The Magic Lantern

Garton Ash considers economics as both a short- and long-term driver of political change. He considers economic forces to explain not only why the revolutions of 1989 happened when they did, but why the entire system became increasingly unpopular and unsustainable. By the 1980s, Polish workers and ordinary citizens experienced declining wages and rising inflation. Garton Ash notes that “only a government with Solidarity’s clear endorsement would have the credibility to push through the painful measures of austerity and restructuring which necessarily would accompany any serious programme of economic reform” (32). People in Poland complained that the government could not even provide basic staples, such as toilet paper. The ongoing economic collapse put urgent pressure on the transition to a new government, and Garton Ash notes that the former communist rulers collaborated productively with Solidarity to usher in the transition. Solidarity had the credibility as a social movement to urge its constituency to accept the changes, including the possibility of job loss.

The GDR’s proximity to the democratic and capitalist Federal Republic of Germany also had specific economic repercussions. When the Berlin Wall opened in November 1989, many of those who crossed it went shopping, to access consumer goods that had previously been entirely unavailable to them.