Regional associations are organisations for displaced persons, bringing together people who, or whose ancestors, come from the same regions of origin. The so-called ‘Landsmannschaft’ concept is based on the idea that this‘tribal’ sense of belonging – which is taken for granted but is predominantly based on ex post constructions – must be maintained. The distinction between the ‘experience generation’ and the ‘commitment generation’ is an expression of these efforts. With the creation of a hereditary displaced person status in the Federal Displaced Persons Act (BVFG) of 1953 – the visible manifestation of which was the displaced person’s identity card – this sense of identity was, as it were, recognised under federal law. It was not until the War Consequences Settlement Act (KfbG) of 1992 that this practice came to an end.

An important root of the regional associations’ self-image lay in the experiences and mindset of the ‘Germans abroad’ minorities of the interwar period, such as the Baltic Germans, West Prussians or (East) Upper Silesians, and above all the so-called Sudeten Germans. This is particularly evident in the term ‘ethnic group’, which was originally used only in this context: after 1945, the Landsmannschaften understood integration primarily as the preservation of their ‘ethnic group identity’; assimilation into the host society was consequently rejected.

From the perspective of organisational sociology, Landsmannschaften share similarities with pre-modern estate-based associations: Group loyalties and communal norms represent an ‘emotional bond’ – one that should not be underestimated – which goes beyond the rational purpose of the association and individual considerations of benefit, and which, in some cases, continues to this day to ensure the loyalty and mobilisability of their members.

The first regional associations were formed as early as 1945, despite the restrictive licensing policy of the Western Allies; it was only in theSoviet Occupation Zone/GDR that similar activities were suppressed from the outset. From the late 1940s onwards, regional umbrella organisations for regional associations began to emerge in West Germany and Austria. On 9 April 1949, the so-called United East German Regional Associations (VOL) were founded in Frankfurt am Main for the Western zones. Originally a mere assembly of spokespersons or chairs, without a differentiated organisational structure or the principle of majority rule, the VOL evolved over the following years – against resistance, particularly from the Silesians and Sudeten Germans – into a genuine umbrella organisation and founded the Association of Regional Associations (VdL) on 18 August 1952 in Bad Kissingen. The distribution of votes within the assembly of spokespersons was particularly contentious in the run-up to the event. Ultimately, agreement was reached on a kind of curia system and a distribution of votes based on membership numbers. The founding of the VdL cemented the organisational division amongst the displaced persons that had existed since 1949. Although there were several attempts to merge with the Central Association of Displaced Germans (ZvD) – which had also been founded in 1949 – under the name Federation of Displaced Germans (BVD), these efforts ultimately failed in 1953. The fact that the ZvD demonstratively renamed itself the BVD the following year was, in this light, a case of false labelling; however, it was to some extent justified in that individual ZvD regional associations, such as that in Hesse, had, on their own initiative, brought about a merger with the regional associations of displaced persons. The main reason for the failure of these efforts was, alongside the fundamental problem of displaced persons’ particularism itself and personal animosities between individual key figures, the ambitions of the powerful ZvD chairman Linus Kather (1893–1983) to hold the office of Federal Minister for Displaced Persons. The fact that the unified organisation , now known as the ‘Bund der Vertriebenen. United Regional Associations and State Associations (BdV)’, was largely due to the realisation gaining ground in both organisations that the previous practice of working against one another had been counterproductive. Kather had previously been largely stripped of his powers by his own organisation and withdrew from politics. Even under the umbrella of the BdV, a permanent working group of the spokespeople for the regional associations continued to exist. The regional associations in the Republic of Austria had joined together on 11 September 1954 to form the “Working Group of Ethnic German Regional Associations of Austria” – today the “Association of Ethnic German Regional Associations of Austria” (VLÖ); organisational links with the sister organisations in the Federal Republic of Germany exist in particular with the Sudeten German Association.

The claim by the regional associations to represent the German eastern territories and their displaced inhabitants in all their regional diversity – and thus to fulfil a pan-German role – essentially meant nothing other than that they regarded themselves, as it were, as compulsory organisations from which their ‘fellow countrymen’ could neither escape nor were permitted to do so. From a purely legal perspective, however, the regional associations were civil society organisations that could speak only on behalf of their members; and by the mid-1950s, with the exception of the German-Baltic Regional Association, these members consistently accounted for less than 30 per cent of the respective population. From the outset, therefore, the Landsmannschaften sought to secure their status under public law in some form. Although this failed, the regional associations structured their internal organisation along state-like lines (or in the manner of a government-in-exile) and continued to insist on their claim to sole representation. Efforts were also made to achieve closer cooperation between the regional associations at a level below that of public law. Consequently, in 1959, alongside the BdV, the ‘Working Group of East German Provinces’ (later the ‘Permanent Council of East German Regional Representations’) was established, an association of the regional associations of East Prussia, West Prussia, Pomerania, Berlin-Mark Brandenburg, Silesia and Upper Silesia. The Council was based on the individual, parliament-like regional representations and claimed to represent, in a sense, the Germans from the territories east of the Oder-Neisse line. The Council’s foundation was also a reflection of the traditional divisions within the regional associations: on the one hand, the Sudeten Germans with their “south-east German” faction; on the other, the so-called “Reich German” regional associations with their “north-east German” faction. The self-assured and well-organised Baltic Germans and Upper Silesians were not always easy to categorise clearly.

Since the 1960s, the regional associations have experienced a similar decline in significance and membership as the umbrella organisation BdV as a whole. Nevertheless, the organisational principle of the regional associations has, to a certain extent, proved viable to this day. Partnerships with Federal States have also contributed to this. The main reason, however, is likely to be found in the aforementioned ‘emotional bond’ that the ‘regional association ethos’ still offers to some of the displaced persons and their descendants, who seek not merely representation of their interests, but a connection to a ‘home family’ (Ingeborg Zeiträg). Recently, the traditional self-image of the regional associations has, in isolated cases, been questioned or reinterpreted; for instance, the German-Baltic Regional Association based in Darmstadt renamed itself the German-Baltic Society in 2006.

• Pertti Ahonen: After the Expulsion. West Germany and Eastern Europe 1945–1990. Oxford, New York 2003.
• K. Erik Franzen: Bavaria’s Fourth Tribe. Patronage of the Sudeten Germans 1954–1974. Munich 2010 (Publications of the Collegium Carolinum 120).
• Michael Schwartz: Officials with a past. The founding executive committee of the Federal Association of Expellees and the ‘Third Reich’. Munich 2013.
• Matthias Stickler: ‘East German Means All of Germany’ – Organisation, Self-Conception and Home Policy Objectives of the German Associations of Displaced Persons 1949–1972. Düsseldorf 2004 (Research and Sources on Contemporary History 46).
• Matthias Stickler: The Integration of Displaced Persons in Austria and Germany – A Comparison. In: Michael Gehler, Ingrid Böhler (eds.): A Comparison of Different European Paths. Austria and the Federal Republic of Germany from 1945/49 to the Present. Festschrift for Rolf Steininger on his 65th birthday. Innsbruck et al. 2007, pp. 416–435.
• Tobias Weger: ‘The “Struggle for National Identity” Without End?’ Sudeten German Organisations 1945–1955. Frankfurt am Main et al. 2008 (The Germans and Eastern Europe 2).
• Ingeborg Zeiträg: The Self-Representation of German Expellee Organisations as a Reflection of their Social Situation. PhD thesis, Hamburg, 1970.

• www.bund-der-vertriebenen.de/ (Federation of Displaced Persons)
• www.vloe.at/ (Association of Ethnic German Communities in Austria)
• www.deutsch-balten.de/ (German-Baltic Society)

Matthias Stickler: National teams. In: Online Encyclopaedia on the Culture and History of Germans in Eastern Europe, 2012. URL: ome-lexikon.uni-oldenburg.de/p32706 (accessed 21 December 2021).