Concentration of Trade and its Urban Impact under Capitalism and Socialism: Former West Germany (Hassfurt) and East Germany (Hildburghausen) Compared

Abstract

One challenge faced by town centres is retail trade concentration in which market channels become vertically integrated and increasingly large retail facilities spread, often locating away from town centres. This paper examines the degree to which this has happened under both market and socialistic conditions. It reviews the recent history of retail developments in the former West and East Germanies and how these played themselves out in two towns near the former border. In both Germanies, trade concentration has taken place and in both it has undermined the viability of the town centres. It did so respectively through excessive innovation and extreme stagnation. The shared goal of economic growth led to convergent conditions in spite of contrasting socio-economic arrangements. After unification, the eastern town is experiencing market-driven developments in a compressed time-frame for which the fledgling retail community in the centre is ill prepared.