Reinventing the Socialist Heritage in Post-Cold War Berlin: The Karl Marx Allee as Urban Icon

The transformation of post-socialist urban centers belongs to the most fascinating developments in the field of urban studies. In this transformation process; architecture, urban planning and heritage play role in the production of a new urban identity. The restoration of historical buildings and the revival of old historical centers built before the WWII are among other visible signs of this identity production, where urban history and urban form becomes more and more relevant to the production of new urban imaginaries.

However, the tangible heritage in the central European post-socialist cities became something what the heritage expert Sharon Macdonald described as a „difficult heritage“.(Macdonald:2009). While in Berlin, Karl Marx Allee, the prestige project of the GDR, during the 1990´s had been heavily criticized, now is functioning as an urban icon for the city, staying as a memento for an utopist and monumental architecture. The nomination for UNESCO World Heritage list shows clearly  how valuable this architecture became during the last decade.

The various local strategies and practices of handling the socialist heritage in these cities are barely explored yet. Our paper will analyze and compare the different ways of dealing and reflecting on this “difficult” heritage. The comparison of this case analyze allows us to understand how did or for what reasons did not this heritage become an integral part of the current city-identity. Through this empirical approach, we argue that it is possible to deduce and capture the urban strategies and practices of re-writing and reinventing of the past.

The paper concludes with a brief comparison to Budapest, where communist statues have been removed from their previous locations and banished to the periphery.