The democrat

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From 1945 to 1990, Der Demokratie was the regional and later district newspaper of the CDU in the GDR in the state of Mecklenburg and the Rostock district . “Der Demokratie” had the third largest circulation among the CDU regional newspapers. The place of publication was initially Schwerin , later Rostock .

From foundation to conformity

“The Democrat” was licensed by the Soviet military administration in Germany at the end of 1945 and appeared for the first time on December 15, 1945. The editions of “The Democrat” were initially subject to prior censorship . All contributions had to be approved in advance by the occupation authorities. Even when the previous censorship was formally lifted in 1947, the newspaper was subject to the control of those in power. In addition to influencing the editorial team, the allocation of paper and printing capacity was an important means of pressure.

The (lack of) allocation of paper limited the circulation, which fell from 25,000 in September 1946 to 20,000 in May 1947. In return, however, the publication cycle could be expanded from two issues per week in 1946 to three issues per week in 1947. At the same time, the paper allocations to the SED's national newspaper increased , so that its circulation rose from 100,000 to 170,000.

The first editor-in-chief was Hans-Werner Gyßling . At the end of 1946 the occupation authorities forced his release. His successor as editor-in-chief, Arthur Janssen , could also only remain in office for one year (January 1947 to December 1947). As part of the transformation of the Eastern CDU into a bloc party , the "Democrat" was also brought into line . Janssen was dismissed by the Soviet military administration (at the same time as Jakob Kaiser and Ernst Lemmer were deposed as chairmen of the Eastern CDU) . His successor, Hugo Reinhart , was loyal to the new rulers and remained in office until December 1952. After a six-month vacancy, Xaver Kugler took over the editor-in-chief in June 1953 , which he headed until 1988 as one of the longest-serving editors-in-chief in the GDR. His successor until the fall of the Berlin Wall was his deputy Wolfgang Voss, last year Jörg Rau headed the editorial team.

The Democrat was under surveillance by the Ministry of State Security , especially in the early 1950s . Several articles were objected to and heavily criticized in the district bloc committee of the Democratic Parties in Schwerin. The State Security later succeeded in recruiting several editors as unofficial employees .

After the turn

After the fall of the Berlin Wall , the newspaper was sold to the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung publisher and was discontinued some time later for economic reasons.

See also

swell

  1. ^ Martin Broszat , Gerhard Braas, Hermann Weber : SBZ-Handbuch, 1993, ISBN 3-486-55262-7 , page 512 and a.
  2. ^ Martin Broszat, Gerhard Braas, Hermann Weber: SBZ manual . 1993, ISBN 3486552627 , p. 542.