HI290- History of Germany
East Germany:
The Anti-fascist State
Organisation of the East German State
16 Members
9 Candidates
(Executive/Collective
Head of State)
Chairman, 6 Deputy
Chairmen, Secretary, 16
Members.
(Government)
Led by an 11-man
Presidium; makes
decisions in consultation
with Central Committee
of the SED.
Chooses
Every 5
years
Appoints
Responsible for national
security; comprised of
Chairman and 12 members
drawn from the Politburo of
the SED.
Chooses
Every 5
years
Chooses
135 Members
46 Candidates
Chooses
(Every 5 years)
CDU
52
LDPD
52
DBD
52
(500 seats in total)
NDPD
SED
FDGB
52
127
68
FDJ
40
DFD
35
KB
22
Send
Delegates
to
15 Regional Party Organisations
Send
Delegates
to
250 Local Party Organisations
State apparatus
Party apparatus
Administrative districts of the GDR, 1952
The Sozialistische Einheitspartei
Deutschlands (Socialist Unity Party, SED)
Wilhelm Pieck (KPD) shakes hands with Otto
Grotewohl (SPD) on formation of SED, April 1946.
The Police State
Emblem of the
Ministerium für
Staatssicherheit (MfS,
Ministry of State Security
or Stasi)
The East German Volkspolizei on parade, 1955
Erich Mielke (1907-2000),
head of the MfS, 1957-1989.
The Economy
• 1945-46:
Wide-ranging
land
reform,
expropriation of businesses and nationalization of
key industries: 40% of industry under state
control; 100 hectares (247 acres) of land
redistributed to peasants and refugees.
• GDR at an economic disadvantage compared to
the West – had only 30% of industrial capacity,
few natural resources and a smaller population.
• Planned economy focusing on building up heavy
industry at the expense of essentials and
consumer goods – meat, butter and sugar
rationed until 1958, luxury goods like chocolate
almost unobtainable.
• Growth fell from 8% in 1950 to 2.3% between
1960 & 1962.
Walter Ulbricht (1893-1973)
• Born in Leipzig, joined the Spartacist League in 1918.
• Co-founder of the KPD, elected as a Reichstag Deputy in
1928.
• 1933-45: In exile in the USSR.
• 1949: Appointed Deputy Prime Minister of the GDR.
• 1950: Became General Secretary of the SED.
• 1960: Became Chairman of the Council of State.
• Favoured ‘hard line’ of constructing socialism in half a
country rather than pursuing reunification; in 1953
under heavy fire from Politburo colleagues, but ‘saved’
by 17 June uprising.
• 1960s: Limited economic reforms, but unable to change
with the times.
• 1971: Ousted by ‘palace coup’ by Honecker, with Soviet
backing.
June 1953 Uprising
Anti-Fascism
• Marxist-Leninist doctrine always interpreted fascism as an
outgrowth of capitalism; therefore antifascism linked to
anti-capitalism (big business as Hitler’s stringpullers).
• Fascism also interpreted as a political class war (mainly v.
KPD), rather than racial war (v. Jews); GDR paid no
reparations to Israel and anti-Semitic attacks on
graveyards persisted.
• West German Federal Republic viewed as haven of
former Nazis, protected by Anglo-Americans (especially in
1950s/60s); antifascism thus had contemporaneous
function of anti-westernism (e.g. Berlin Wall officially
labelled ‘Antifascist Defence Rampart’).
• SED leadership (mainly Soviet exiles) had ambivalent
attitude to ‘real’ antifascist veterans (marginalised
‘inland’ resisters, dissolved veterans’ organisations).
• Antifascism an affective moral argument for wartime
generation; but younger generations increasingly
indifferent to abstract antifascism.
Buchenwald memorial: unveiled in 1958, this group represents the
KPD’s leading role in the resistance, with a (historically dubious)
myth of the camp’s self-liberation. Buchenwald was the GDR’s main
memorial site for school visits and veterans meetings.
Republikflucht
A Family Flees from East to West over the Border in
the Bavarian Forest (1948-49)
Troops of the 40,000-strong Grenztruppen der DDR
(East German Border Guards) patrolling the innerGerman border, 1971.
Education, Culture and the Arts
Foundation of the FDJ in Berlin,
Nov. 1947
Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956)
Christa Wolf (1929-2011)
Interpretations
Totalitarian Interpretations
• Popular in 1950s West German interpretations;
revival post-1989
• Comparisons drawn with brown dictatorship of
National Socialism
• Stress illegitimacy of Soviet occupation & East
German ‘puppets’
• State ideology of ‘socialist personality’ within
collective
• ‘Leading role’ of ruling party enshrined in
constitution
• Stasi secret police
• State control of economy
• Control of media
• Control of economy
• Berlin Wall as epitome of state control of
individual
• Breached UN human rights on freedom of travel
• Also popular with many former GDR citizens; but is
this because it denies personal responsibility?
A Modernising Dictatorship?
• Complex industrial economy required ‘rational’ not
‘ideological’ elite
• More university graduates enter party apparatus from
1960s
• Peter C. Ludz, The Changing Party Elite in East Germany
(1968/72)
• Economic reforms of 1960s (New Economic System)
• Attempt at decentralisation and incentivisation of
economy
• Technological revolution
• Special role of intelligentsia in GDR (see dividers on
state emblem)
• Precision engineering from Dresden & Leipzig
• 1980s gamble on microchip technology (too high
investment costs)
• Welfare dictatorship (Konrad Jarausch)
• Indirect use of ‘social power’ to predispose groups to
choose socialism
• Full employment, hospitals, education system > fond
memories
• Educational dictatorship (Erziehungsdiktatur)?
• Party ‘in loco parentis’, knowing what was good for the
people
• Rolf Henrich, The Guardian State (1989); party man
turned dissident