Economic and Social Challenge of the 1980S

MIKE DENNIS (Dudley, U.K.) ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL CHALLENGE OF THE 1980S* 1. The Economic Crisis of the early 1980s In his second most frequently quoted statement in the 1970s (after the 'no taboos' speech of 1971), SED General Secretary . Erich Honecker warned his Central Committee in December 1979: 'We are dealing not merely with a further worsening of what was already a complicated situation; a new situation confronts us'.1 What lay behind the SED leader's open acknowledgment of a critical economic situation? Essentially, the GDR as a major importer of oil and an exporter of manufactured goods had been

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