Ideology, Iconoclasm, and the Wunderkammer of Berlin (original) (raw)

Rethinking Marxism, 2009

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to make a critical reading of the dismantling process of the Palast der Republik in Berlin. The demolition of the Palast, the prestige building of the former German Democratic Republic, can be seen as the final step in the process of reassessing the East German past. It shows how the space in the center of Berlin has been (re)appropriated from above (i.e., by state power and its ruling class) and redefined according to the new social and cultural undertakings of the German Republic. The International Commission of Experts (Internationale Expertenkommission) appointed to validate through “scientific” arguments the demolition of the building produced in its final report an appropriate, site-specific cultural value that has colluded with both the purely economic valorization of the place and the construction of national symbols. I suggest that these three aspects—cultural value, economic valorization, and national identity—jointly contribute in this concrete case to shape an entrepreneurial quality that the city of Berlin has embraced as a showcase of the reunified Germany. Through this critical reading, I demonstrate that the demolition of the Palast der Republik should be examined as a symbolic construction of state power that requires a form of iconoclasm.

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