The fall of the Berlin Wall, and the chain of events leading up to it, arguably constitute one of the most thoroughly documented episodes in recent history. Nonetheless, most accounts have focused predominantly on high-level politics and diplomacy along with the most dramatic and photogenic public displays.End Game, a rich, sweeping account of the autumn of 1989 as it was experienced on the ground in the German Democratic Republic, powerfully depicting the desolation and dysfunction that shaped everyday life for so many East Germans in the face of economic disruption and political impotence. Citizens frustration mounted until it bubbled over in the form of massive demonstrations and other forms of protest. Following the story up to the first free elections in March 1990, the volume combines abundant detail with sharp analysis and helps us to see this familiar historical moment through new eyes.

Ilko-Sascha Kowalczuk is a historian in the research department of the Stasi Records Authority, where he has been on leave since 2018. Currently, he is a researcher at the Hamburg Foundation for the Promotion of Science and Culture to write a biography on Walter Ulbricht. He is the author of many books, includingDie Übernahme. Wie Ostdeutschland Teil der Bundesrepublik wurde (2019),"Fasse Dich kurz! Der grenzüberschreitende Telefonverkehr der Opposition in den 1980er Jahren und das Ministerium für Staatssicherheit(2014), and17. Juni 1953 (2013),Stasi konkret. Überwachung und Repression in der DDR (2013),

List of Abbreviations Acknowledgments Preface to the 2015 edition

Introduction

Part 1: Images of a Social Crisis

PrologueChapter 1. General ConditionsChapter 2. The GDR in Its International ContextChapter 3. Symptoms of CrisisChapter 4. Nuances: Regional Variations and SubculturesChapter 5. Countermovements: The Pull of the West and the ChurchesChapter 6. Opposition in the SED StateChapter 7. Germination Time: The Ossietzky Affair

Part 2: From the Social Crisis to a Crisis of the Dictatorship

Chapter 8. The Social Crisis DeepensChapter 9. Regime Collapse and Historic Days

Part 3: The Fall of a Dictatorship

Chapter 10. From Demonstrations to the Fall of the WallChapter 11. The FalloutChapter 12. Forging a New Path: Elections and Reunification

Conclusion: The Revolution. Or: Otto Schily as a Symbol

Afterword for the 2021 edition: From the Revolution in the GDR in 1989 to Eastern Germany in the Twenty-first Century

Select Bibliography Index