SFB 580:  Social Developments after Structural Change - Discontinuity, Tradition, Structural Formation

• Subject Area: Social and Behavioural Sciences
• Term: from 2001 to 2012
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 5484710

The first phase of research into the transformation of East Germany was guided by the expectation that the East would quickly adapt to the status of the West by a proc-ess of rapid modernisation. In the second phase this approach has been changed: The starting point no longer assumes that East Germany is simply hampered by a modernisation lag that can be reduced over time but rather that in the East there are developments particular to that region. This assumption that a specific logic of societal development and crisis management exists in the East is the central focus of this col-laborative research centre. The general research questions therefore are: Under which conditions and in which areas can we expect further moves in the East towards a greater similarity with the West, and where might we expect a stabilisation of differences? Do processes of social learning and the underlying transformation of societal institutions result in new permanent arrangements or will there be strong tensions and instabilities in East Germany that will lead to repeated disruptions? How do the East German social structures blend with new developments in Germany as a whole and across Europe? The research into the mid-term logic of societal developments and crisis management creates an important basis for comparisons both for the analysis of further transformations of East and mid-European post-socialist societies and for the discussion of modernisation crises in western societies. In a second grant period a stronger research focus on comparisons with developments in western and eastern European societies is there-fore planned.

• DFG Programme: Collaborative Research Centres
• International Connection: South Korea

Completed projects

• A01 - Functional elites and societal differentiation in the GDR and the East German federal states - career structures and continuity (Project Head Best, Heinrich )
• A02 - Economic elites in expanded Europe: recruitment, careers, and orientations of managers (Project Heads Behr, Michael ;  Bluhm, Katharina ;  Dörre, Klaus )
• A03 - Representative elites after regime change (Project Head Best, Heinrich )
• A04 - Local political and administrative elites - life courses and new challenges in the elite action between uncertainty, professionalization and legitimization (Project Heads Aderhold, Jens ;  Holtmann, Everhard )
• A05 - Spheres of experience and levels of expectation in a period of genertional transitions. Chances of participation and interpretation systems of selected basic elites (Project Heads Köhle-Hezinger, Christel ;  Niethammer, Lutz )
• A06 - Non-partisan local lists as hybrid political actors (Project Heads Holtmann, Everhard ;  Reiser, Marion )
• B01 - Large-scale unemployment and lack of skilled labour. Intercompany labour markets between instability and restructuring (Project Heads Grünert, Holle ;  Kohte, Wolfhard )
• B02 - Open and closed positions - employer and employee interests and strategies. (Project Heads Koehler, Christoph ;  Krause, Alexandra ;  Struck, Olaf )
• B05 - Die Nachfrage nach Personaldienstleistungen im Spannungsfeld von ökonomischen und rechtlichen Determinanten (Project Head Alewell, Dorothea )
• B07 - Strategische Interaktion, Reziprozität und Fairness - Bausteine zu einer Theorie der Beschäftigungsbeziehung (Project Heads Güth, Werner ;  Sutter, Matthias )
• B08 - Demographischer Wandel und Arbeitsmarkt des öffentlichen Sektors (Project Head Sackmann, Reinhold )
• B09 - A new emerging underclass? Labour market orientations and institutions at the boundary between long-term-unemployment and low-wage-employment. An international comparison (Project Heads Behr, Michael ;  Dörre, Klaus )
• B10 - New business formation and the labour market in East and West German growth regimes (Project Head Fritsch, Michael )
• C2 - Elternhaus und Kindergarten. Institutionen und Akteure im Prozess des Aufwachsens von Kindern. Ein deutsch-deutscher und internationaler Vergleich von Figurationsprozessen zwischen Professionellen und Laien (Project Head Rabe-Kleberg, Ursula )
• C03 - Individual resources and professional support in processes of systems transformation in contrasting rural milieus in Eastern and Western Germany (Project Head Hildenbrand, Bruno )
• C04 - Moral topographics of engaged and disengaged citizens in Eastern and Western Germany (Project Heads Corsten, Michael ;  Rosa, Hartmut )
• C05 - Rehabilitation and care between transformation and developpment: Individualisation and differenciation of health care and social care in the case of health related riscs of exclusion in Eastern and Western Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Italy and the Tschech Republic (Project Heads Behrens, Johann ;  Zimmermann, Markus )
• C06 - Individual and social resources for coping with social change. Development and psychosocial effects. (Project Head Silbereisen, Rainer K. )
• C09 - "Productive Ageing", East and West: Images and practices of ageing in the post-1989 transformation of the German welfare state (Project Heads van Dyk, Silke ;  Lessenich, Stephan )
• M - Koordination und Organisation der CATI-Umfragen für den SFB (Project Head Sahner, Heinz )
• PR - Deutscher Sonderweg Ost? (Project Head Best, Heinrich )
• T - 1989 as a testcase for theories of social change: A multi-level theoretical approach to the ongoing process of transformation. (Project Head Rosa, Hartmut )
• T03 - Transfer of Knowledge as Intercultural Translation: Evolving Practices of transformationpreparing Activities in Korea (Project Heads Holtmann, Everhard ;  Lee, Eun-Jeung )
• Z01 - Zentrale Aufgaben des Sonderforschungsbereiches (Project Head Holtmann, Everhard )

• Applicant Institution: Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena
• Participating University: Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg
• Participating Institution: Max-Planck-Institut für Geoanthropologie
• Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Everhard Holtmann