“T’alnaengjŏn chŏnhu Tokil ŭi siminkwŏn chedo wa ijumin jŏngch’aek ŭi pyŏnhwa-kukjŏkpŏp kwa iminpŏp ŭl chungsimŭiro”[The Changes of German Citizenship and Immigration Policy around Post-Cold War Era: Focus on Nationality Law and Immigration Law]

This paper aims to review German identity issues through gradual changes of Nationality and Immigration Law around Post-Cold War era. Unlike existing literature, this article tries to analyze social and legal issues in Germany with implication on current Korean society. Traditionally, Germany has defined itself as cultural community and delineated its boundary on jus sanguine or blood-based line. Since the German Imperial and State Citizenship Law was enacted in 1913, the blood-based principle continued even under the German Basic Law or Constitutional Law in 1949. However, the guest workers who came to Germany from mid-1950s onwards and proliferated into 1970s, had raised a thorny issue of their integration into German society. Thus, several core ideas that Heinz Kühn brought in his pioneering report, stipulating specific conditions for the integration of foreigners, were realized in the revised Nationality Law (2000) under the SPD administration. The revised law permitted foreigners with 5 to 8 years of work experience in Germany to get permanent residency and to be naturalized afterwards. Following a new revised nationality Law, a newly created Immigration Law (2005) stipulated the immigration of foreigners to Germany from non-German states. Since it was possible to realize comprehensive immigration regime through labor, investment, and refuge etc, foreign immigrants have exponentially increased in Germany. These legal changes raise ultimate question of identity, namely, who Germans are. A German case brings Korean case to the relief, particularly a necessity for Korea to devise a comprehensive immigration law, incorporating diverse but dispersed laws on foreigners. Thus German case also will be a great reference for Korea to search for an identity question in the future.