Bradford Morith
Bradford James Morith, MA, MEd
DAAD Scholar, 2020-2021
Home Institution: Texas A&M University (USA), Department of History, PhD in History Program
Courses Taught:
Winter Semester 2021/22
Undergraduate:
American Foreign Relations in the Late Cold War, Brad Morith, Tuesdays, 12:00-14:00
Previous Courses:
Modern Global History, 1500 to Present (Texas A&M University, La Salle University)
Biographical Approach to US History (La Salle University)
For my dissertation, I explore American and West German fiscal and monetary policy planning during “die Wende”, from 1988 to early 1990. In context of ever-strengthening European economic and monetary integration from the late 1970s to the late 1980s, I discuss the policies of US President George HW Bush and West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl to facilitate market liberalization that took place over the 1989 Eastern European revolutions, especially in reference to forthcoming German unification and its relation to the expanded role of the European Community (EC). This dissertation discusses four approaches towards East German and Eastern European economic and monetary reform, with origins before the fall of the Berlin Wall. The Bush administration focused on the Support for East European Democracy Act (SEED Act) and the strengthening of transatlantic and global institutions such as EC, the CSCE, and the Uruguay Round. The Kohl government also focused on two approaches: a. Concurrent introduction of the West German Mark and market-based reforms in East Germany, and b. a stronger role of the Bundesrepublik to work with France and the EC to facilitate these aforementioned economic and monetary reforms, on the road to the Maastricht Treaty of 1991. These four approaches became fundaments of the “2 + 4” working group in early 1990, leading to the unification of Germany and the end of the Cold War. To corroborate this dissertation, I draw on research from American and German private and public archives, including the James A. Baker III Papers, the George H.W. Bush Presidential Library, the Bundesarchiv system, and the Politisches Archiv des Auswaertigen Amts.
Research Grants:
DAAD Doctoral Research Grant, 2020-2021
Princeton University Library Research Grant, 2019