German Expellee Organizations between “Homeland” and “At Home”: A Case Study of the Politics of Belonging

Abstract

Since the expulsion of more than ten million ethnic Germans from Central and Eastern Europe after the end of the Second World War, the political and cultural organizations of the expellees have advocated the interests of this segment of the Federal Republic’s population. The article examines the various ways in which activists in the expellee organizations have used the ambiguity of homeland and belonging in the political process in Germany and increasingly in Europe to further a political agenda that, while it has undergone major changes, remains deeply problematic in some of its objectives and many of its implications.