Federal press conference

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Federal press conference hall in Berlin (2018)

The Federal Press Conference (BPK) is an association of full-time journalists who report exclusively for the German media and constantly or predominantly from Berlin and Bonn . It is organized as an association, following the example of journalists from the Weimar Republic , in order to invite representatives of the federal government , but also parties, associations or individuals of national political importance to press conferences and to question them there.

organization

The institution was founded in autumn 1949, initially as a society under civil law . It has been a registered association since May 19, 1953 , the purpose of which is to hold press conferences and to provide its members with "opportunities to provide comprehensive information to the public", as stated in the statutes. It is financed from membership fees.

House of the Federal Press Conference in Berlin (2014)

At first, foreign correspondents also belonged to the BPK, until the Association of the Foreign Press in Germany (VAP) was founded in January 1951 . It was originally founded in 1906, but has been inactive since 1945 and was then re-established in 1951 in the FRG and GDR as separate associations.

On its sixtieth anniversary in October 2009, the Federal Press Conference had 922 members. At that time, 93 journalists were still working in the former federal capital, Bonn, as important political tasks continue to be performed there as a federal city .

The association has had its own building in the center of Berlin since 2000, which also has offices for correspondents. The building for the Federal Press Conference was designed by architects Johanne and Gernot Nalbach in 1998 and completed two years later.

Specialty

In contrast to the practice in many other countries, the “hosts” of the federal press conferences are the journalists themselves and not the government, ministries, parties, associations, ideological communities or individual politicians. This means that journalists who are known for their critical questions always have their say, while in comparable events in other countries these journalists are often unable to ask questions.

For the same reason, some guests refrain from appearing before the federal press conference. The Federal Chancellors, for example, usually only come to the Federal Press Conference once a year and otherwise organize their own press conferences in the Chancellery. Even Joschka Fischer was known in his time as Foreign Minister to steer clear of the federal press conference.

A so-called government press conference is held three times a week (Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays). To this end, the press spokespersons of the federal government and the ministries are routinely invited to answer questions from journalists after their brief introductory statements.

The guests at the press conference can mark individual explanations as confidential and it corresponds to the voluntary commitment of the journalists to maintain this confidentiality as set out in the press code. In practice, however, guests very rarely use this option.

Only members of the BPK and the foreign correspondents affiliated with the VAP have the right to participate and ask questions in the events.

history

The earliest roots lie in the press conferences organized by the Great General Staff of the Imperial Army during the First World War , which the former stock market journalist and Major Georg Schweitzer held from 1915 . He had already been one of the founding members of the imperial press ball. "Informing the people" corresponded to the prevailing patriotic mood at the time.

After the abolition of the monarchy , the journalists of the leading German daily newspapers working in Berlin took the organization of the press conferences into their own hands and invited politicians and government spokesmen as guests instead of the other way around.

After the end of the Second World War, the form of press conferences of the Weimar Republic was taken up again. In 1947 the state press conference was first held in Hanover and in 1948 the Frankfurt press conference at the Economic Council of the United Economic Area . It dissolved again with the founding of the Federal Republic at the end of 1949 and is considered a direct forerunner of the Bonn BPK. Many of its founding members moved to Bonn from the Frankfurt press conference after the federal government and parliament were constituted there in 1949.

Federal press conference hall in Bonn's tulip field (2014)
Exterior of the Federal Press Conference hall in Bonn (2014)

On September 15, 1949, the day of the first Federal Chancellor election , a group of newspaper correspondents posted a notice in the Bundeshaus in Bonn to call on “all journalists accredited to the Bundestag to found a federal press conference”. The founding assembly took place four days later, but the BPK was not officially constituted until October 11, 1949 with the election of an executive committee.

At the first federal press conference on their own responsibility, which took place on October 17 or 18, 1949 in the plenary hall of the Federal Council , Federal Chancellor Konrad Adenauer and Minister of Economics Ludwig Erhard answered questions from member journalists . Later the press conferences usually took place in room 117a of the old building of the Bundeshaus , the hall of the defense committee .

Immediately after the founding of the BPK in 1949, certain members of the board of directors were entrusted with one of the most urgent organizational tasks of the post-war period: the procurement of living space for the Bonn journalists. At that time, a quota of 10% could be enforced for the local members in the occupancy of social housing, which was originally only intended for employees of the Bundestag . Therefore a number of journalists also lived in the Reutersiedlung . After further grants (such as support for surviving dependents) were added, the Social Fund Federal Press Conference was launched.

After the Berlin Wall was built in 1961, the statutes were changed in the autumn to exclude all GDR correspondents from the BPK. In the more than 40-year history of the Bonn Republic, it remained the only exclusion against accredited journalists. It existed for almost 10 years, until on February 8, 1971, the “exclusion paragraph” for East German journalists was removed from the statutes and three years later they were also given the opportunity to join the Association of Foreign Press.

From October 1967, the Federal Press Conference with its hall was located in the so-called “ press house ” of the Allianz buildings on the tulip field . Your distinguishing mark there was a meter-high rosewood wall with squares .

After the fall of the Berlin Wall, in spring 1990 the BPK supported the establishment of the “Berlin Capital Press Conference”, from which the “BPK Berlin Branch Office” developed after German reunification.

When the government and parliament moved in 1999, the BPK also moved its headquarters to Berlin. The room in which the federal press conference takes place as well as the offices of the association employees are rented from Allianz, which owns the building. Even after moving to Berlin, the Federal Press Conference is still represented with a branch in Bonn's federal district.

In the closing speech of the then deputy press spokeswoman Charima Reinhardt on August 4, 1999 in Bonn's tulip field, the number of press conferences held there was given as “between 9,000 and 10,000”.

Chairperson

Gregor Mayntz - Chairman from 2011 to 2020

Social Fund Federal Press Conference

The Social Fund for the Federal Press Conference is a self-help organization run by members of the Federal Press Conference in the form of a registered non-profit association based in Berlin. The members come from the circle of the Federal Press Conference.

The general assembly, which meets once a year, advises on social measures and monitors the association's finances. A three-person board is elected from the group of members, who appoints its chairman.

The purpose of the fund is to support journalists in need or their survivors through ongoing financial contributions or one-off grants. The aid money from the Social Fund comes primarily from the proceeds of the raffle at the annual Federal Press Ball in Berlin. In addition, the association receives irregular donations from sponsors. The recipients of these services are preferably former or current members of the Federal Press Conference. The board decides on donations after examining the individual cases.

Prize of the Federal Press Conference

Since 2014, the so-called Federal Press Conference Prize - a keyboard engraved in crystal - has been awarded annually at the Federal Press Ball. The award recognizes outstanding achievements in terms of freedom of the press.

Previous winners are the Reuters correspondent Gernot Heller (2014), the Spiegel reporter Christoph Reuter (2015), the long-time head of the ARD studio in Brussels Rolf-Dieter Krause (2016), the dpa correspondent Kristina Dunz (2017), the Phoenix -journalists Gerd-Joachim von Fallois and Erhard Scherfer (2018), the Polish DW -Journalist Jacek Lepiarz (2019), and - representing the team at the Corona podcast of the NDR - the science journalists Korinna Hennig and Catherine Mahrenholtz (2020).

See also

literature

  • Gunnar Krüger: We're not an exclusive club! The federal press conference in the Adenauer era. LIT-Verlag, Münster 2005, ISBN 3-8258-8342-6
  • Bernd F. Köhler: The federal press conference. Approaching a known unknown. Phil. Diss., Mannheim 1988, self-published (detailed literature review on the subject)
  • Manfred Koch and Waltraud Hausmann: 'Forever'. Analysis of the content of the flow of communication after the Federal Press Conference on May 9, 1969. In: Publizistik, 16th year 1971, issue 4, Seuteb 369–378
  • Ernst Ney: The Federal Press Conference - Bonn Politics Soundboard. In: Heinz-Dietrich Fischer (Ed.): Government Spokesman - Between Information and Secrecy. Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, Cologne 1981, ISBN 3-8046-8581-1 , pages 89-106
  • Eckart Klaus Roloff : Federal Press Conference. Annotated materials on the professional organization of Bonn correspondents. In: Journalistik, 22nd year 1977, issue 2, pages 248–256 (with literature list)
  • Eckart Klaus Roloff: The Federal Press Conference - a clique? In: Der Journalist, 25th year 1975, issue 3, pages 25-27
  • Eckart Klaus Roloff, Walter Tausch and other employees (based on a concept by Günter Kieslich ): Input-output analysis of the information performance of state political bodies in the Federal Republic of Germany. Lead study based on the survey of members of the Federal Press Conference. Machine duplicated Salzburg, Institute for Journalism and Communication Theory 1972
  • Holger Schmale: Here journalists are in charge. The Federal Press Conference was founded 65 years ago, this institution only exists in Germany. In: Frankfurter Rundschau from 11./12. October 2014, pages 37

Web links

Commons : Federal Press Conference  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Helmut Herles : Federal press conference celebrates 60th birthday. Bonner General-Anzeiger , October 8, 2009, accessed on November 3, 2018 .
  2. ↑ Sten Martenson: Parliament, the public and media. In: Hans-Peter Schneider and * Wolfgang Zeh (eds.): Parliamentary law and parliamentary practice in the Federal Republic of Germany. De Gruyter, Berlin 1989, ISBN 978-3-11-011077-7 , pages 261-288 (here: page 274).
  3. ↑ Nina Grunenberg : Half an hour Bonn routine. Die Zeit , No. 24/66, June 10, 1966, accessed on November 3, 2018 .
  4. ↑ Anke Fiedler: With your back to the wall. How the Federal Republic suppressed unwanted GDR reporting. Federal Agency for Civic Education , July 25, 2012, accessed on November 3, 2018 .
  5. ↑ Tulpenfeld office buildings. For the last Federal Press Conference in Bonn on August 4, 1999. wegderdemokratie.de, accessed on November 3, 2018 .