Chapter 10: East Germany
The Creation of the SED dictatorship
- Totalitarianist state with the aim of looking like a democracy: SED and party system,
judiciary, Stasi, Soviet troops and SMAD
- Loyalty to USSR: Put in prison and trailed communists not sympathetic to the
Stalinist line
- Removed 150,000 members of the party after 2 years of the GDR
- Democratic centralism
- 1950 had participation from 98% of the electorate
- Stasi: set up in February 1050 and had 13,000 members by 1955
- There were 175,000 IMs by the fall of the regime
- The Judiciary: in 1950 ½ judges and 86% of public prosecutors were members of the
SED
- In 40 years, 200,000 were prosecuted for political crimes
Political survival
- Workers Uprising on 17 June 1953. The government wanted to match the FRG with
a 10% rise in productivity
- The peaceful protest turned radicalised with people protesting against the
government, wanting democracy and reunification
- 100,000 protestors
- 1300 people put on trial and 2 put on death. Presented uprising as ‘fascist
Putsch’ in propaganda
- West didn’t intervene, poorly organised, soviet intervened with tanks = 20-50
fatalities
- Death of Pieck(previously head of state i.e President) meant that Ulbricht became
Chairman council of the state as well as general secretary of the SED = power more
centralised
- Destalinisation: Hungary 1956 was brutal- 3000 died and 200 captured and executed
so Ulbricht released 21,000 political prisoners in the GDR to prevent a mirroring of
this
Economy
- There was a previous two-year plan to get ready for the five-year plan (1951-55)
- Doubled overall industrial production since 1950
- Failed as it was overdependent on heavy industry at the expense of
consumer goods, it had slow centralised planning
- 2nd 5-year plan = first nuclear reactor in 1957
- 7-year plan (1959-65):
- Consumer good production increased by 177%
- Industrial production increased by 188%
- Extend collectivisation- this failed and food production declined. Farmers
voted with their feet and went to the FRG and rationing was reintroduced in
1961
- However, between 1958-1959, the economy was growing by 12% per annum
Society
The Creation of the SED dictatorship
- Totalitarianist state with the aim of looking like a democracy: SED and party system,
judiciary, Stasi, Soviet troops and SMAD
- Loyalty to USSR: Put in prison and trailed communists not sympathetic to the
Stalinist line
- Removed 150,000 members of the party after 2 years of the GDR
- Democratic centralism
- 1950 had participation from 98% of the electorate
- Stasi: set up in February 1050 and had 13,000 members by 1955
- There were 175,000 IMs by the fall of the regime
- The Judiciary: in 1950 ½ judges and 86% of public prosecutors were members of the
SED
- In 40 years, 200,000 were prosecuted for political crimes
Political survival
- Workers Uprising on 17 June 1953. The government wanted to match the FRG with
a 10% rise in productivity
- The peaceful protest turned radicalised with people protesting against the
government, wanting democracy and reunification
- 100,000 protestors
- 1300 people put on trial and 2 put on death. Presented uprising as ‘fascist
Putsch’ in propaganda
- West didn’t intervene, poorly organised, soviet intervened with tanks = 20-50
fatalities
- Death of Pieck(previously head of state i.e President) meant that Ulbricht became
Chairman council of the state as well as general secretary of the SED = power more
centralised
- Destalinisation: Hungary 1956 was brutal- 3000 died and 200 captured and executed
so Ulbricht released 21,000 political prisoners in the GDR to prevent a mirroring of
this
Economy
- There was a previous two-year plan to get ready for the five-year plan (1951-55)
- Doubled overall industrial production since 1950
- Failed as it was overdependent on heavy industry at the expense of
consumer goods, it had slow centralised planning
- 2nd 5-year plan = first nuclear reactor in 1957
- 7-year plan (1959-65):
- Consumer good production increased by 177%
- Industrial production increased by 188%
- Extend collectivisation- this failed and food production declined. Farmers
voted with their feet and went to the FRG and rationing was reintroduced in
1961
- However, between 1958-1959, the economy was growing by 12% per annum
Society
