What drives urban population growth and shrinkage in postsocialist East Germany?

Abstract

Abstract Most cities in East Germany experienced drastic shrinkage between 1990 and 2014, but in recent years some have stabilized or even switched toward new growth paths, while others have been continuously declining. A descriptive analysis of subgroups of cities with diverging population growth trajectories reveals that this recent phase of “urban resurgence” accounts to a large share to the growth of the largest cities and some smaller cities in their hinterland and is strongly related to the residential preferences of families and young adults. Furthermore, the estimation of spatial regression models for the period 2004–2014 including a comprehensive set of control variables, such as agglomeration effects, initial demographic conditions, labor market characteristics, climate, and quality of life‐related factors, reveals that recent patterns of urban population development are negatively correlated to historical growth rates during times of socialism. This indicates that postsocialist urban development can be interpreted as a direct outcome of the transition process and as a backlash against the socialist past when urban development was dominated by central planning policies. However, the relevance of the individual determinants included in our regression model differs strongly with respect to the population dynamics in different age groups.

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