Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the GDR
The Chamber of Commerce of the GDR was in 1953 an organization in the GDR , which for not nationalized companies subtasks of the Chamber of Commerce perceived (IHK). In contrast to the free IHK it was not an organization of the self-administration of the companies, but was part of the state control of the economy. The GDR Chamber of Commerce and Industry was located in the GDR Chamber of Commerce building in East Berlin .
history
The CCI were in the era of National Socialism into line and disbanded in 1942 and together with the Chambers of Crafts in Gauwirtschaftskammern been transferred. In the Soviet occupation zone , the law on the reorganization of the commercial economy in 1946 created a central IHK for each country . At the traditional locations of the former IHKs, independent IHKs were formed in 1945 on the initiative of local entrepreneurs. From 1946 onwards, these were run as branch offices of the respective regional IHK. In some cases they (e.g. in Dessau and Magdeburg ) managed to maintain a relatively high degree of independence. The Landes-IHK lost its responsibility for cooperatives and VEB'en in 1949 and was dissolved on March 31, 1953 by the resolution of March 5, 1953 on the cessation of the activity of the chambers of industry and commerce.
As a result of the suppressed popular uprising of June 17, 1953 , the GDR Chamber of Commerce and Industry was created as a concession to the remaining entrepreneurs in the GDR with the regulation on the establishment of the GDR's Chamber of Commerce and Industry of August 6, 1953. The GDR Chamber of Industry and Commerce consisted of a directorate in Berlin and, downstream, a district directorate for each district (which could set up district offices at the district level). The Chamber of Industry and Commerce was subordinate to the state planning commission and was thus integrated into the ruling apparatus of the SED .
With the ordinance on the chambers of industry and commerce of the districts , the presidium of the IHK in Berlin was dissolved in 1958. The district directorates were affiliated to the economic councils formed in 1958 at the district councils. With the wave of nationalization in 1972, the number of member companies was further reduced.
With the decision of the Council of Ministers of the GDR to transform the chambers of industry and commerce into chambers of commerce and trade (private industry no longer existed after the wave of nationalization in 1972), the chambers lost their traditional name in 1983.
After the fall of the Wall , free chambers of industry and commerce were re-established in the GDR. On March 12, 1990 this was legalized by a decree of the Council of Ministers. The existing chambers were dissolved and a legal framework was created for the new foundations, which was based on the IHK law of the Federal Republic. The central innovation was the reintroduction of self-government and the free election of all bodies of the new chambers by the members.
Board
The board of the GDR Chamber of Commerce and Industry consisted of 45 people. A third of these were each determined by the company, the state and the workforce (five of them directly by the board of directors of the FDGB ). The presidium consisted of the chairman and four deputies. It was determined by the board and had to be approved by the prime minister.
tasks
While the tasks of the IHK of the GDR were initially based on those of the independent IHK as a professional body , from 1958 the IHK were largely deprived of these tasks, such as participation in vocational training. The most important task now was to win the entrepreneurs over to the construction of socialism. Due to the abolition of the freedom of association in the GDR, the IHK had the task of concluding collective agreements for private companies . In this regard, they formally had the function of an employers' association (materially, this task could not be performed, as the entrepreneurs only represented minorities in the committees).
Chamber of Commerce and Industry Greater Berlin
The four-power status of Berlin prevented the work of the IHK of the GDR in East Berlin (just as the Federal German IHK law could not initially apply in West Berlin). Therefore, with the ordinance of a Chamber of Commerce and Industry Greater Berlin of January 8, 1954, an independent IHK was created for East Berlin, which worked completely analogously.
President
- Magnus Dedek (1955)
swell
- Martin Will: Self-administration of the economy. Law and history of self-government in the chambers of industry and commerce, craft guilds, district craft associations, chambers of crafts and chambers of agriculture (Jus publicum; 199). Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 2011, ISBN 978-3-16-150705-2 , page 364 ff. And 384 ff., (Also habilitation thesis, University of Marburg 2007) online
- Jann Müller: The re-establishment of the chambers of industry and commerce in East Germany in the process of reunification, 2017, ISBN 978-3-515-11565-0 .
