'We don't need another hero': Women and the collapse of the Berlin wall

The collapse of the Berlin Wall is usually associated with images of progress, with falling autocrats and rising liberties. But things are not quite as straightforward if scrutinized from the vantage-point of women. Despite their unusually active participation in the mass protests of 1989, women in the eastern part of Germany suffered a series of setbacks in the subsequent unification process, most notably in the realms of reproductive rights, employment opportunities and access to affordable day-care. This article engages contending feminist approaches in East and West Germany in an attempt to highlight the controversial but central role the concept of patriarchy occupies in understanding the gendered effects of unification. To recognize the significance of patriarchal domination is not to deny that some forms of dissent - and even emancipatory transformation - have taken place. It does, however, necessitate an understanding of gender-related domination and resistance that focuses not only on heroic revolutionary events and on political, legal and institutional features, but also, and perhaps even primarily, on relatively mundane daily struggles that take place over values and societal expectations. © 2000 Taylor & Francis Ltd