Political Developments

IN THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC AT LEAST, the 1960s were a time of major change in both the political and cultural fields. In the world of politics, the Adenauer government still held sway at the beginning of the decade, whereas at its end, power lay for the first time in the hands of an SPD-led government under Willy Brandt. Although it could have been foreseen in 1960 that the Adenauer era was approaching its close (the patriarch attained the age of eighty-four in that year), it was not just a matter of the inevitable passing of time leading to new constellations of power. Various significant events, many of which attracted considerable attention from writers and intellectuals, helped bring about the many changes that occurred during the decade.

In August 1961, the division of Germany was sealed by the construction of the Berlin Wall. This act by the GDR authorities with Soviet backing seemed to many to be tangible proof that the reunification policy of the Adenauer government, to force concessions from the East through a “policy of strength,” had failed. The result was that the CDU/CSU was punished in the autumn elections, the big winner being the CDU's frequent coalition partner, the liberal Freie Demokratische Partei (Free Democrats, or FDP), which increased its share of the vote from 7.7 to 12.8 per cent, not least by having conducted an anti-Adenauer campaign.