Unrealistic irredentist goals alienated expellee members and marginalized their organizations

Evidence

Yet, the specific Heimatpolitik (‘homeland policy’) pursued by the Vertriebenenverbände marked a notable difference between the two cases: from the outset, expellee associations sought to promote distinct expellee cultures and lobbied to return to their homelands as their main (long-term) goal. Ironically, it was this very core of separatist Heimatpolitik that, according to Ahonen, expedited the expellees’ integration into West German society. While it functioned as a sort of narcotic against massive suffering in the first postwar years, this clinging to an increasingly unrealistic irredentism alienated many of the associations’ members, gradually marginalizing the organizations politically from the 1960s. — Manuel Borutta and Jan C. Jansen, Vertriebene and Pieds-Noirs in Postwar…, 83

Categorization

• XREF: Directly relevant to the reader’s research on whether threat-hardened beliefs collapse when their grievance engine fails — this shows an unmet-grievance ideology that itself decayed through unrealism rather than through resolution. — connects to: Expellee rhetoric of rights and Europe disguised irredentist territorial claims. — Pertti Ahonen, Domestic Constraints on West German…, 67; Electoral competition for expellee votes fossilized symbolic irredentism that no longer meant return — Manuel Borutta and Jan C. Jansen, Vertriebene and Pieds-Noirs in Postwar…, 741; Expellees’ apolitical memory work outweighed their leaders’ revanchist politics — Andrew Demshuk, The Lost German East: Forced Migration…, 201 (+1 more)
• QUESTION: The claim that irredentism ‘expedited integration’ is counterintuitive — worth chasing how Ahonen argues the emotional safety valve let integration proceed despite political failure of the goal.

Broader Connections

• Electoral competition for expellee votes fossilized symbolic irredentism that no longer meant return #qualifies (0.82) — Manuel Borutta and Jan C. Jansen, Vertriebene and Pieds-Noirs in Postwar…, 741
• Expellees’ apolitical memory work outweighed their leaders’ revanchist politics #contradicts (0.82) — Andrew Demshuk, The Lost German East, 201
• Expellee rhetoric of rights and Europe disguised irredentist territorial claims. #expands (0.80) — Pertti Ahonen, Domestic Constraints on West German…, 67
• Expellee organizations enforced an orthodox policy line by punishing political deviation #expands (0.80) — Pertti Ahonen, Domestic Constraints on West German…, 105