Interview with Marcus Böick and Hubertus Luthardt

In August 2020 Marcus Böick and Hubertus Luthardt were invited by Werkleitz to a discussion in the Burgörner-Altdorf district of Hettstedt. Marcus Böick is a historian at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum and has researched the perception and estimation of the Treuhandanstalt’s work. Hubertus Luthardt is co-founder of the first workers’ council of the MKM Mansfelder Kupfer und Messing company (now KME). The interview focuses on the controversial history of the Treuhandanstalt as it relates to the events that unfolded at Mansfeld AG/MKM in the early 1990s. To this day the activities of the Treuhandanstalt are an extremely emotional subject, as thousands of people were directly affected by the shutdown of entire industries when they lost their jobs. Both politically and socially the Treuhandanstalt represents an unprecedented attempt to integrate East Germany’s socialist economy into the West German social market economy. The failure associated with this attempt as well as individual success stories are still quite evident in Mansfeld Land. Böick and Luthardt discuss the frustration that stems from the expectations that political actors first fueled and then disappointed and what was happening politically at the time. They examine the significance of individual decisions and the role of local figures. In this way the interview offers a complex perspective on the work of the Treuhandanstalt.