BERLIN / Der Spiegel On Line International / Demography / May 12, 2011
Half Empty
The Slow, Painful Demise of Rural Germany
More and more young people in Germany are abandoning the rural areas
where they grew up and settling in metropolitan areas. That leaves
many rural communities full of seniors and with empty coffers. DDP
By SPIEGEL Staff
"Just stay calm," Josef Daum thinks. "Remember your heart." His wife has already cast a worried glance around the corner. Ever since his heart attack last September, Daum has had to be a little more careful. But that's easier said than done -- especially in his position as the mayor of the northern Bavarian town of Nordhalben.
Just take the figures: 85 out of the town's 820 houses are empty. The town had 3,000 inhabitants not too long ago, but now there are only 1,900. When elderly citizens have passed away, there has been no one there to replace them.
When communities cannot attract people to replace those who are leaving or dying, houses stand empty. In a vicious cycle, the more abandoned a place looks, the more abandoned it becomes. Fritz Stockmeier
And don't get Daum started on money issues. Most state contributions to municipalities depend on their population figures. But since people are moving away from Nordhalben, it has had to borrow €3.5 million ($5 million) just to make ends meet. "We're now taking out loans just to pay off our other loans." Daum says. "If we were a company, we'd be a classic case of insolvency."
To make matters worse for Daum, even his daughter has moved away now, to Munich, because that's where the jobs are.
'A Declaration of War on the Provinces'
Nordhalben is a municipality in its death throes even though it is located in the relatively wealthy state of Bavaria. Indeed, Bavaria is the most self-confident of Germany's 16 federal states, enjoying the greatest purchasing power, the highest economic growth and the lowest unemployment rate. Just recently, owing to federal rules that require richer states to give some of their proceeds to poorer ones, the Bavarian government even had to hand over €3.5 million.
But despite this prosperity, parts of Bavaria are doing very poorly. According to analysts at Switzerland's Prognos institute, Bavaria is already the state "with the greatest disparities between individual regions." While some are chic, others are "problematic." While home prices are skyrocketing in Munich, there's a mass exodus from the rural areas of northeastern Bavaria.
Politicians can do little to counteract the trend. Erwin Huber, the former head of the Christian Social Union (CSU), the Bavarian sister party of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU), praises his people's "pride in their own identity." Konrad Kobler, a CSU parliamentarian in Passau, rails against the threatening "liquidation of Lower Bavaria." And the business-friendly Free Democratic Party (FDP) fears "a declaration of war on provincial areas."
The 'Special' and the Empty
Horst Seehofer, Bavaria's governor, has appointed a "Future Council" to look into the problem -- and its suggestions have been causing uproar in several areas for weeks. For example, the council has suggested expanding what it calls "potent cities" into national centers of excellence. It has called for cash injections into these "clusters" and less for outlying areas.
Indeed, the council says that "business as usual" is no longer an option. "Special regions" -- that is, those experiencing financial hardship -- should start "orienting" themselves toward alliances with other nearby regions. According to this vision, Upper Franconia should work together with Saxony, Passau with Austria, and Würzburg with Frankfurt. The "special regions" have got the message -- and, not surprisingly, they feel abandoned.
Otmar Weber has been a civil servant in the small southwestern state of Saarland for the past 30 years, and his business card gives his title as "Head of the Rural Areas Agency." Weber believes that the prevalence of gravel in the front yards of houses is a good indicator of the average age of their inhabitants. He now travels around the country delivering talks about addressing rural decline. He has even developed a special vocabulary to make this death by a thousand cuts sound less daunting. He speaks of "creative demolition" and uses the somewhat grandiose slogan "More village for fewer people."
Uwe Bellhäuser / Das Bilderwerk / DER SPIEGEL
Outlying areas of Hesse, Lower Saxony and Bavaria are falling further and further behind, and former industrial heartlands -- like the northern Ruhr Valley -- will have difficulty getting back on their feet. Empty houses make communities already struggling with ageing populations less attractive.
The situation is not helped by the fact that Germany's population as a whole is shrinking. In fact, in just the last eight years, the population fell by 770,000. Some studies even suggest that, 50 years from now, there could be 17 million fewer Germans and that one in seven of them could be 80 or over.
In the past, immigrants made up for declining birth rates among Germans. But the influx has dwindled to a trickle. Indeed, since 2008, more people have been leaving the country than moving in.
Draining the Countryside of Money
These developments are dealing a death blow to structurally weak regions. Granted, young people have always been attracted to big cities, but now the country is witnessing a genuine cultural shift. The citizens of the information society are being sucked into cities more strongly than ever -- and, with them, many of the companies that fight bitter battles to attract the brightest minds. Well-educated young people want to have an opera house nearby, a first-division soccer club, theaters, fashion boutiques, sushi and top chefs. That leaves, at best, only vacation homes in the countryside.
Under these circumstances, cities can rejoice about higher tax revenues, but rural areas have to watch their finances dry up. Even the ever-swelling numbers of elderly can't turn the tide. Active retirees may cherish their walks in the countryside, but more and more of them would still like to have pharmacies, doctors and stores within reach. And only small towns can survive on pensioners alone.
The effects of this process of re-urbanization can also be seen in income-distribution figures. Three-quarters of the regions gaining more than 1 percent of the population can be found in major cities. As they expand, so do their wealthy suburbs. In Starnberg, for example, just outside Munich, disposable income is now 157 percent of the national average. By contrast, that of Uecker-Randow, a rural district in the far northeastern corner of the country, has dropped to only 73 percent of the national average.
Click here for more of this indepth analysis of the The Slow, Painful Demise of Rural Germany
Part 1: The Slow, Painful Demise of Rural Germany
Part 2: Fewer People in Fewer Places
Part 3: The Gravel Factor
Part 4: A Time for Realistic Alternatives
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