Colorful list - fight back

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The Colorful List - Defend Yourselves: Initiative for Democracy and Environmental Protection (BuLi) was a political party founded in Hamburg in 1978 . The party, which emerged under the considerable influence of the Communist League (KB), is to be regarded as one of the predecessor groups of the GREEN party . In the Hamburg state and district elections in June 1978 , the list appeared once and reached 3.5% at the state level and two mandates at the district level. Due to internal disputes and division, the list became more and more meaningless after the election and was finally included in the Hamburg regional association of DIE GRÜNEN, the “ Green Alternative List ” (GAL). The most important representatives of the BuLi were Rainer Trampert , Thomas Ebermann , Jürgen Reents and Knut Mellenthin .

Pre- and founding history

In the run-up to the 1976 federal election , the Communist Federation (KB) initiated initial discussions about alternative participation in the Hamburg alternative scene. The governing body of the KB called for a "broad debate on the correct election tactics". The established parties did not feel represented. So were election boycott , supporting one of the parties to the left of the SPD or own candidacy the imaginable options. This discussion initially fizzled out, but was resumed in September 1977. This time, the reason was the idea expressed within the “Citizens' Initiative for Environmental Protection Lower Elbe” (BUU) to run for the Hamburg state election in 1978 with a separate list. Two thirds of the BUU members voted for the proposal. A meeting was scheduled for the following January. The colorful list's founding meeting followed in March. They committed themselves to a broad program encompassing various problem areas. The primacy of ecological policy should be broken and groups from tenants' initiatives, women, school and apprentice groups, opponents of nuclear power , environmentalists , homosexual groups , church members, conscientious objectors , progressive filmmakers and much more should be addressed equally. Members should not be individuals, but groups of people. 91 different groups had already come to the first preparatory meeting, and there were more than 200 when it was founded. However, many of the citizens' initiatives and groups consisted entirely or largely of KB members, which only came to light after the election. There are even said to have been some “ letter box initiatives” (Steffen sees at least 26 such initiatives within the BuLi). Thomas Ebermann, former KB cadre and later member of the Greens, estimated the citizens' initiatives dominated by KB at 117. The BuLi entered the state election in Hamburg on June 4, 1978 with the top candidates Holger Strohm , ex-SPD member, and Rainer Trampert, Works council at Texaco and KB-Kader. With 33,302 votes and 3.5%, BuLi immediately became the fourth strongest force. However, it was not enough for a place in the citizenry. However, two seats in the Eimsbüttel district council were won. KB members Christina Kukielka and Ilona Kiene took advantage of this.

Splitting process

After the election, the first protests against the majorityization of the Colorful List by the Communist League began to stir. The trigger was an open letter from Holger Strohm: "I don't like the way the KB is playing out its dominance more and more and blocking everything that does not fit into its political concept." Strohm resigned from his position for three months in protest. In his response, the KB insulted the ecologist Strohm as a 'weirdo' and a 'false democrat' and accused him in the workers' struggle (central organ of the KB) that he was offended because his proposal to participate in the European elections was rejected by the party congress. This marked the beginning of the splitting process of the BuLi, which was announced by a considerable decline in membership. The beginning of the founding of the Federal Green Party revealed another deep rift that ran through BuLi and KB alike. While the management level of the KB pleaded for the formation of an independent nationwide alternative party, a group around Rainer Trampert, Thomas Ebermann, Jürgen Reents, Willi Goltermann and Christina Kukielka, called Group-Z , wanted to infiltrate the Greens as a strong left-wing faction and from the Liberate the conservative wing around Herbert Gruhl and Baldur Springmann . The differences of opinion finally led to the split in the KB in December. From then on, Group Z concentrated on its commitment to the Greens. She withdrew from BuLi in the course of 1980 in favor of the newly founded green regional association. This shattered the structures of the BuLi.

Dissolution in favor of GAL

Even before the federal party was founded, the Hamburg State Association of the Greens was brought into being on November 30, 1979. On December 20th, the association already had 734 members, 250 of whom belonged to Group Z at the same time. The rest of the colorful list, now completely dominated by the rump KB, failed with its attempt to found a nationwide alternative party and dealt with a candidacy in the 1982 state elections in the course of the year . Since the simultaneous candidacy of BuLi and the Green Regional Association entailed the danger that both groups would again fail because of the 5% clause, the will to approach each other grew. These efforts were supported by the disappointed ex-BuLi members and Spontis 'initiative for the establishment of an alternative list', which in November 1981 led to the establishment of the 'Alternative List Hamburg'. Shortly thereafter, the BuLi dissolved in favor of the alternative list. After long negotiations, in March 1982 the Alternative List and the Green Regional Association merged to form the "Green Alternative List" (GAL), as the Hamburg Regional Association was still called until April 2012.

literature

  • Anna Hallensleben: From the Green List to the Green Party? The development of the Green List environmental protection from its creation in Lower Saxony in 1977 to the founding of the party DIE GRÜNEN in 1980 (= Göttingen political science research. Vol. 4, ZDB -ID 554359-9 ). Muster-Schmidt, Göttingen et al. 1984 (at the same time: Göttingen, Univ., Diss., 1983).
  • Rudolf van Hüllen : Ideology and power struggle among the Greens. Investigation of the programmatic and internal organizational development of a German "movement party". Bouvier, Bonn 1990, ISBN 3-416-02222-X (at the same time: Bonn, Univ., Diss., 1988).
  • Silke Mende: "Not right, not left, but in front". A history of the founding Greens (= system of order. Vol. 33). Oldenbourg, Munich 2011, ISBN 978-3-486-59811-7 (also revised version by: Tübingen, Univ., Diss., 2009/10).
  • Joachim Raschke (Ed.): The Greens. How they became what they are. Bund-Verlag, Cologne 1993, ISBN 3-7663-2474-8 .
  • Michael Schroeren (Ed.): The Greens. 10 eventful years. Ueberreuter, Vienna 1990, ISBN 3-8000-3352-6 .
  • Michael Steffen: Stories about the truffle pig. Politics and Organization of the Communist Federation 1971 to 1991. Marburg 2002 (Marburg, Univ., Diss., 2002), online (PDF; 21 MB) .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ see: Steffen: Stories from the Truffle Pig. 2002, p. 138.
  2. ↑ a b see: Rudolf van Hüllen : Ideology and power struggle among the Greens. 1990, p. 115.
  3. ↑ See: Steffen: Stories from the Truffle Pig. 2002, p. 231.
  4. ↑ See interview with Thomas Ebermann, from: Schroeren (Ed.): Die Grünen. 10 eventful years. 1990, p. 215.
  5. ^ Hallensleben: From the Green List to the Green Party? 1984, p. 86.
  6. ↑ ibid. P. 94
  7. ↑ see: Bunte Liste discusses further work. In: labor struggle. No. 133, 1978, ZDB -ID 518420-4 , p. 7.
  8. ↑ see: Hüllen: ideology and power struggle among the Greens. 1990, p. 224.
  9. ↑ see: Raschke (ed.): The Greens. How they became what they are. 1993, p. 298f.