Company holiday camp in the GDR
Operating camps were camps of enterprises , institutions, cooperatives and government organizations for several weeks recovery stays of children and adolescents. The union organized the first politicized children's holiday camps as early as 1946 .
If required, these facilities were also used for internal seminars or as a vacation home for employees. The children's holiday camp in the company's social system was a segment of social tourism . Company holiday camps had existed in the USSR , but also in Germany , since the 1920s . Company holiday camps played a particularly important role in state social policy in the GDR .
Company holiday camp in the GDR
The company holiday camps for children in the GDR, which by law had to be run for the employees' children, are a novelty in the history of children's social tourism in Germany.
Legal basis
The legal basis was the 3rd implementation provision of the Law for the Promotion of Young People of 1951 and the Ordinance on the Use of Company Recreational Facilities of May 10, 1979. The Labor Code of June 16, 1977 regulated: “The company is obliged to take advantage of all possible children to ensure that his working people have a relaxing holiday in company holiday camps or through other forms of children's holiday recreation. "
Length of stay
The holiday camps were mainly used during the summer holidays, rarely during the winter holidays. The duration of the vacation was between 14 days and 21 days. On average, the parents had to pay 12 to 20 GDR marks of the total costs (food, accommodation, travel and care).
Educational goal
Everything that happened in the company holiday camp had to serve the education of the children to a " socialist personality ". However, the politicization cannot be compared with the socialist pioneer camps . The leisure activities such as hiking, sports, games, cultural activities and much more were well organized within the framework of children's tourism.
The focus was on group work as a pedagogical construct.
accommodation
The company holiday camp was not a luxury hostel, but a tent camp , a cottage settlement, a rented inn or other permanent accommodation. The thirst for adventure to explore the natural landscapes during the holidays was not diminished by this - many participants found these experiences to be a “little children's paradise”.
In 1989 there were around 5,000 company holiday camps in the GDR.
financing
The financing of this recreation facility was the task of the company and led to a considerable underfunding, as the facility could only be used for a short time during the year. The FDGB provided grants for the facilities .
Use of children's social tourism in companies
According to GDR statistics, around 800,000 children aged up to 14/15 were in company holiday camps in 1983.
West German children in the east holiday camp
The " Central Working Group (ZAG) - Happy Holidays for All Children ", founded in Düsseldorf in 1955, organized, together with regional committees of the individual federal states , for low pay or sometimes free of charge, a stay of West German children in summer camps in the GDR.
Tens of thousands of children from the Federal Republic of Germany spent their holidays in the company holiday camps. Especially in the years 1954–1961 special trains were used for this purpose.
These actions were part of GDR propaganda and highlight the SED's western policy, West German anti-communism and German-German systemic competition . The ZAG was one of a network of communist organizations in the Federal Republic that has so far been little researched.
Children's exchange for recreation
An exchange with other countries took place within the Comecon, the Council for Mutual Economic Aid . Children from different countries such as B. Poland , Hungary , and the ČSSR traveled to other socialist states, including the GDR.
Within the GDR, the companies swapped their facilities in order to offer variety.
literature
- Udo Beßer: The military recreation system in the GDR. Rest homes, holiday camps, spa facilities . Steffen-Verlag, Friedland 2012, ISBN 978-3-942477-30-7 .
- Christopher Görlich: Vacation from the state. Tourism in the GDR. Böhlau Verlag, Cologne / Weimar / Vienna 2012, ISBN 978-3-412-20863-9 .
- Helmut Breuer and others (collective of authors of the German Central Pedagogical Institute): Our company holiday camp. An educational guide for camp managers and helpers . Published by the federal executive committee of the FDGB in cooperation with the German Central Pedagogical Institute. Verlag Tribüne, Berlin 1958.
- Thomas Schaufuß: Holiday leisure time with games, sports and adventure. Child and youth social tourism. The company holiday camp in the GDR and its predecessors . OEZ Berlin Verlag, March 2017, ISBN 978-3-942437-28-8 .
- Jens Niederhut: Happy holidays in the GDR . Communism and Anti-Communism in the 1950s (November 16, 2011). Retrieved July 14, 2017.
- Siegfried Müller: Culture in Germany. From the empire to reunification . Verlag W. Kohlhammer, December 2016, ISBN 978-3-17-031844-1 .
- Heike Behre: Tourism Policy in System Transformation. A study of travel in the GDR and East German tourism in the period 1980–2000 . Berlin 2003.
- Heike Wolter: "I wait in the country and go, strangers to him". The history of tourism in the GDR. Campus-Verlag , Frankfurt / New York 2009, ISBN 978-3-593-39055-0 (on company holiday camps p. 290 ff.)
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Siegfried Müller: Culture in Germany, chapter Eastern Zone and GDR: 1945–1989, p. 76.
- ^ Journal of Laws I p. 179
- ↑ Labor Code of the German Democratic Republic, § 234. (1), online
- ↑ Helmut Breuer, Our company holiday camp , p. 15.
- ↑ Thomas Schaufuß: Ferienfreizeit, p. 116.
- ↑ See also 4th implementing regulation for the Youth Act of the GDR - Holiday arrangements for schoolchildren and apprentices - from June 15, 1967.
- ^ Jens Niederhut, Happy Holidays in the GDR