Marianne Birthler

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Marianne Birthler, 2015

Marianne Birthler b. Radtke (born January 22, 1948 in Berlin ) is a German politician ( Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen ). From 2000 to March 2011 she was the Federal Commissioner for the Records of the State Security Service of the former German Democratic Republic .

Professional and personal career

Birthler speaks at the major demonstration in Berlin on November 4, 1989

Marianne Birthler was born in Berlin-Friedrichshain . After graduating from the Georg-Friedrich-Händel-Oberschule - despite leaving the FDJ - and the skilled worker certificate in Berlin in 1966, she worked in GDR foreign trade and at the same time completed a distance learning course in foreign trade, which she completed in 1972. Birthler had previously rejoined the FDJ. This was followed by a family break and employment in her husband's veterinary practice. At the same time, she volunteered in the Protestant Church and organized discussion groups on social and political issues. In 1976, Birthler began a five-year distance learning community education course to become a catechist and community assistant. From 1981 to 1987 she was active in the child and youth work of the evangelical Elias congregation in the Berlin district of Prenzlauer Berg . In 1987 she became a youth officer in the youth parish office of East Berlin. Birthler is divorced. She was married to the veterinarian Wolfgang Birthler from 1968 to 1983 and has three daughters. Wolfgang Birthler later also became politically active; from 1990 to 2009 he was a member of the SPD state parliament and from 1999 to 2004 a minister in the state of Brandenburg.

Opposition and Peaceful Revolution

From the mid-1980s onwards, she was in ever closer contact with opposition groups in Berlin and made no secret of her opposition to the SED , especially in the Peace and Human Rights Initiative . In 1986 she was one of the founding members of the “Solidarity Church” working group, which placed the democratization of the church and society in the GDR at the center of its efforts. At the Alexanderplatz demonstration on November 4, 1989, Birthler spoke for the peace and human rights initiative . She said among other things:

“It is good to fight for freedom of expression, freedom of travel, a better functioning economy and a new education system. All of this is sorely necessary, but in all of this we should not neglect the fact that these rights must be secured, that is, we must think about the questions of power and how power can be controlled. "

- Marianne Birthler : German Historical Museum

In the last GDR People's Chamber , Birthler was spokeswoman for Bündnis 90 from March to October 1990 and was a member of the German Bundestag from October 3 until the first all-German elections on December 2 .

Political offices and activities 1990–2000

In October 1990 , Birthler was elected for Bündnis 90 in the Brandenburg state parliament. In November she took over the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport in the state government under Manfred Stolpe , one of two ministries for Alliance 90. In summer 1992, she and Environment Minister Matthias Platzeck resigned from their state parliament mandates. Both justified this step with the necessary ability of the six-member parliamentary group to work - where they made room for two successors, but retained their right to vote within the parliamentary group - and with the necessary separation between the legislature and the executive . Finally, on October 29, 1992, she resigned from her ministerial office in protest, after Manfred Stolpe's Stasi entanglements became known. Shortly afterwards, her application for the office of spokeswoman for the new Alliance 90 / The Greens was successful, while Platzeck remained in the government and rejected the merger with the Greens in 1993. Instead, he converted the alliance faction into the citizens' alliance of free voters he had founded , but which no longer played a role in the 1994 election . In 1993 she became a member of the Presidium of the German Evangelical Church Congress . In October 1995 Birthler received the Federal Cross of Merit, 1st class.

In 2009 she was a member of the 13th Federal Assembly for the election of the Federal President for the Greens . In the run-up to the election, she had clashed with the SPD presidential candidate Gesine Schwan, who was also supported by the Greens, because of Schwan's controversial statement that the GDR was not an injustice state . In 2010 she was a member of the 14th Federal Assembly for the election of the Federal President.

Federal Commissioner for Stasi Records 2000–2011

Marianne Birthler (2009)

In September 2000, Marianne Birthler succeeded Joachim Gauck's Federal Commissioner for the Records of the State Security Service of the former German Democratic Republic . On January 27, 2006, she was confirmed in office by the Bundestag with a large majority of 486 members, 60 against and 17 abstentions.

The term of office ended in March 2011. Birthler wanted Roland Jahn as his successor, who was elected by the Bundestag as her successor on January 28, 2011. Jahn was expatriated from the GDR in 1983 against his will. On March 25, 2011, Birthler was awarded the Grand Cross of Merit with Star of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany for her work in coming to terms with the SED dictatorship and for her voluntary work by the then Federal President Christian Wulff .

Statements on the 2005 Bundestag election

In the course of the 2005 Bundestag election , Birthler claimed that, according to the files, at least seven of the newly elected MPs in the GDR had worked for the Ministry for State Security in the left-wing parliamentary group in the Bundestag . After criticism, it corrected itself to the effect that the number had only related to the unofficial employees "among the promising candidates" of the party. But not all of them were elected.

Order to shoot at the inner-German border

A statement by Birthler, distributed on August 11, 2007, caused a controversial discussion, according to which a “sensational” find in the form of an “unrestricted shooting order ” for a special unit of the border troops had been made in the Magdeburg branch of the Stasi records authority. In fact, excerpts from the seven-page document had already appeared in 1997 in a document volume on GDR history. The paper was made public in 1993.

Secondary employment, honorary positions, miscellaneous

From 1993 to 2005 Birthler was a member of the executive committee of the German Evangelical Church Congress . Birthler belonged to the group of supporters and was a member of the advisory board of the lobbyist group " Berlinpolis ". She is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Employment Foundation . Birthler has been Deputy Chairwoman of the Friede Springer Foundation's Board of Trustees since 2011 .

In 2003 she had a supporting role as head of the Birthler authority in the Rosenholz crime scene .

Chancellor Angela Merkel wanted to propose her as a candidate for the office of Federal President in November 2016 . Birthler canceled; then Frank-Walter Steinmeier was nominated.

On August 16, 2017, Federal Building Minister Barbara Hendricks Birthler and the team of architects Graft appointed curators for the German contribution to the 16th Architecture Biennale in Venice in order to realize the Unbuilding Walls exhibition .

After Hubertus Knabe was recalled as head of the Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Memorial , Birthler was appointed by the Board of Trustees as a confidante in September 2018 to organize the transition phase at the memorial. Birthler should stabilize the memorial, which has been shaken by allegations of sexism, and establish a new working atmosphere. As a consultant, she supports the Board of Trustees in their search for a new director.

Awards

Publications

literature

Web links

Commons : Marianne Birthler  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
 Wikinews: Marianne Birthler  - in the news

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Provenance in production - Marianne Birthler's school turned 100 years old . In: Der Tagesspiegel from March 14, 2006.
  2. ↑ http://www.jugendopposition.de/index.php?id=1814 on jugendopposition.de ( Federal Agency for Civic Education / Robert Havemann Society eV), viewed on March 20, 2017.
  3. ↑ [1] .
  4. ↑ Speeches at the Alexanderplatz demonstration: Marianne Birthler (11:55 a.m.). Deutsches Historisches Museum , Berlin, December 2009, accessed on January 2, 2017 .
  5. ↑ tagesspiegel.de of November 9, 2010
  6. ↑ http://www.bstu.bund.de/cln_028/nn_715182/DE/Behoerde/Aktuelles/Verdienstkreuz.html__nnn=true (link not available)
  7. ↑ http://www.berlinpolis.de/bp/uber-uns/ (link not available)
  8. ^ Foundation for collaboration: Board of Trustees ( memento of June 8, 2016 in the Internet Archive ), accessed on July 24, 2011.
  9. ↑ [2]
  10. ↑ faz.net
  11. ↑ sueddeutsche.de: This is how Merkel's coup with Marianne Birthler burst
  12. ↑ http://www.bmub.bund.de/pressemitteilung/graft-architekten-und-marianne-birthler-kuratieren-den-deutschen-pavillon-auf-der-16-architekturbie/BMUB (link not available)
  13. ↑ tagesspiegel.de: After Knabe's dismissal: Board of Trustees gets Marianne Birthler, September 27, 2018
personal data
SURNAME Birthler, Marianne
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Radtke, Marianne (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen), MdV, MdL, MdB
DATE OF BIRTH January 22, 1948
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin