 |
|  |
|
Socialization means: for the benefit of society! This is already evident in the confusion of terms in the resolution. It speaks of a "nationalization of private rental housing stock through socialization laws." However, according to most experts, "nationalization" and "socialization" are mutually exclusive. According to Article 15 of the Basic Law, "land, natural resources, and means of production" can be socialized. Housing stock, as an essential component of the land, falls under this category. Socialization is not "nationalization" or "expropriation," but rather the transfer "into public ownership or other forms of public benefit"—a distinction that is documented and established in legal commentaries. The fact that the federal government is so confused about this shows that it's less about a serious legislative proposal and more about a diversionary tactic. While the primary goal is indeed to effectively prevent socialization in Berlin, there's a strong suspicion that the announced ban at the federal level is primarily intended to obstruct progress and create procedural obstacles. Much suggests this is the intended outcome: either no legal challenge against the law will be filed, or the process will drag on so long that the implementation of the referendum will be further delayed. The timing of the attack is no coincidence. The Berlin House of Representatives will be newly elected on September 20, 2026. And one day before the coalition committee's hasty decision on July 1, 2026, the Left Party, with its lead candidate Elif Eralp, reached the top spot for the first time in the Infratest dimap Berlin Trend poll, achieving 20 percent. The CDU, led by Governing Mayor Kai Wegner, slipped to 17 percent, placing it only fourth. At the same time, the initiative "Expropriate Deutsche Wohnen & Co." has already submitted its own socialization law . For the first time since September 2021, there is now a prospect that the referendum will also be implemented by parliament. This means that a Berlin socialization law has become a real, and from the perspective of the CDU, the real estate industry, and their lobby groups, a threatening scenario. Especially since there is also unrest within the Berlin SPD, which is polling at only 13 percent in the same survey. The Berlin Greens, led by top candidate Werner Graf, have taken a clear stance . They assess the resolution for what it is: an attempt to torpedo a decision that has already been democratically legitimized. The Berlin Tenants' Association also criticizes the plan to deprive the city of a constitutionally guaranteed instrument for strengthening public-benefit housing provision – amidst a housing crisis, following a 132 percent increase in asking rents between 2010 and 2024. This would further weaken the city's ability to intervene at the state level, after the Federal Constitutional Court struck down the rent cap and effectively eliminated the right of first refusal. The initiative speaks of a "profoundly distorted understanding of democracy" and sees this as confirmation that socialization can effectively combat the rental crisis. The opponents of socialization are pursuing a new strategy. What's interesting about this process is how the opponents of socialization have changed their arguments. For years, they denied that "expropriation" or socialization was even legally possible (which, of course, doesn't apply to the 177 expropriation proceedings for road construction alone that were pursued in 2025 ). Now, even real estate experts concede that the Basic Law explicitly permits a systemic shift away from the primacy of private property, especially with regard to the "commodity" of housing. It is therefore becoming increasingly clear what is at stake: the “constant conflict between living as a home and living as real estate”, in the words of sociologists David Madden and Peter Marcuse (2014). Mayor Mamdani in New York is doing it, it's being done in Spain, and more and more European countries are introducing rent controls. At the same time, there is growing concern that in Berlin, too, a Governing Mayor, Elif Eralp (The Left Party), might advocate for openly addressing this conflict as a question of social power dynamics, not as a constitutional issue. A united front from politics and finance capital It's fitting that, in addition to Bavaria and North Rhine-Westphalia, Berlin banks are now also publicly warning of an exodus of investors from the real estate sector. This is a remarkably open alliance between state politics and financial capital. As if private capital had built affordable housing on a large scale in recent years. In fact, only around 21,000 new social housing units were built in Berlin between 2014 and 2023 , of which only 526 were built by private companies . Historically speaking, none of this is new. Article 15 of the Basic Law is rooted in the tradition of the Weimar Constitution. According to historians, the possibility of socialization enshrined therein was intended to channel the revolutionary demands for socialization after 1918 by keeping open a legal path to socialization. The underlying idea was therefore a permanent option, enshrined in the Basic Law, to democratically and legitimately limit the market, which does not regulate itself. This is precisely what the Berlin referendum "Expropriate Deutsche Wohnen & Co." of September 26, 2021, represents, in which a clear majority of more than one million voters supported the socialization of large housing companies (with more than 3,000 apartments). The coming months will decide the future of socialization. The coming months leading up to the major Berlin rent demonstration on September 5th , the conference of construction ministers on September 10th and 11th, and the Berlin House of Representatives election on September 20th, 2026, will show whether the federal government's move actually proves to be so clever. They will show whether this initiative will be publicly and legally dismantled or whether it will actually have an effect. And they will show whether the voters in Berlin will decide who owns the city, and whether functioning – albeit in need of reform – alternatives such as state-owned housing companies or cooperatives with their predominantly low rents will be strengthened. Or whether those potential candidates for socialization, with their estimated 240,000 apartments, will continue to profit, whose business model mainly consists of buying up apartments, raising rents, cutting costs, and making a profit from housing. https://www.rosalux.de/news/id/54993/vergesellschaftung-heisst-fuer-die-gesellschaft Back |
|
||||||
Thanks for visting the G20 From Below Website. If you want something published here or other enquiries mailto:Brics-from-below@protonmail.com
|
|||||||
