Michaela can not understand that her friends have moved away. The 19-year-old lives with her parents in Reichenbach, a small town in the district of Görlitz, the easternmost Saxon. He makes significant the Upper Lusatia.
The Upper Lusatia, which is counted by the approaching end of lignite mining in studies regularly to the depraved areas of the Federal Republic. The Upper Lusatia, from the teenager prefer to move away. The Upper Lusatia with its high proportion of Hartz IV receivers. No good prospects. Actually.
Michaela sees it differently. She is one of the women who want to stay here: because of the family, their parents, the nature, the garden with pool. "I belong here," she says. It is this positive sense of belonging that is often overlooked when looking at places like Upper Lusatia in cities like Dresden or Leipzig.
Görlitz, according to the statistics, is the region in Saxony from which most women move away: Since the fall of the Wall, 30 percent of the inhabitants have left this area. All in all, many young people see their future elsewhere, according to the Berlin Institute in the study entitled "Teilhabeatlas Deutschland", which the researchers carried out on behalf of the Wüstenrot Foundation. On average, around 18 percent of 18 to 29-year-olds left the area between 2014 and 2017. Today, around 250,000 people live here.
Can you live happily here? The "Teilhabeatlas Deutschland" recently tried to find out.
In a first step, the researchers wanted to find out what are the opportunities for participation in different regions of Germany, such as access to education, infrastructure, work. In a second, unrepresentative section, scientists asked people in different regions about their satisfaction. It turned out that people are not only good if they live in a boom region. Even people in remote regions can have a high life satisfaction.
This is in line with the experiences of the sociologist Julia Gabler in her study "Who comes, who stays, who goes". The survey was funded by the Equal Opportunity Commissioner of the district of Görlitz, Ines Fabisch. She and Gabler wanted to find out what could make women stay in the area. In 2015/2016, Gabler and her colleagues interviewed 11th and 12th graders of the grammar schools in the district as well as students from all semesters at the University of Applied Sciences Zittau / Görlitz in online questionnaires whether they want to leave. In workshops, Gabler and her colleagues talked to various women from the region. Representative is the study only for the students of the HSZG.
Time and again, surveys have confirmed that women migrate from Upper Lusatia because there are mainly technical professions in which men traditionally work. However, when women decide to stay, according to Gabler and her colleagues' survey results, it is often due to the family, their social environment and the opportunities to use public transport. Researcher Gabler concludes that many young women are still moving away - but there is also a counter-movement. Women who network, who stay and fight.
She co-founded such a network following the study with like-minded women: "F for strength" is the message. A platform that aims to bring together and strengthen women from East Saxony. An initiative to support female politicians has also emerged: "Frauen.Wahl.Lokal" supports women in their candidacy for political office and afterwards.
Franziska Glaubitz
Gender equality officer Ines Fabisch and researcher Julia Gabler in conversation: They want to strengthen women in Görlitz - and keep them here
Even young women who have never heard of these networks defend their homeland. Michaela from Reichenbach for example: By train she can go to Görlitz in 15 minutes, where her friend lives, where she works in the production of Birkenstock, making shoe soles.
After completing her secondary school diploma, Michaela has had several jobs. There is enough work in the area, she finds. She is not very interested in politics, she does not benefit from political decisions or does not know anything about it. "They do anyway what they want," she says about politicians. Therefore, Michaela does not want to vote at the state election on Sunday. It's the first year she could do it.
Michaela, also shows the study by Julia Gabler, is one of the typical women who want to stay in Upper Lusatia. The problem of finding jobs in the county was mainly due to the well-educated, graduating, studying.
Social professions have to pay off for women
The 14-year-old Lia, for example, who is waiting for her train at the train station in Reichenbach, will have to go to a school in the city for her health department. The high school in Reichenbach finally only goes up to tenth grade. She wants to move to Dresden later for her education. She recently did an internship as a nurse, health management, or a nursing job - she has a good idea of both. She wants to come back if she has children herself. To experience something else before that is difficult here.
Patrick Pleul / DPA
Sign on the edge of Upper Lusatia: How do you keep young women in rural areas?
Researcher Julia Gabler says that it is actually not so much about keeping the graduates, but women with a middle school degree. Women like Lia who are pushing into social professions. For this work must be more worthwhile, for example, in the social field. Figures from the Federal Employment Agency recently showed that full-time employees in the district of Görlitz received the lowest average monthly wage in 2018 nationwide - € 2,272 gross.
If people are to stay in the area, one would first have to change their earnings, says Gabler. Nursing jobs would have to be better paid and valued more. "The low pay sector and the recruitment of Eastern European nurses eliminate the problem, although of course with nurses you could keep a group of people here."
Especially women who try to bring family and work together. However, there are only a few qualification prospects in the region for them. The university concentrates more on technical professions. "You could invest here if you really wanted to keep the women here," says Gabler.
It's no wonder if the AfD finds voters here
One more thing the researcher has noticed in the talks: how the state policy looks at the district and has acted in the past decades, that has shaped the people here. "The structural political irrelevance of the experiences and knowledge of the people who live here is an expression of arrogance that we can not afford," she says.
She also means the discussion about the funding after the fall of the Wall. "If it is said over and over again, 'You have got money for road construction and commercial areas, what more do you want?'"
This attitude prevented that one could thematize structural weakness. It was also due to the loss of social infrastructure, the public places for education and communitarisation in the past decades and has led to isolation and loneliness. It does not surprise her if the AfD finds voters here.
Although this circumstance is not attributable solely to politics, but the AfD or their electorate again and again to call "stupid" stigmatize, after all, more than 30 percent of people in the district of Görlitz, who had voted in the European elections. Into the middle class.
In Upper Lusatia, however, not all are equal and one should not exclude all. "Rural society is diverse and this diversity must be able to present itself in order to be capable of conflict," says Gabler. Politicians should finally recognize that. They should rather pursue their own program than to demonize that of the AfD. When in doubt, Gabler recommends: women ask. At least they choose the AfD much less often than men.