ABSTRACT Title of Dissertation: FROM RED TO GREEN IN ... - Isioma

political home for much of the radical West German Left in the 1970s. The West
Berlin Abgeordnetenhaus, the parliamentary body responsible for governing the
city, provides another important source of documentation. 8
The
Abgeordnetenhaus has published transcripts of its proceedings since its founding
in 1951. These transcripts are an excellent source regarding the parliamentary
self-perception of the AL, as well as the AL’s interactions with the other political
parties in Berlin, in particular when debating issues such as relationships with
the Western Allies, the symbolically charged adoption of West German law in
West Berlin, and the oversight of the controversial governmental body
responsible for protecting the constitution.
Despite these excellent resources and the potential to provide insights into
larger historical and historiographical issues, the AL remains relatively littleresearched,
especially from a historical perspective. In many respects, this
reflects the state of research on the Green Party, research on which has generally
been conducted from within the disciplines of political science or sociology.
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The AL’s involvement in the West Berlin Abgeordnetenhaus would play an
important role in integrating the Left and inculcating parliamentary values.
Initially, the parliament’s influence was restricted by its lack of credibility in the
eyes of the AL: decades of scandals and the “Berliner Filzokratie” (the spoils
system in city government) made the Abgeordnetenhaus an initially weak factor in
the parliamentarization of the AL. As time went on, however, the
Abgeordnetenhaus came to be an arena where a remarkable debate about
democracy took place, with AL members at times striving to educate members of
other parties about what they held to be the true meaning and place of
democratic values. A full account of the nature of the Abgeordnetenhaus, its
responsibilities and areas of competence is given in Horst Naubert, Das Berliner
Parlament: Struktur und Arbeitsweise des Abgeordnetenhauses von Berlin (Berlin: Der
Präsident des Abgeordnetenhauses von Berlin, 1986).
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