I was struck by the casual reference made in an article in Die Zeit by Peer Steinbrueck, SPD politician and former finance minister, to the former ‘satrapies’ of the Soviet Union. It’s not an analogy I recall seeing before in discussions of the nature(s) of modern imperialism, let alone the controversial issue of whether the Warsaw Pact should be described as any kind of empire, but it’s actually rather useful: emphasis on the relatively loose and informal nature of the relationship and the degree of autonomy afforded to the inferior party while leaving no doubt about where power really lies. It’s certainly rather more useful as an analogy for the position of the DDR or Poland or Hungary than ‘colony’ or ‘dependency’, the usual terms used in general discussions of imperialism, and a useful reminder that Rome isn’t the only possible ancient comparitor. I have no idea whether this is a common term in German discourse on the topic – perhaps their well-known interest in Near Eastern as well as Classical cultures in the nineteenth century (see Susanne Marchand’s Down From Olympus) has made Persia more familiar to them than it is to the English-speaking world.
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Sphinx 
Dear Abahachi,
if my information is accurate, the concept of the DDR as a ‘satrapy’ is based on the concluding volume of Hans-Ulrich Wehler’s ‘Deutsche Gesellschaftsgeschichte’ (vol. 5: Bundesrepublik Deutschland und DDR 1949–1990. Munich 2008), which tries to cover a ‘histoire totale’ of Germany from around 1700 to 1990. Here (p. 323) Wehler also presents the condensed assumption on which Peer Steinbrück’s quotation seems to be based, “Die DDR dagegen existierte genau 40 Jahre lang nicht aus Eigenrecht, sondern als eine sowjetische Satrapie, die in letzter Instanz auf den russischen Bajonetten beruhte.” (in English something like, “The DDR has been in existence for about forty years not on its own right, but as a Soviet satrapy, which has ultimately been based on Russian bayonets”).
Wehlers work in general as well as this very passage triggered off a controversial debate in Germany, for a synthesis see Patrick Bahners/Alexander Cammann (eds.), Bundesrepublik und DDR. Die Debatte um Hans-Ulrich Wehlers “Deutsche Gesellschaftsgeschichte”. München 2009, especially p. 134–149 (“War die DDR eine linkstotalitäre Diktatur und eine ‘sowjetische Satrapie’?”). As far as the topic of your inspiring blog entry is concerned, the criticism is also passed on the labelling of the DDR as a kind of oriental despotism, as it reverts to Max Weber’s term of ‘sultanism’. Both assumptions transport a specific concept and discourse of ‘the Orient’ and are quite revealing of a European understanding of (ancient) Near East rooted in the 19th century.
So thanks a lot for your intriguing blog, it’s always a pleasure to read your latest entries!
Kind regards,
M. H.
Very many thanks for this; that is extremely illuminating, and it does make a lot of sense that Weber’s comparative approach would have introduced a wider range of reference into sociological and political discussions – I shall have to refresh my memory of what he says about imperialism.