All-German institute

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The Pan-German Institute - Federal Agency for Pan-German Tasks (BfgA) was a federal institution under public law with its seat in Bonn and a branch in West Berlin . It was founded on July 1, 1969 by the German Federal Government and was subject to the supervision of the Federal Ministry for All-German Issues (BMG), from October 1969 for internal German relations (BMB).

history

Forerunners of the BfgA were several private law organizations that had worked for the BMG since the 1950s and were also largely financed by it, including the investigative committee of freedom lawyers (UFJ) and the former "Office for All-German Student Issues" of the Association of German Student Unions ( VDS) in Berlin. The staff and archives of these predecessor organizations were largely taken over by the BfgA.

According to its legal mandate, the BfgA should, in addition to the collection and scientific evaluation of information material for the Federal Ministry for all-German tasks , contribute to the consolidation and dissemination of the all-German idea by providing information, as well as promoting aid and support measures. The work of the All-German Institute encompassed archiving and research activities as well as the area of political education . The results of the work were fed from publicly accessible sources.

One of the main focuses of the BfgA were lectures for school classes who visited Berlin and the GDR. Employees of the institute published standard works on GDR research , including the monographs "GDR Handbook" and "Names and Dates of Important People in the GDR".

The institute was the goal of extensive educational work by the Ministry for State Security of the GDR , which saw the BfgA as an "agent and diversion center" . Western secret services regularly used the knowledge gathered there.

The presidents of the BfgA were Ludwig A. Rehlinger ( CDU , 1969–1972) and Detlef Kühn ( FDP , 1972–1991).

After German reunification , the All-German Institute was dissolved on December 31, 1991.

The former library of the German Institute (Library for the History of the GDR) has belonged to the House of History of the Federal Republic of Germany since January 1st, 1994 and is integrated into the information center. With an inventory of more than 180,000 volumes that has been continuously expanded for over 50 years, it is one of the leading collections on the history of the GDR and intra-German relations.

literature