Party secretary

Party secretary or secretary of a political party is a senior official , who within the organization of the party at various levels of the hierarchy can be set up. There are party secretaries of the elementary and higher organizations, secretaries and general secretaries . They can be appointed or elected on a full-time or voluntary basis .

history

Late 19th and early 20th century (selection)

The Social Democratic Party of Germany was the first German party to introduce the function of secretaries. These were workers functionaries who organized and led the party's groups and organizations. They worked closely with the young unions , who in turn set up workers' secretaries .

The office of party secretary also existed in the Catholic Center Party and in the left-liberal National Social Association . In the Italian National Fascist Party , the party secretary was the second most powerful man in the regime after Mussolini .

Party secretaries were and are in the communist and Marxist-Leninist parties selected party cadres and heads of the respective party leaderships themselves. The Communist Party of the Soviet Union introduced the principle of leadership through secretaries. In 1939 Josef Stalin formulated : "The party cadres are the command of the party, and since our party is in power, they also represent the command of the leading state organs ..." From 1912 to 1924, Lenin was the undisputed leader of the CPSU . In 1922, Stalin took over the newly created office of general secretary of the party, which after Lenin's death in 1924 he increasingly endowed it with dictatorship power tailored to his person . This self-image is derived from the thesis of the dictatorship of the proletariat and became a model for many communist and workers' parties of the Comintern and the Eastern Bloc that were later founded , including the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED).

Socialist Unity Party of Germany

Intra-party position

Party secretaries were functionaries named in the (SED) according to the party statute , who were elected by the following organs of the party and whose party leaderships they chaired:

• The Central Committee of the SED (ZK) elected its chief secretary general. From 1953 to 1976 the first secretary of the Central Committee was elected in his place.
• The Central Committee elected the secretaries who made up the secretariat. Its main task was to ensure ongoing work, control of the implementation of party congress resolutions and the selection of cadres . There was a secretary for church matters and others.
• The district , district, city and city district leaderships also elected secretaries. The secretaries were confirmed in accordance with the nomenclature .
• The foundation of the party was formed by its basic organizations (GO), which were founded in almost all commercial enterprises , state and scientific institutions, residential areas and in the armed organs of the GDR if at least three party members were present there. The basic organizations chose their leadership, which was headed by secretaries. Larger basic organizations could also form several departmental party organizations (APO), which were then headed by the APO secretaries.
• Party groups could be formed within the GO and APO. They did not elect a secretary, but their party group organizer.

At the end of the 1980s, around 44,000 full-time employees and 300,000 part -time employees, including 100,000 party secretaries, worked for the SED, which has around two million members .

Since the secretaries of the basic organizations and APO worked on the grassroots, the people's party secretary was omnipresent. It was implicitly clear that the party secretary only meant a secretary of the SED.

Competencies of the party secretaries

The leadership role claimed by the SED in society reached down to the grassroots. The party secretaries in the factories were placed at the side of the state or cooperative management (e.g. directors, department heads, department heads, chairmen of the cooperatives). In the ideologically defined society, one of their tasks was to secure the party's political, ideological and organizational influence in order to realize its leading role in all trade union areas . This was actually implemented through the following conditions:

• The party secretary had the right to take part in production consultations and management meetings. In state- owned companies , no major decision was made without the SED.

• The state, cooperative and many scientific, artistic, medical and heads of other bodies were themselves members of the SED and were therefore directly subject to its demands, which took shape with the party secretaries.

Party secretaries in armed organs

There were also party secretaries in the National People's Army (NVA), the People's Police and the Ministry for State Security (MfS) who presided over the party organizations in these bodies. Organizationally, however, the party organizations were assigned to the next higher territorial party instance: the GO in the headquarters of the MfS, for example, to the central committee, the GO of the individual district administrations of the MfS to the 14 district leaderships and the GO in the district administrations to the district leaderships of the SED.

Although the GO party secretaries in the armed organs were assigned to the territorial party leadership, the hierarchy of command and the military authority were never affected.

Current situation (selection)

Party secretaries

Even after the Second World War , the secretaries of the SPD, which was banned in the German Reich , established themselves immediately . For example, after his return in 1946 , Erich Ollenhauer became secretary of the SPD in the western zones in Dr. Schumacher in Hanover or the trade unionist Heinz Kluncker party secretary of the SPD in Wuppertal . The party issued him an official ID card in which the function “secretary” was noted.

Today's German parties SPD and CDU only have general secretaries.

The British Labor Party has local branch secretaries and party secretaries at constituency level.

The Swiss People's Party (SVP) of the city of Zurich has a party secretary, as does the Christian Democratic People's Party (CVP) Graubünden or the SP (Switzerland). Functionaries at the cantonal or communal level are also often called party secretaries.

In the Spanish Socialist Workers Party (Partido Socialista Obrero Español, PSOE ) there is a party secretary for trade union policy.

The following example shows that the party secretary also develops power in modern parties: In the course of the 1950s, the Social Democratic Party of Finland (SDP) was increasingly torn by internal disputes and power struggles. At the end of the decade, this development split the party. Outwardly, the conflict turned out to be a confrontation between the camp around party chairman Emil Skog on the one hand and the camp around party secretary Väinö Leskinen on the other.

Secretary General

→ Main article : Secretary General

At the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st century, most parties have a general secretary. The German Free Democratic Party (FDP) reintroduced the office of Secretary General in 1971. The general secretaries are usually subordinate to the chairman and his deputy and lead the organizational and daily work of the respective party.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Studiengesellschaft Emsland , accessed September 22, 2009.
2. ↑ Dieter Düding: The National Social Association 1896-1903. The failed attempt at a party-political synthesis of nationalism, socialism and liberalism. Oldenbourg Verlag, Munich 1972, p. 134 f.
3. ↑ Josef Stalin: Report on the 18th party congress of the CPSU on March 10, 1939. In: Ders .: Questions of Leninism. Publishing house for foreign language literature, Moscow 1946, p. 715.
4. ↑ Stasiopfer.de , accessed September 22, 2009, 7:00 p.m.
5. ^ Statute of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany. 12th edition. Dietz Verlag, Berlin 1988, ISBN 3-320-00511-1 , p. 53.
6. ↑ Library.fes.de , accessed September 22, 2009.
7. ↑ Bstu online  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed October 1, 2009, 7:00 p.m.  
8. ↑ SPD Archive Berlin ( Memento of the original from April 7, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed September 13, 2009, 7:00 p.m. 
9. ^ Verdi history , accessed September 22, 2009.
10. ↑ SPD Saxony ( Memento of the original from October 8, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed October 6, 2009. 
11. ↑ Statute of the CDU ( Memento of the original from October 14, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 1.3 MB), accessed October 6, 2009. 
12. ↑ European Parliament Online , accessed September 22, 2009.
13. ^ SVP City of Zurich , accessed September 22, 2009.
14. ↑ CVP statutes 2008  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed September 22, 2009.  
15. ↑ 20 minutes online , accessed September 22
16. ^ Jürgen Dittberner: The FDP. Stories, people, organization, perspectives. An introduction. VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften / GWV Fachverlage, Wiesbaden 2005, ISBN 3-531-14050-7 , p. 197.