For the Soviets, Hans Scharoun and his collective’s plan for Great Berlin turned out to be too modernist. Stalin summoned his East German acolytes to resuscitate national traditions committed to monumentality instead. Ironically, as this chapter shows, it was the socialists, formerly committed to internationalism, who would retap the notion of Heimat, which had been dear to the Fascists. ‘Socialism in one country’ (Stalin 1954) and a return to the ‘beautiful, truly German city’ were the architectural dictums in the early years of the Cold War, of which the showcase ‘workers’ palaces’ on East Berlin’s Stalinallee turned out to be a prominent manifestation (see section 4.1). Yet, as will be also illustrated, behind the facades of national traditions and monumentality, new building practices were already being experimented with, practices of Taylorism that emphasized efficiency via rationalization. Once decried as the epitome of worker-unfriendly, dehumanizing ‘imperial capitalism’, Taylorism was gradually integrated into socialism, which in East Germany meant Marxism-Leninism (shaped by one-party-rule, a centralized state, a planned economy, and an emphasis on techno-scientific progress). In the immediate post-WWII years, Taylorism was coupled with shock work: the expectation of an above-average work ethic in the service of building socialism (due to a shortage of labor and machinery). Many workers agreed to perform above average in their jobs but failed to move any closer to the promised fruits of their labor nonetheless: a decent standard of living.