Weaving a foundational narrative – place-making and change in an old-industrial town in East Germany

ABSTRACT

In light of economic, social and discursive changes, old-industrial towns and regions increasingly apply entrepreneurial strategies to actively shape discourses as part of place-making processes. Foundational narratives play an important role in this regard. They are used by agents to foster cohesion in a local community, to legitimize and anchor their actions and goals and to make sense of complex development processes. Applying the methodology of Critical Narrative Analysis, the present study zooms in such processes of narrative building in Lauchhammer (Germany). Despite having experienced the decline of the most important parts of its industry, local actors still mobilize the industrial past in order to strengthen local identity and attract new businesses and manufacturers. Yet, the paper shows that different agents foreground different aspects of the industrial past and narratives may be contested. At the same time, local, regional and national development strategies are closely interlinked offering ‘opportunity spaces’ for local actors but raising also questions about a potential (de)legitimization of local narratives.

KEYWORDS:

• Narratives
• place-making
• change
• East Germany
• cultural political economy

1. Introduction

The first time I was in Lauchhammer, a small town in Brandenburg, I had a meeting with the responsible person for economic development who told me: ‘We have been an industrial town and we will continue to be one.’ I felt that the legacy of the lignite and heavy machinery industries was still quite strongly intertwined with the local identity. Two years later, the town renamed itself as ‘Lauchhammer  – Kunstguss-Stadt’ (Town of Art Foundry) which is still connected to the industrial past but emphasizes a cultural approach to the industrial legacy. This renaming points to a change in local narratives and the attempt to shape a new self-understanding of local actors, a phenomenon that I want to look at in this paper.

In the last decades, old-industrial places have undergone profound changes not only in economic, social and political terms but also with regard to their local identity and processes of place-making (Harfst 2021; McCann 2002). In response to the demands of a growing discourse on intermunicipal competition, local actors have increasingly applied entrepreneurial strategies to shape places’ development paths and improve places’ images to attract new investments and residents (Jessop 1997; McCann 2002; Steyaert and Beyes 2009). For that purpose, economic notions of a place are often interwoven ‘with symbols and stories on sustainability, social cohesion, community development, governance building and participative and strategic forms of planning’ (Lagendijk 2007, 1202). Such symbols can be, among others, specific buildings or personalities that are used as resources by local agents in place-making processes and local narratives (Pugh and Andersson 2023). Local narratives and spatial imaginaries in turn can be understood as specific articulations of local agency and matter therefore particularly. They are used to foster cohesion in a local community, to legitimize and anchor actors’ actions and goals (MacKinnon et al. 2019) and to make sense of complex development processes resulting in practical and economic implications for places’ residents (Willett 2016).

In light of this, scholars argue that local economy and culture should be viewed as intertwined, socially constructed, and multiscalar processes (Lorentzen and van Heur 2012; Ribera-Fumaz 2009). They need to be considered together, as captured i.a. by the notion of cultural politics of local economic development (McCann 2002) or the Cultural Political Economy approach (Sum and Jessop 2013). A focus on local narratives and spatial imaginaries and their mutual intertwinement with actual local development processes allows for such an integrated perspective (e.g. Benner 2020). So far, such discursive and ideational perspectives have been adopted mainly in place-making and branding literature (e.g. Björner and Aronsson 2022; Grenni, Horlings, and Soini 2020) and just recently also in economic geography (Benner 2024). The creation of narratives and imaginaries is hence considered to be an important aspect of local agency and requires further consideration by scholarly work.

So-called foundational narratives that shape a place’s identity and imaginary with regard to its history are here of particular importance (Sandercock 2003). Through their use, specific aspects of the past including specific practices or personalities are selected to shape a place’s imagined future (Garud, Kumaraswamy, and Karnøe 2010; Pugh and Andersson 2023). Yet, such narratives are not static but might change according to prevailing strategies for local development and the interests of specific groups. They need resonance within local social relations in order to become effective (Jessop 1997; Willett 2021) and can serve either as catalysts for change or as anchors for tradition. It is the actual power relations that shape ‘which [and how] stories get told, get heard, carry weight’ (Sandercock 2003, 12; see also Massey 1995), and determine if they contribute to change or a reproduction of existing structures. Furthermore, such narratives are not only influencing actions and events but they become materially embodied both in documents and in the built environment. Thereby, they shape a place’s physical appearance as well as the imaginaries people create about a place and provide a link between local agency and structures (Benner 2024; Jessop 1997).

With this paper, I aim to understand which role foundational narratives and the underlying imaginaries play in the present and future development strategies of a place. For this purpose, I pose the following research questions:

• How do local actors make sense of the past and imagine the future from the present?

• Who speaks and is involved in sense-making?

• Are there any counter narratives to the foundational story potentially developing alternative storylines of development?

• What does the focus on narratives add to research on place-making and local agency?

I will expand on these questions by looking at the example of Lauchhammer, a small old-industrial town in South Brandenburg, Germany. An in-depth examination of the case shows that a shift in the foundational story has caused controversial debates about the visibility and (de-) valorization of different kinds of (industrial) heritage. These debates resulted in local decision-makers and other key actors aiming to integrate diverse narratives in an entrepreneurial strategy of place-making.

The remainder of the paper is structured as follows: in the second chapter narratives and imaginaries are presented as important aspects in the process of place-making. After a short insight into the methodology, I continue with identifying core narratives employed by key actors in the town, their contestations and relations to overarching development strategies. Finally, I conclude by emphasizing the potential of narratives for place-making but also raising questions on self-responsibilization and delegitimization of specific discourses.

2. Semiotic aspects of place-making: the creation of foundational narratives and resonant imaginaries

Place-making is an inherently political process that includes the building of local identity and social cohesion as well as outward-oriented place branding strategies (Grenni, Horlings, and Soini 2020; McCann 2002). It affects both the symbolic meanings and the material shape of a place and involves a wide range of stakeholders from different spheres such as local political actors, businesses, civil society initiatives and ordinary residents (Albrecht and Kortelainen 2021). Hence, it is a complex collective process including discursive and material aspects which needs coordination to be effective.

One strategy in such processes is the ‘imagineering’ of a place and its future of which the ‘politics of narration’ (Steyaert and Beyes 2009, 208) are an important part. The construction and transmission of narratives as an inherent part of the local agency is hence at the heart of such strategies. Place-making and the role of narratives are often assessed in the context of cities and urban development projects (Mace and Volgmann 2018; Sandercock 2003). Yet, there is also a body of literature particularly stemming from the Nordic and some other countries which puts smaller places in the focus and on which I build upon in this paper (e.g. Albrecht and Kortelainen 2021; Björner and Aronsson 2022; Grenni, Horlings, and Soini 2020; Lorentzen and van Heur 2012; Pugh and Andersson 2023). These studies show how small and medium-sized towns try to get visible on the map competing both against each other as well as bigger cities to attract residents and businesses alike.

Place-making processes are exemplary for the intertwinement of discursive aspects with local economic development measures and planning practices (Albrecht and Kortelainen 2021; Björner and Aronsson 2022; Grenni, Horlings, and Soini 2020; McCann 2002). This calls for a transdisciplinary integration of perspectives from economic geography and planning studies, critical discourse and narrative studies (Fairclough 2003; Görmar and Kinossian 2022; Lorentzen and van Heur 2012). The Cultural Political Economy approach offers such an integrated perspective emphasizing the mutual co-constitution of discursive and non-discursive elements of local development (Sum and Jessop 2013). Being informed by this perspective, the current paper adds to recent discourse-oriented multidimensional perspectives towards local development (e.g. Beer, Barnes, and Horne 2023; Benner 2020, 2024; Miörner 2022).

Role and structures of (foundational) narratives

Narratives and associated imaginaries have the potential to simplify complex processes and make sense of them (Sum and Jessop 2013), especially in phases of uncertainty linked to population decline or economic change as old-industrial places might face them (Mace and Volgmann 2018). By providing potential causal links, narratives allow to reduce this complexity and uncertainty (Beckert and Bronk 2019). They are actively built in the present and not only shape how a place’s past is perceived (Massey 1995, 184) but also how its future is imagined (Throgmorton 2003; Van Hulst 2012). They can hence be used as strategic instruments for discourse coalitions (Leipold and Winkel 2017) to legitimate urban development projects (Olesen 2017) and enhance a place’s visibility on multiple scales. In formulating a local brand, they might even contribute to the attraction of investors and facilitate residents’ place attachment (Björner and Aronsson 2022; Grenni, Horlings, and Soini 2020; Willett 2016).

To be effective, narratives have to fulfil specific conventions that people expect from stories such as plot structures, characters, specific settings and a certain moral ordering (Shanahan, Jones, and McBeth 2018). Concrete personalities might serve either as heroes, villains or supporting actors. Sometimes, it is also processes, impersonal forces or abstract objects like towns, mining or even globalization and capitalism that appear as personified characters (see Sandercock 2003, 14). The plot should present some kind of development or transformation, as the ‘most familiar plot is change itself, and the desire to explain it’ (Sandercock 2003, 21). The contemporary and historical repertoire of stories then gives coherence and legitimacy to today’s local practices and shapes what is deemed to be possible in a place, what are the priorities for action, and what is considered as problematic (Czarniawska 2004, 45).

One of the most important kinds of narratives is so-called core stories which are deeply embedded in a place’s community and shape its identity (Sandercock 2003). Part of these core stories are foundational narratives, also understood as mytho-poetic stories of origin (Sandercock 2003). Using a common language, imagery, or metaphors, they give a collective sense of the foundation of a place, the actors involved and subsequent, generally successful developments. Most often, they are framed as success stories with one or a few heroes that may serve as role models for future action (Pugh and Andersson 2023). Such stories foreground specific actions and events from which it might be possible to draw certain moral conclusions for present and future actions and strategies. These moral conclusions need to be interpreted in light of the prevailing economic, political and spatial imaginaries about a place. Such collectively shared worldviews are the backbone of every local (and hence also foundational) narrative. They define what kind of development and which political measures are deemed as desirable and which are not (Jessop and Oosterlynck 2008) and how a specific place is collectively conceived and made.

Foundational narratives are deemed most important when it comes to conflicting notions of identity, such as in multicultural contexts. Yet, given their strong temporal focus, they might become also essential tools in the development of old-industrial places to overcome struggles about local identity and development visions (Cruickshank, Ellingsen, and Hidle 2013). Their uniting aspect (Mace and Volgmann 2018) can contribute to the coherence of a place and be a source of self-esteem of what might be possible in the future. As such, they might contribute to ‘spatial transformation or the improvement of the socio-spatial and spatial-economic conditions of a place’ (Grenni, Horlings, and Soini 2020, 1356).

Multiplicity of narratives

A strong foundational story has the potential to connect different narratives and might play an important role in place-making activities. Yet, there are also other core stories not dealing with the initial foundation of a place. Particularly in old-industrial regions, these might include more pessimistic stories of decline (Van Hulst 2012) which are narrated in the form of tragedies. It is considered the task of planners and place makers to transform these tragedies into optimistic tales of renewal that might connect to a place’s foundation but also give an optimistic outlook into the future.

Hence, in most cases, there is not only one story but a multitude of them created by a variety of local agents. They are competing, contrasting or complementing each other (Jensen 2007; Massey 1995). Even if a narrative gets hegemonic it might offer ‘slippages’ to alternative stories (Willett 2016, 440) opening up new spaces of possibility. Narrators, such as planners, policy makers, economic actors or ordinary residents, choose facts that are deemed to be relevant and important and decide how they are assembled thereby offering already an interpretation that cannot be dissolved from the facts. By stories, decision makers select the problems to be addressed (Throgmorton 2003), either explicitly within the narrative or implicitly with the selection of specific narratives and in the argumentation for this selection. Agents hence dispose of a specific discursive agency (Leipold and Winkel 2017) or even interpretive leadership (Benner 2020; Sotarauta 2018). This agency allows them to cope with ambiguity and uncertainty by interpreting reality based on their own positionality. To this end, Grenni, Horlings, and Soini (2020, 1357) identify ‘inner’ and ‘outer’ storylines or narratives. While ‘inner’ story lines reflect according to them ‘people’s stories and perceived images of place’ and are hence concerned with the local identity, ‘outer’ storylines are ‘communicated as a brand to the outside world’.

Foundational narratives can adopt both functions fostering on one hand local identity and social cohesion and creating on the other hand an attractive brand that should appeal tourists, new residents and businesses. Time wise, they are rather concerned with a more or less distant history but might be challenged by new contemporary narratives or adaptations of the original narrative. Where a place sees its roots and what it aims to ‘become’ in the future (Willett 2016) are political questions that go hand in hand in place-making and local development processes.

The relational character of narratives

In narratives, the relational character of places is inherently reflected. Tales about specific places are told in reference to other places and to more abstract tales about the city in general or other prototype places, such as old-industrial places (Finnegan 1998). They position a certain place within a wider region or country at a specific point in time drawing interrelations to other places, e.g. by movement of the main characters or a transfer of ideas (Massey 1995). Hence, narrators as well as recipients need to be sensitive to stories’ context and acknowledge their spatial and temporal complexity (Willett 2016).

Narratives are only retained when they resonate with their recipients’ experiences, their prior knowledge and/or with discourses on multiple levels (organizations, regions, society as a whole) (Jessop and Oosterlynck 2008; Willett 2016). Such resonances might be evoked by physically recalled similarities or emotional recognition

whereby a particular set of signs and signifiers recall what might be quite complex and layered emotional responses. The thoughts and feelings that become attached to certain memories, material objects, institutions or things affect how we relate to those same objects, drawing matter and ideas into [a narrative] assemblage, and expelling other things. (Willett 2016, 441)

It is hence important to pay attention to the materialization of local narratives in objects but also to symbolic acts as for example a place’s renaming or local festivals. For the creation and retention of new narratives, the time of telling a story is also important. Individuals or even societies need to be open and receptive towards new objects or interpretive schemata (Willett 2021, 40). Pessimistic narratives seem to have a stronger hold as ‘[t]he pain through which the communities have experienced changes […] means that stories about pain and loss have a stronger affective resonance, and therefore are more easily shared […]’ (Willett 2021, 109).

In times of restructuring, different social forces in the private and the public sectors are trying to push their respective agendas and create new narratives and associated strategies and projects. Narratives of certain groups with less power might be taken over, excluded or even more actively silenced. Yet, it not only depends on actual power relations which narratives will become hegemonic and which ones are devalorized or even invisibilized, but also on the strategies’ plausibility and resonance with personal and shared narratives of different social groups (Jessop and Oosterlynck 2008).

Still, the future itself remains unpredictable as it is unclear what consequences newly emerging narratives actually entail. In the case of Cornwell, which Willett draws on in her work (2016; 2021), the dominance of the liveable region narrative appeared as counter-productive being only oriented towards the past and closing off other more action-oriented possibilities (for a similar argument see also Pugh and Andersson 2023). Hence, narratives and imaginaries may be a source for new entrepreneurial strategies leading to local change but at the same time can also hinder them leading to a reproduction of a given development path. Furthermore, they are interrelated to and influenced by broader societal debates and overarching state strategies potentially limiting the possible scope for local actors’ strategies and visions (see Görmar et al. 2022).

3. Critical narrative analysis and methodological proceeding

In this paper, I focus on the identification of multiple core narratives about Lauchhammer and how actors make use of them in place-making processes. To this end, I have employed the novel approach of Critical Narrative Analysis (CNA) (Gavriely-Nuri 2017; Görmar 2023; Görmar and Kinossian 2022; Souto-Manning 2014) combining elements of Narrative Analysis (NA) (Czarniawska 2004; Sandercock 2003) and Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) based on Fairclough’s work (e.g. 2003; 2005).

Local narratives condense the imaginaries, experiences and materialities of a given place and reduce their complexity to a comprehensible storyline (Görmar 2023). They imply a certain change from a status A in the beginning to a status B or C in the end. The resulting simplification is highly selective and needs critical scrutiny from the agents involved in place-making but also from the researcher. Both narrator(s) and recipient(s) (and also researchers as recipients) are constantly making choices regarding the start and end point and the events selected for the narrative, material reference points, the different roles assigned to agents and the perspective under which the story is narrated or received (Gadinger et al. 2014). These choices influence how plausible and trustworthy a narrative appears to be regardless of its actual truth (Throgmorton 2003). As such choices are made on both the narrator(s) and the recipient(s) sides, they might induce different meanings of the narrative to different agents depending on their socio-geographical positions and political orientations (Groth 2019; Massey 1995).

CDA as one root of the methodology focuses on the interrelationships between texts and social structures mainly on a macro-analytical level (Fairclough 2013). Narrative approaches instead offer analytical tools to study texts on the micro  – or meso-levels (Souto-Manning 2014) and to gain insights into how local agents ‘texture’ specific stories, hence in the process of local agency. Combining the two approaches allows to build a bridge between individual stories on the ground, officially published narratives on multiple levels and the structural context enabling or constraining local development.

The present study draws on extensive field work carried out between February 2020 and October 2022. Lauchhammer has been chosen for three reasons: first, it is a small town with approximately 15,000 inhabitants located in a non-metropolitan region, second, it has a specific industrial history being rooted in two key industries, lignite industry and heavy machinery, and third, at the time of research, it has been in a phase of strategic reorientation (for an overview about the town’s development see Table 1). The town’s retelling of its foundational story is in line with similar place-making strategies elsewhere (see e.g. Ameel 2016). Yet, its smallness, its history as an artificial merger and its dispersed structure make it also a unique case.

Table 1. Overview of Lauchhammer’s development (author’s own elaboration).

	Lauchhammer
Historic development (selection of events related to narrative analysis)	Before eighteenth century villages characterized by agriculture Bog iron ore found in eighteenth century → development of iron foundry by baroness of Löwendal (basis of foundational story II) Naming of the foundry in Lauchhammer – ‘Lauch’ means a wet area with peat soil which is the basis for lignite; ‘Hammer’ is the metal producing and processing plant Lignite mines since nineteenth century, the foundation of briquette factories latest since 1900 Massive industrialization – lignite exploitation and processing as well as heavy machinery (Location of 7 briquette factories, 1 large-scale coking plant, ‘Lauchhammerwerk’) The foundation of town in 1950 as a merger of 4 villages due to demand for better economic and social coordination, city rights in 1953 → centre of lignite exploitation and processing in GDR (basis for foundational story I) 1974 incorporation of Kleinleipisch as Lauchhammer-Nord 1990 lignite processing plants and mines closed soon and were demolished, heavy machinery enterprise got privatized and split into several enterprises, i.a. TAKRAF, art foundry, Galatea Decrease of the population from 24,609 in 1990–14,336 in 2019 (economic and population decline as basis for story of disintegration) 1993 Incorporation of Grünewalde and Kostebrau 2008 Opening of biotowers as an industrial monument and event location 2020 Decision of the German federal government to finish coal-based energy production in Lusatia, Central Germany and the Rhineland
Strategic development processes	Overall structural change in Lusatia because of exit from coal-based energy production 2020/21 Development of master plan because of mining legacy 2022 Renaming ‘Kunstguss-Stadt’ (Town of art foundry)

Twenty-four semi-structured interviews with officials from municipal administration and city council, civil society organizations and enterprises were either held physically or via video meetings depending on the availability of interview partners (for the interview guideline see Annex 2). They were transcribed afterwards by a student assistant using MaxQDA. Eight strategic meetings have been selected for participatory observation because of their relevance in processes of strategic reorientation. In my position as a researcher, I remained a passive observer and took detailed notes in a research diary that complemented the interviews. 21 documents such as development strategies, marketing material, press releases, statements as well as the websites of the municipality, local associations, the art foundry museum, the economic region of Lusatia and the Brandenburg government have been selected in several rounds of a desk and archival research and by asking interviewees for additional sources. Criteria for selection were their strategic potentials, the inclusion of a vision for the future development of Lauchhammer or the surrounding region or a reference to the latest strategic projects of the town (for an overview of all data sources see Annex 1).

The various data sources have been chosen as narratives are created, stored and transmitted by both oral communication in group meetings or interviews as well as written texts such as policy and marketing documents (see e.g. Ameel 2016; Czarniawska 2004; Shanahan, Jones, and McBeth 2018). The analysis of documents allowed to identify official hegemonic narratives whereas the observation protocols and interviews served to identify more side-lined alternative narratives and contestations. In the analysis, core stories and the included narrative structures (such as settings, characters and emplotment) (Shanahan, Jones, and McBeth 2018) as well as linguistic aspects such as vocabulary, specific metaphors or textual structures have been identified. Additionally, the data has been coded with regard to specific topics. This analysis gave first hints to underlying values and imaginaries as well as certain temporal and causal relations (Görmar and Kinossian 2022). In a second step, the analysis went beyond the micro level by looking for relations between different documents beyond the local level and examining the specific spatio-temporal context within which these narratives are circulated. By triangulating all available data, the narratives have been linked to actual development processes and material outcomes.

4. Narratives and place-making in Lauchhammer

The core stories of Lauchhammer are strongly linked to the ups and downs of local industrial development. Industrialization in the nineteenth and early twentieth century proceeded fast and the deindustrialization processes after 1990 even faster resulting in not only a loss of industry but also of more than 10,000 inhabitants between 1990 and 2019 (see Table 1). Within the interviews, three core stories that are interrelated with each other but also have been contested could be identified: (1) the foundation of Lauchhammer as a town in the 1950s because of the needs of the growing lignite mining industry (foundational story I); (2) the story of social, spatial and economic disintegration of Lauchhammer; and (3) the foundation of the iron foundry by baroness of Löwendal as starting point of local industry and development more general (foundational story II). Currently, the third one is promoted to become the dominant one by integrating some of the counter-narratives and being embedded in broader narratives forwarded by state actors (4).

(1) ‘Town of coal’ – Foundational story I

The foundation of the town as a merger of four villages was decided because the industrial development of the region made joint actions necessary in terms of residential building, social, cultural and transport infrastructures as well as economic development (LH_IN_01). Without the rapid development of the lignite industry, the building of the biggest GDR coking plant of that time and the development of heavy machinery industry for lignite exploiting machines, the villages might have remained separate. These roots were also displayed in the town’s coat of arms of that time showing symbols of mining and heavy machinery as foundations of the town’s development. Still today, adherents of this story, mainly former workers in the lignite industry but also some other older residents, are proud of having been once the centre of GDR’s energy production (LH_IN_11). The development concept for Lauchhammer-Mitte (IEK) from 2016, for example, states:

Located in the south of the state of Brandenburg, the town of Lauchhammer was once the centre of lignite processing and was created by the fusion of several towns and rapid population growth in the 1950s. (IEK 2016, see online supplementary material, translated by student assistant)

Yet, despite the merger into a united town the villages’ residents still kept their local habits and mentalities (LH_IN_07). Additionally, much of the needed workforce was attracted by the growing industries from other parts of the GDR and got only loose roots in the region. A joint identity developed rather on the basis of industrial belonging as industry not only provided jobs but also a considerable part of the social and cultural life of the town (LH_IN_01). Heroes have been the workers as collective actors. Even today, the former belongings of one of the industrial branches find resonance among Lauchhammer’s residents and affect people’s self-understandings as well as the local identity as an industrial town.

Soon after 1990, the lignite mines in the immediate neighbourhood of Lauchhammer as well as the processing plants closed quite rapidly resulting in high unemployment, outmigration and empty spaces. In the early 1990s, residents and local politicians still saw the lignite industry as part of their local economy as plans for a lignite-based power plant showed. Yet, they were also already quite critical of its negative image because of the dirt and environmental damage lignite processing caused in the region (LH_IN_02). They got aware that even if the former industry still provided some pride to the inside it could not send positive signals to the outside. Hence, the city council decided soon to create a new coat of arms and remove the mining symbols to the disappointment of former miners and lignite processing workers (LH_IN_01; LH_IN_07; Miner’s association unpublished statement; see Figures 1 and 2).

Figure 1. Coat of arms of Lauchhammer in GDR time (Source: https://www.heraldry-wiki.com/heraldrywiki/index.php?curid=56836).

Figure 2. The current coat of arms of Lauchhammer (Source: https://www.heraldry-wiki.com/heraldrywiki/index.php?curid=56835).

Yet, former miners and coal processing workers did not want to give up the town’s identity as ‘town of coal’ and aimed to preserve the last material traces as symbols of the past. In 2001, they founded an association to save and valorize the industrial heritage related to lignite mining and exploitation. Events like the miner’s day have been organized year-by-year, brochures published, old relicts of the lignite industry collected in a so-called ‘relict park’ and tours offered to the so-called biotowers¹ (Figures 3 and 4). Still, the members of the association, mostly former miners and industrial workers, are getting older and younger people lack the experience of a lived industry resulting in less interest in mining history and heritage (LH_IN_02). Today, the association’s goals do not resonate anymore with local (younger) residents. It is considered as not being future-oriented or connected to other population groups (informal conversation after LH-OB-03). Even the support of the sites maintained by the association, the relict park and the biotowers, is questioned sometimes, e.g. by local and regional politicians or promoters of other cultural amenities such as the museum for art foundry or the castle garden (LH_IN_15).

Figure 3. Relict park (Photo: author).

Figure 4. Biotowers (Photo: author).

(2) ‘Town without coal’  – The story of social, spatial and economic disintegration and its counter-narratives

Closely linked to the deindustrialization processes in the 1990s is the story of the subsequent disintegration of Lauchhammer’s social, economic and material fabric. The closures of the coal mines and processing plants as well as the reductions in heavy machinery not only resulted in high unemployment numbers but also in a perceived loss of community and physical disintegration of the town (LH_IN_11). The material remnants of the industries that linked the former villages with each other were devastated. They made space for vast green areas with no further signs of what has been there which has led to an increased feeling of a dispersed town. Lignite mining and processing became almost invisible in the town with the only remaining symbol of the biotowers (LH_IN_14). Lauchhammer started to change and local agents have looked for a new identity, a process which is ongoing up to today as the following quote illustrates.

The town without coal: […] In the years after 1990, people tore down, threw away, threw out and were fired, so much that it hurt. […]The vast wastelands between the former village centres, which grew together so quickly due to industry, […] are not just holes in the landscape, but holes in the hearts. Yet, the town has also been in a constant state of becoming and growing since 1990. And the fact that a region without coal can actually win is made clear not only by the fresh coat of paint on a house facade. (last panel titled ‘Lauchhammer today’ from the special exhibition on baroness von Löwendal and her heritage; translation by student assistant)

Lauchhammer’s residents have been constantly faced with changes since 1990 including the search for a new identity and local imaginary resonant both to the inside and the outside. Official statements such as ‘Lauchhammer is one’² or ‘Lauchhammer – surprisingly diverse’³ witness the municipality’s attempts either to conjure the unity of the municipality and its different parts or to take benefit from the dispersed municipal structure and the differences between its individual parts. Together with local associations, the municipality initiated a project to better connect civil society in the whole town and create a dense network. However, after the project lifetime, the network coordination was only half-heartedly continued (at least according to a member of civil society) which diminished its effects on social cohesion. As also industrial identities weakened, individual local identities of the former villages have got seemingly stronger again which even the municipal administration acknowledges (LH_IN_08; LH_IN_14).

Another attempt to counter the story of disintegration is the establishment of an imaginary of the ‘green centre’ (Lauchhammer ISEK 2015, see online supplementary material). The spaces that were formed after the mines have been partly refilled or turned into small lakes. Factory brownfields were reconquered by nature being now reserved under nature protection or considered as valuable recreation space (LH_IN_24). Yet, the enhancement of the area for recreation is a slow process as the municipality is here dependent on the owner of most of the land, the LMBV, a public company responsible for the revitalization of old mines in Lusatia and Central Germany. The imaginary can hence not be filled with life by the municipality alone and changes are rather invisible to local residents.

(3) ‘Town of art foundry’ – Foundational story II

In recent years, a discourse coalition of local politicians, local administrative actors, economic and civil society actors has aimed to draw a new storyline into the future (Leipold and Winkel 2017). To this end, they endeavour to capitalize on the international recognition of Lauchhammer’s art foundry as one of the oldest in Europe. It is an attempt to fill the void in local identity resulting from the delegitimization of the original foundational story and to forward a positive image to attract tourists, residents and businesses alike. The new story promotes an imaginary of a liveable place rooted in industry and culture which should find resonance both within the local population and also beyond the municipality’s boundaries (LH_IN_03; LH_IN_06; notes LH-OB-05 and 07).

Already in 1725, the baroness Benedicta Margarethe von Löwendal installed the first furnace for the production of iron from bog iron ore in one of the villages that are now part of Lauchhammer. Her successor developed a procedure for art iron foundry as one of the first in Europe. The foundry is active today and was also the basis for the later development of a heavy machinery plant.

The baroness is in many documents and speeches portrayed as heroine with a pronounced entrepreneurial spirit who initiated the industrial development of the town and the whole region of Lower Lusatia (LH_IN_14). She can be seen as a role model for successful entrepreneurial activities and, more generally, regional development as a whole (for a similar attempt to leverage the glory of Alfred Nobel in Karlskoga see Pugh and Andersson 2023). This is all the more important in a town that is said to lack an entrepreneurial culture not least due to the extensive state subsidies that have been spent in the 1990s to compensate for the rapid decline of local industries. This inhibited, at least from the perspective of some interviewees, the development of small and medium-sized endogenous businesses (LH_IN_03).

The importance of the foundry and the baroness are materially visible by the art foundry itself, several monuments and the museum (see Figures 5–7). Yet, the greatest sign of its recognition is the amendment to the official name of the town, which has been since August 2022 ‘Lauchhammer – Kunstguss-Stadt’.

Figure 5. Monument of the baroness of Löwendal (photo: author).

Figure 6. Museum of art foundry (photo: author).

Figure 7. Still existing art foundry (photo: author).

Originally brought up by the left party in the city council, the idea of renaming has been taken up by the municipal administration and further developed with the support of an actors’ coalition around the museum for art foundry. This coalition has included the foundation Stiftung Kunstgussmuseum as the official operator of the museum, the board of the foundation, an association for the support of the museum ‘Freundeskreis Kunstgussmuseum’, the Biotürme gGmbH as a daughter of the foundation (now Transformation 1.535° gGmbh) and the department for social and cultural affairs of the town administration. Leaders in the board and the association are well-known actors who have had decisive positions in the local economy since the 1990s.

The direct economic importance of the art foundry is rather limited. It employs only 21 people and was threatened several times by bankruptcy but the current owners apparently manage to stabilize the enterprise. Still, its symbolic potential is considered of high importance both for the town’s external image as well as for the identification of its residents (LH_IN_09). It has gained a great international reputation as one of Europe’s oldest still operating art foundries. For this reason, the left party group made the proposal to the city council and got the support of the administration. Yet, it took some months to get the consent of the city council for the promotion and renaming concept. After the initial decision to start the process, all party groups in the council wanted to join the proposal and develop it together requiring more coordination of the whole process. In 2022, the process could be finalized with the consent of Brandenburg’s state government.

The actors of the above-mentioned coalition but also local entrepreneurs and municipal leaders consider the byname ‘Kunstguss-Stadt’ as future-oriented. Past identity claims rooted in the coal and heavy machinery industries are amended with a cultural component. This strategy takes up debates about culture and creativity as soft location factors attracting potentially new tourists, new residents and new businesses (LH_IN_03; LH_IN_06; Lauchhammer 2021, see online supplementary material; field notes; see also Musterd & Kovács 2013), yet it has not remained uncontested.

(4) Contestations, integration and embeddedness in state strategies

The emphasis on art foundry in the town’s official narratives did not remain uncontested. Especially the miners’ association initially feared that the mining heritage would be delegitimized and invisibilized with such a one-sided name and even decided to oppose the renaming officially. Instead, they argued for a holistic view of industrial heritage including heavy machinery and lignite industries which, from their perspective, would have more resonance with the local population. Even promoters of the amendment conceded that, for a long time, local residents identified themselves rather with mining than with the art foundry (notes LH-OB-03; LH_IN_03).

Although acknowledging the need to improve the image of the town itself, the miner’s association could not offer an alternative to the art foundry narrative and slowly changed their mind admitting the potential of the name ‘Lauchhammer – Kunstguss-Stadt’ to integrate the whole industrial history (LH_IN_03). With a relatively high average age and limited membership, it seems that the association lacked capacities and hence power for further debates and stopped lobbying against the name (notes LH-OB-05).

Yet, the town administration also acknowledged the need to integrate both aspects of industrial culture as can be seen in a working group for the 300th anniversary of industrial culture. Additionally, an investment project has been developed with the working title ‘ERZ + KOHLE’ (ore and coal) which will be funded by the German coal-exit funds. The project can be understood as the material manifestation of the new foundational narrative while integrating at the same time the town’s roots in lignite industries. It contains investments in both the area around the art foundry museum (the ‘ore’ part) as well as the area around the above-mentioned biotowers (the ‘coal’ part). Intense lobbying from different persons was necessary to include the coal part in the project as the first ideas only centered on the art foundry museum (LH_IN_03; LH_IN_06). Still, the final project title ‘Transformation 1.535°’ is explicitly referring to an envisaged identity change (Lauchhammer 2022 – press release) by emphasizing again, particularly the art foundry, 1535° being the melting temperature of iron.

This project also shows that Lauchhammer’s narrative is embedded in broader strategic discussions within the Lusatian region and beyond that supports the current structural change processes due to the lignite mining exit. It is not only considered of local importance but relates to federal and regional strategies and aims to position Lauchhammer in reference to other places in the region (Görmar 2023). These strategies aim to support the current structural change not only with economic and infrastructural support but also with projects focussed on industrial culture. That way culture is included in overarching entrepreneurial strategies to increase the attractiveness of the region and develop an economically successful, ecologically and socially sustainable model region (Staatskanzlei 2020, see online supplementary material). Culture is considered as key to strengthen regional identity, develop new employment potentials and increase the reputation of the Lusatian region (MWFK 2019, see online supplementary material). The Transformation 1.535° project fits directly in this line, yet, without the so called coal funds, the project could not be realized given the constraints of Lauchhammer’s basic budget. Local actors operate within a specific ‘opportunity space’ (Grillitsch and Sotarauta 2020) created by multiple actors engaged in the structural change process. This space opened up as state actors aimed at avoiding a structural break as experienced in the 1990s and acknowledge the need of the Lusatian region to get support in the process and not being left behind (MWFK 2019). However, funding is only provided for topics included in the specific funding schemes restricting the projects which can be realized from the top.

In addition to the topics of economy, energy, climate and the development of skilled workers, supporting arts and culture as a location factor is at least as important. I am therefore particularly pleased that Lauchhammer, as one of the oldest industrial sites in Germany, is preserving the history of ore and coal extraction in an arts and experience centre and making it a tangible experience. (Staatskanzlei 2022, see online supplementary material)

5. Discussion: changing the place by changing the story?

The multiple core stories about Lauchhammer and the underlying imaginaries are inherent parts of local place-making, a dynamic process that is constantly in construction (see Figure 8). This act of ‘imagineering’ (Steyaert and Beyes 2009) is so far political as different actor groups foreground different stories in order to actively shape a place’s identity and promote a specific image to the outside. Former workers of the coal industry have been proud to be part of the East German energy district strengthening not only the local but also personal identities as part of the workers’ collective. Yet, during the last decades, the reputation of the coal industry and of workers’ collectives in society has changed and lignite is considered as dirty and environmentally polluting offering not much potential for a positive local identity (Wolle 2020). Hence, a coalition of different actors including local politics, local entrepreneurs and municipal leaders has actively engaged in the entrepreneurial strategy of creating a new foundational narrative around the art foundry to portray Lauchhammer as a liveable place based on culture and industry. The art foundry is considered to be clean and beautiful and the story offers an entrepreneurial hero character that can serve as a role model for current residents and economic actors (Pugh and Andersson 2023).

Figure 8. Core narratives and place-making in Lauchhammer (author’s own elaboration).

The foundation of the first iron foundry and the subsequent transformation of an agrarian into an industrial region can be considered as a parallel story to the current transformation process. Hence, the new narrative gains its legitimacy by the use of the past and offers legitimacy on its own for new development projects. The byname ‘Kunstguss-Stadt’ and the new project ‘Transformation 1.535°’ set symbolic starting points in a way that should lead Lauchhammer into a bright future. They are also seen as means to overcome the narrative of disintegration and decline, fill the void in local identity and provide orientation in the current structural change process of the region (see also Mace and Volgmann 2018). This is not easy as, still today, the narrative of disintegration is highly resonant with the experiences of loss of the local population (Görmar 2023; Willett 2021) and the different narratives intersect with each other.

During the last years, members of the above-mentioned coalition have engaged as ‘narrative entrepreneurs’ (Bronk and Jacoby 2020; Cianciara 2022) or ‘interpretive leaders’ (Sotarauta 2018). They not only shaped new ‘inner’ and ‘outer’ storylines (Grenni, Horlings, and Soini 2020). Through the official act of renaming, the new foundational story even got institutionalized in local policies and materially visible in the form of place signs and a new municipal logo (Albrecht and Kortelainen 2021). The coalition succeeded in integrating the former miner’s narrative into the new foundational narrative presenting lignite as the means to develop the iron foundry further and creating an integrative investment project as another material outcome.

Today, local actors in Lauchhammer consider the art foundry as a place brand of the town both in economic and cultural terms. Its strategic discursive mobilization as an anchor point for Lauchhammer’s development but also its materialization in the form of new investment projects resonate with broader political goals to boost culture and creativity as soft location factors in order to attract new tourists, new residents and new businesses (LH_IN_03; LH_IN_06; field notes; see also Musterd & Kovács 2013). This resonance opens up opportunities to get funding for the new strategic development from the so called coal-funds. Resonance is hence not only important on the local level and among the local population but also for actors in a multi-level arrangement to be able to push their envisaged goals within a specific ‘opportunity space’.

6. Conclusions

Old industrial towns and regions like Lauchhammer have experienced considerable changes in their economic, social and material fabric. This entails also intensive discussions about future directions of development potentially resulting in entrepreneurial strategies of place-making as part of local agency (Albrecht and Kortelainen 2021). Narratives and imaginaries play a particular role in such strategies. They mobilize selected perceptions of the past such as practices or personalities in coherent story lines to create resonance with local actors’ experiences, thereby legitimating local development strategies and shaping a place’s future (Pugh and Andersson 2023; Willett 2016).

The example of Lauchhammer reveals that old-industrial towns experiencing strong decline and disintegration struggle long to redefine themselves (Cruickshank, Ellingsen, and Hidle 2013). History and particularly foundational narratives can here be of use twofold: first, in an ‘outer storyline’, as a key asset to attract businesses, new residents and tourists; and second, in an ‘inner storyline’, to induce local pride and cohesion among local residents fostering thereby local identity (Grenni, Horlings, and Soini 2020). Yet, there is a multitude of stories that intersect and are interrelated to each other. In Lauchhammer, I could identify three core stories, the two foundational stories and the story of disintegration. Each of them has been dominant at different points in time and challenged or even delegitimized by others. Discourse coalitions that coalesce around a coherent storyline (Leipold and Winkel 2017) and act as ‘interpretive leaders’ (Sotarauta 2018) play an important role in such processes of narrative creation, contestation and delegitimization. Local agents hence dispose of discursive agency (Leipold and Winkel 2017) and power. They create resonance with other actors and position themselves in local place-making and development processes. At the same time, there are close interrelationships between local, regional and even national development strategies (Görmar et al. 2022). If local narratives resonate with national and regional strategies, an opportunity space opens up that can be seized by local agents. Yet, this also mean that narratives that do not fit into hegemonic agendas and are perceived to hinder future development may be delegitimized and invisibilized. In Lauchhammer, references to the ‘town of coal’ are increasingly backgrounded by the new narrative of the ‘town of art foundry’ and hidden by the more general term of ‘industrial culture’. Yet, it remains to be seen how successful these place-making strategies will be. Pugh and Andersson (2023) rightly pointed out that competition among municipalities is high and not all strategies are successful.

The approach of Critical Narrative Analysis has allowed me to study discursive agency by the use of local narratives as well as its intertwinement with material outcomes and structural contexts in a specific place. Thereby, I contribute not only empirically, but also methodologically to the growing literature on ideas and discourse in economic geography (e.g. Benner 2024; Björner and Aronsson 2022). It could be shown that imaginaries such as ‘the liveable city’ or ‘culture as lever for development’ are adopted not only in cities but in small towns alike influencing local narratives of and strategies in such places (Görmar 2023). This can be both an opportunity and a threat to small town development. The reference to overarching economic and political imaginaries allows old industrial places to benefit from funding schemes and promote endogenous development processes. Yet, there is also the danger of one-size-fits-all solutions and a certain self-responsibilization of local agents (Plüschke-Altof and Grootens 2019). This is particularly true in peripheralized or old-industrial regions which often lack basic funding and are dependent on external funding for investments and voluntary tasks. Policy makers need to be reflective on that and be careful about the narratives they produce and promote while being aware of bottom-up narratives forwarded by other agents. The focus on one theme or one personality might not be inclusive and represent all residents but rather a top-down approach led by local government which may provoke contestations (Pugh and Andersson 2023).

In Lauchhammer at least, local agents ultimately joined forces and appeared to be highly motivated to fill the ‘new’ narrative with life. Whether the town will substantially profit from it remains to be proved.

Acknowledgements

I am grateful for the comments of my colleagues at IfL, particularly Markus Sattler, Nadir Kinossian, Lela Rekhviashvili and Thilo Lang, on earlier versions of this paper as well as to three anonymous reviewers whose comments helped a lot to improve the paper. I am particularly grateful for the support of my student assistant Pia Kahlfuß in transcribing interview recordings.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported in the frame of the project ‘Agents of change in old industrial regions in Europe’ by the Volkswagen Foundation, funding programme ‘Challenges for Europe’ under grant number A126123 (ref. 94757).

Notes

1 The bio towers have been built to clear the waste water from the coking plant and were active until the late 1990s. They are protected as monuments since the early 2000s but only the International Building Exposition (IBA) in Lusatia (2000-2010) provided the opportunity for their preservation and touristic use. In 2008, they were reopened as monument and event location.

2 ‘Lauchhammer ist eins’ – slogan used in a draft for a mission statement (without date) and as project title.

3 The slogan ‘Lauchhammer – überraschend vielseitig (surprisingly diverse)’ was used as claim on the municipal website until the new byname ‘Kunstguss-Stadt’ was approved.