to historic preservation, German cities chose discontinue paths after nonplustling on whether, how, and under what conditions to rebuild the damaged shell (p. 69). Hamburg, Berlin, Frankfurt, Hanover, and Stuttgart generally favored modernization Munster, Freiburg, and Nuremberg emphasized their historic character Lubeck, Cologne, and Munich took a sum path. The chapter contains excellent photographs, and Diefendorf observes that planners tended to prefer modernization whereas citizens groups called for preservation. Planning Amidst Reconstruction DifficultiesDebates to the highest degree architecture and political behavior had taken place since the 1920s. The book highlights the idea that traditional architecture, with its ingredient of historic preservation, and its stress on regional national variations and native building materials, vied with more modern forms of city planning, with its emphasis on commerce, industry and transportation, particularly on job by car. In many cases the light bombardment had razed the center and most dumbly settled area of the city, and had provided the planners with a ready-made ground and the opportunity for modern rebuilding.Here was a chance to solve the problems of earlier unplanned urbanization that had been brought more or less by the industrial ization. In a large number of cases, underground sewage, water, gas and electricity conduits were not heavy damaged and could be used again. The rapid rebuilding of the German cities, done within almost a decade, can only be understood in terms of previous long-term urban planning. Notably, German housing shortages dated back to the turn of the century. cold from abating during the Weimar country, they were further complicated and compounded during the Nazi regime.A housing crisis developed particularly during World War II, persisting into the postwar period partly because extensive new construction did not begin until the currency reform of 1948. Thereafter, modest residential housing units in both suburbs and inner cities began to appear across the national Republic. This outcome was aided by a broad consensus on housing construction, the passage of a federal housing law in 1950, as well as private and public supporting (with baseborn Marshall Plan funds acting as lubricant) .In this case, it can be noted that the existence of housing predicaments paved the way for the attention of the public and private sectors. Diefendorf further notes that the growth of a body planning law paralleled the growth of town planning in Germany in the late ordinal century (p. 222). This observation of the author corresponds to the belief that the make up in the reaches of Germanys body planning law has something to do with the increase in the planning for the reconstruction of various parts of Germany.From the minor to the major towns and cities, the laws enacted by the states to set limits and definitions on ways that affect the reconstruction of the various regions led to a sweeping set of changes in the urban lives of the people. The prominent architects and city planners, who were in direct participation in the efforts of reconstruction during the early period of the postwar era, had accumulated their training during the Weimar Republic, had been actively participat ing during the Third Reich, and were more than eager to use their skills and competence in the service of building during the postwar era.They saw themselves as individuals belonging to the nonpolitical group, just as the large number of doctors had done. They were engaged essentially in developing the cities while straying by from the political domain and the influence of political groups that prove to control the reconstruction process to their advantage. Yet even if the laws were enacted, there were notable lapses that undermine the very use of goods and services in which these laws were created. For instance, the laws usually sufficed for laying out streets but typically failed to address the issue of what was erected behind the street facades (p.222). There were certain lapses that the book highlights, which veritably amounts to the presumption that even if there were salient legal efforts to boost the reconstruction process by setting legal definitions on the process, thes e were nevertheless not without certain unique lapses on their own. Predictably, the enduring housing problems had kept the planners busy during pause and war. Diefendorf emphasizes that postwar planning remained largely in the workforce of pre-1945 planners who had gained experience in the years 1933-45 but whose plans tended to feed the Nazi regime.Despite the planners ambivalence about public in trust and their debatable military press that they were apolitical, Diefendorf treats them and their plans generously Freiburg and Cologne came to exemplify conservative planning, Kiel and Aachen demonstrate the pragmatic approach, while the partial planning of Mainz and Berlin resembled that of most other West German cities (p. 197). If the planners failed to solve the burgeoning postwar traffic problems, it was because they could not anticipate the speedy arriver and proliferation of private motor vehicles.Diefendorf makes it clear that planning the reconstruction of vast cities a nd towns is not a process under the helm of pure democracy. It was at the same time burdensome and difficult to reconcile the wishes of the whole mass of populations who desire to avert back their familiar environment. It was also difficult to reconcile the needs of an expanding and forward-looking parsimony under the oversight of a wide variety of public and private organizations. The book has two related flaws It misstates its subject, and it is not interdisciplinary.Its real subject is the planning for the reconstruction of German cities after the war (and the organizational and legal problems that accompanied that planning), but not the economics, the politics, or the sociology of the reconstruction process itself. Its focus is on what planners said, what theories they held, what positions they occupied, a little about what they accomplished, and much more about what they did not accomplish. Along the way, many interesting questions are raised(a) Is there such a thing as Nazi planning? (Yes, but only in limited areas.) Did planning evolve continuously from the Weimar Republic through the Nazi era to the postwar years, or was the Nazi period a sharp break in continuity? (No sharp break. ) Was reconstruction planning successful? (Under the circumstances, remarkably so, although, in hindsight, with many shortcomings. ) Yet it appears that the flesh and blood of reconstruction is apparently dummy up to be found. Planners may plan cities, but they do not create the decisions on what gets built, or where, when, and how these buildings are to be built.Not unlike in the United States, in Germany after the war, developers, builders, financial institutions, property owners, and politicians concerend about taxes, were all key players, as sometimes were groups of citizens with nonfinancial and nonpolitical motivations. Briefly, in discussing why comprehensive planning laws did not get passed, the author shares some confidential information of pressures from prope rty owners briefly, in discussing organizations, he avers that when major banks contend a role in planning, things went more smoothly.Yet it may well be that the department-store, real-estate offices were more powerful in what actually happened than the entire planner put together. Diefendorf displays understanding for the difficulties facing German planners, but his conclusions could be taken as the starting point for a critique of a functionalism stripped of aesthetic ambition. Postwar architecture tended to satisfy neither modernists nor traditionalists. Associated with a new building style n the 1920s, standardized housing of the 1940s and 1950s was no loner expected to result in exciting buildings (p. 61).Functionalist abandonment of aesthetic concerns was also evident in planning. Emphasizing broad functional tasks, most city planners concerned themselves principally with public health and safety and with the flow of traffic in the cities. Although there may have been sple ndiferous city planners involved in the reconstruction process, the funding for the entire process have also hindered the acquisition of utterly expensive and grand architectural buildings, owing perhaps to the books observation that the proper appropriation of the financial budget had to be guardedly managed so as to meet the ends.The author quotes social lion Grebler, a real-estate economist familiar with market forces, to the found that postwar German planning produced traffic improvements and decongestion on central areas (p. 347), but his explanation for the amelioration alludes only to the personalities of planners and planning theories. Diefendorf cites none of either the old or the new urban sociology, no urban politics, no social history to explain reactions to central planning, and no urban economicsnothing on the forces geological formation cities worldwide in the postwar era.Further, the book notes that the wars devastation offered Germany a unique opportunity to co rrect the failings of the urban blight produced by the industrial and population expansion of the second half of the nineteenth century (p. 275). One of the books most fascinating discussions concerns the transformation of the German planning employment from the Nazi period to the early postwar years.