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This contribution analyses the controversies over economic policy that during 1990 concerned the transformation of the GDR’s socialist economy into a market economy and its integration in unified Germany’s economic space. The paper especially analyses the details of the economic, monetary and social union of July 1, 1990 that prepared the October 3 political union. Crucial issues were privatizing the East-German economy and financing the unification costs. The positions of the main political forces in East- and West-Germany as well as those of economic experts and institutions such as the Bundesbank were some of the crucial issues. Overall, the transformation was done as a "shock therapy" for East Germany, characterized by an excessive optimism in the market’s ability to self-regulate and with mixed results.