Berlin
Berlin , city (1994 pop. 3,475,400), capital of Germany, coextensive with Berlin state (341 sq mi/883 sq km), NE Germany, on the Spree and Havel rivers. Formerly divided into East Berlin (156 sq mi/404 sq km) and West Berlin (185 sq mi/479 sq km), the city was reunified along with East and West Germany on Oct. 3, 1990.
Economy
Due in part to aid from the United States and other Allied powers, West Berlin's recovery after World War II was rapid and substantial. East Berlin, however, saw a period of relative economic decline, though it became the undisputed focal point of development within the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) and an important city in Soviet-dominated Eastern Europe. Disparities between E and W Berlin still survive. Berlin's economy has been primarily industrial, but is becoming increasingly focused on service-sector activities. Electronics and garments are major industries; other manufactures includes textiles, metals, porcelain and china, bicycles, and machinery. The anticipated move of the national government to Berlin prompted a building boom during the 1990s, including more than 30 major construction projects in the eastern part of the city and a large aircraft factory on its outskirts. A new central railroad station opened in 2006.
Institutions and Attractions
Berlin is a major cultural center, home to numerous symphony orchestras, opera companies, repertory theaters, and museums. It has an excellent public transportation system and is served by two airports. In the Kurfürstendamm, the main thoroughfare in the western section of the city, stands the gutted tower of the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, left unrestored as a reminder of the war. A similar memorial, the unrestored remains of the St. Nicholas Church, has been preserved in E Berlin.
The large Tiergarten park in central Berlin contains the reconstructed Reichstag building with its glass dome and the Berlin zoo. On the NE side of the park, along a bend in the Spree River, the Federal Strip, which is under construction, houses a number of government buildings, including the enormous Chancellery (opened 2001). The concert hall of the Berlin Philharmonic is on the opposite side of the Tiergarten. At the SE end of the park is Potsdamer Platz, which was the heart of the city in the 1920s and 30s. In the 1990s, it came under commercial and residential renewal, becoming the largest construction site in Europe. The State Opera is in E Berlin, on the famous Unter den Linden, which leads to the Brandenburg Gate, a triumphal arch in the classical style. Near the Gate is the city's 5.5-acre (2.2-hectare) Holocaust memorial (2005).
Among Berlin's many museums are those in the Cultural Forum in the western part of the city, including the New National Gallery and the Gemäldegarie; those in Museum Island in the eastern part of the city, including the Altes Museum and the Pergamon Museum; and the Berlin Museum-Jewish Museum complex in the Kreuzberg district. Humboldt Univ. of Berlin (formerly known as the Univ. of Berlin or Frederick William Univ.) and the Free Univ. of Berlin (founded in 1948) are among the city's many educational and scientific institutions.
History
Early History to World War II
Berlin had its beginning in two Wendish villages, Berlin and Kölln, which were chartered in the 13th cent. and merged in 1307. It assumed importance as a Hanseatic League town in the 14th cent. and became the seat of the electors of Brandenburg (after 1701, kings of Prussia) in 1486. Berlin suffered severely from the Thirty Years War (1618-48), but Frederick William (reigned 1640-88), the Great Elector, restored and improved the city. Occupied in the Seven Years War by Austrian (1757) and Russian (1760) troops and in the Napoleonic Wars by the French (1806-8), Berlin emerged from the conflicts as a center of German national feeling and an increasingly serious rival of Vienna.
From the 18th and early 19th cent. date many of the distinguished monuments and buildings of the city (chiefly by Andreas Schlüter and Karl Friedrich Schinkel ). Berlin was the center of the Revolution of 1848 against King Frederick William IV. The construction of railroads (1840-61) gave it additional importance as an industrial and commercial center. Berlin also became part of a canal system that linked it to the Oder, Elbe, and Rhine rivers and to the North Sea. In 1866 it became the seat of the North German Confederation and in 1871 it was made the capital of the German Empire. The city prospered and expanded rapidly, becoming one of the great urban centers of the world. Berlin's population had increased from 201,000 in 1819 to 914,000 in 1871; by 1900 it was 2,712,000.
The German military defeat of 1918 brought on a period of social and political unrest. After the establishment (Nov., 1918) of a Socialist government, Berlin was the scene of the abortive uprising of the Communist Spartacus party (Jan., 1919) and of the conservative putsch of 1920 (see Kapp, Wolfgang ). As the capital of the Weimar Republic, Berlin suffered severe economic crises in the 1920s, but it was also a brilliant cultural center.
Throughout the Nazi regime (1933-45) Berlin remained the second largest city of Europe, a notable economic, political, and educational center, and a huge inland port with a flourishing world trade. It was also the major communications and transportation hub of Central Europe. During World War II, Berlin was repeatedly bombed from the air by the Allies, but the heaviest destruction was caused by a Soviet artillery barrage of unprecedented intensity that preceded the capture (May 2, 1945) of the city by Marshal Zhukov.
Divided Berlin
On May 8, 1945, Germany's unconditional surrender to the Allies was signed in Berlin. The division of the city into sectors by the Potsdam Conference resulted in severe tension between the Soviet Union and the Western powers. The Soviets occupied the sector that subsequently became known as East Berlin. The zones assigned to the British, American, and French occupation forces constituted West Berlin. The French occupied the NW part of the city, and the Americans and the British occupied the S districts. The joint Allied military government ( Kommandatura ) was not successful and virtually ceased to function when the USSR informally withdrew in 1948.
The status of Berlin became a major cold war issue, and attempts at international agreement ended in deadlock (see Foreign Ministers, Council of ) as the USSR sought to remove all Western (including West German) control from West Berlin and the Western powers maintained that settlement of the Berlin problem depended on reunification of Germany. In 1948, Soviet authorities established a blockade on all land and water communications between West Berlin and West Germany. The Western powers, foremost among them the United States, successfully undertook to supply West Berlin by a large-scale airlift through three air "corridors" left open to them (see Berlin airlift ). The blockade was withdrawn in May, 1949, and the airlift ended in Sept., 1949. In that year East Berlin was proclaimed the capital of the new German Democratic Republic, and in 1950 West Berlin was established as one of the states of the Federal Republic of Germany (of which Berlin was the de jure capital and Bonn the de facto capital). Workers rioted in East Berlin in June, 1953, and were suppressed by Soviet tanks.
In the following years there were several Berlin crises, as the USSR in unilateral declarations, often accompanied by harassing actions, contested the legal basis for the Western powers' presence in and access to West Berlin. Meanwhile better living conditions in the western zone had led to a massive exodus of refugees from East to West, which was both a great embarrassment for the Communists and a serious drain on the East German labor supply. To stop the flow, East Germany gave the division of the city a grimly physical form in Aug., 1961, by erecting the 29-mi (47-km) fortified Berlin Wall along the partition line, leaving only a few closely guarded crossing points.
The Western powers protested vigorously but ineffectively, and East German border guards killed dozens of persons attempting to break through the barrier. War seemed near as Soviet and American tanks faced each other at the border crossings, but after 1962 the crisis eased. In Dec., 1963, the first of several agreements was reached permitting West Berliners to visit relatives in the eastern zone. Visits across the wall and access to West Berlin from West Germany were finally regularized in the Berlin accords reached among the four powers and the two Germanys in 1972.
Reunification
The tense stalemate in inter-German relations that persisted throughout most of the 1980s was dramatically broken as a result of the political upheavals that took place in East Germany in late 1989 and early 1990. Massive demonstrations in East Berlin and other East German cities led to the collapse of the Honecker regime and the dismantling of the Berlin Wall in Nov., 1989. In Oct., 1990, East and West Berlin were officially joined to form the state of Berlin, and the first city-wide elections in Berlin since 1946 were held in Dec., 1990. In June, 1991, the German Bundestag voted in favor of Berlin as the seat of the nation's legislature and government; Bonn , the capital of the former West Germany, served as the provisional seat of government until 1999, when most government functions were transferred to Berlin. In 1996 residents of Berlin voted to unite in a single state with surrounding Brandenburg, but the measure was rejected by Brandenburg voters.
Bibliography
See H. Vizetelly, Berlin under the New Empire (2 vol., 1879; repr. 1968); G. Masur, Imperial Berlin (1971); O. Friedrich, Before the Deluge (1986); G. Kirchhoff, ed., Views of Berlin (1989); B. Gwertzman and M. Kaufman, The Collapse of Communism (1990).
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