The first prequel delves deeper into the everyday world of the average person and, as such, touches upon a multitude of elements. While my new protagonist never joined ‘the Party’ (he can’t be bothered with the endless meetings and Party-speak), his sister did. She therefore has to be seen toeing the line, which means attending those endless meetings and wallowing in Party-speak! So, how would that look in reality? East Germany is my main source of reference here…
Party Membership
‘It is a great honour to be a member of the Socialist Unity Party,’ began the section ‘Party members, their duties and rights’ in the 5th statute of the Party in 1976. It certainly helped open doors. Many people applied and were accepted with at prestigious ceremonies. But the percentage of Party members only amounted to 21.9% of the working population by 1981.
However, Party life in the DDR could be tedious. Members were expected to devour the official daily newspaper Neues Deutschland (New Germany). Key political content would be divided into topics and various members tasked with reporting on them at Party meetings and courses.
Party meetings were held once a month, taking place on a Monday evening and lasting several hours. As part of the Party’s training year, a monthly course would also be held in which, theoretically, the member would be expected to read the drawn-out speeches from Party congresses and plenary sessions. On top of this, the member would be expected to engage in the work of mass organisations, every activity being recorded in their file.
Mass Organisations
By far the biggest of these mass organisations was the trade union federation, the FDGB (Freier Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund), which virtually all workers joined, and which was a pivotal part of working life. Through it, workers received their bonuses and their subsidised holiday passes for accommodation in company recreational facilities. Under its mantle came a host of affiliated unions, though they tended to be meaningless when it came to representing workers’ rights! Other mass organisations included the Free German Youth (Freie Deutsche Jugend), the Society for German-Soviet Friendship (Gesellschaft für Deutsch-Sowjetische Freundschaft) and the Society for Sports and Technology (Gesellschaft für Sport und Technik).
As reward for all this, the diligent Party member was certainly favoured over the non-Party member, and advancement in the Party meant advancement outside.
Further Reading
For further reading on the above, I highly recommend:
- WOLLE, Stefan, Die heile Welt der Diktatur: Alltag und Herrschaft in der DDR 1971–1989 (Berlin: 1998; tr. David Burnett as The Ideal World of Dictatorship: Daily Like and Party Rule in the GDR 1971–1989, Berlin: Christoph Links Verlag, 2019)
Photo: Membership Card of the SED (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands — Socialist Unity Party of Germany), Wikipedia, Public Domain.