Neues Deutschland

Last updated

Neues Deutschland
Neues Deutschland (2020-07-13).svg
TypeDaily newspaper
(Monday-Saturday)
Format Rhenish (between broadsheet and Berliner)
Publishernd.Genossenschaft eG
Editor-in-chiefWolfgang Hübner
Founded23 April 1946
Political alignment Democratic socialism
1946–1990:
Communism
Marxism–Leninism
Language German
Headquarters Berlin, Germany
Circulation 16,028 (Q2, 2022) [1]
Website neues-deutschland.de

Neues Deutschland (nd; English: New Germany, sometimes stylized in lowercase letters) is a left-wing German daily newspaper, headquartered in Berlin.

Contents

For 43 years it was the official party newspaper of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED), which governed East Germany (officially known as the German Democratic Republic), and as such served as one of the party's most important organs. [2] The Neues Deutschland that existed in East Germany had a circulation of 1.1 million as of 1989 and was the communist party's main way to show citizens its stances and opinions about politics, economics, etc. It was regarded by foreign countries as the communist regime's diplomatic voice.

Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Neues Deutschland has lost 99 percent of its readership and has a circulation of 16,028 as of 2022. Between 2019 and 2020 the number of sold copies and subscriptions declined 14.8 percent. [3] Since 1990 the newspaper has changed its political outlook and now has a democratic socialist political stance. The newspaper was both politically and financially tied to one of its former owners, The Left (Die Linke), which owned the publishing house and printing presses until the end of 2021. Since 2022, the newspaper is published by a cooperative of staff and subscribers and officially named nd. [4]

East Germany

Front page of Neues Deutschland in March 1953 on the death of "the greatest human being of our era, comrade J.W. Stalin" Neues Deutschland on the death of Stalin.jpg
Front page of Neues Deutschland in March 1953 on the death of "the greatest human being of our era, comrade J.W. Stalin"

ND was formed in 1946 [5] as a "licensed newspaper" ( lizenzzeitung  [ de ]) after the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) were forcibly merged to form the SED in the Soviet occupation zone of Germany. The first edition of ND was published on 23 April 1946 in conjunction with the founding of the SED. ND replaced the SPD organ Das Volk and the KPD organ Deutsche Volkszeitung . Karl Maron was the first chief editor of the daily and served in the post until 1950. [5]

While Neues Deutschland was the SED's Zentralorgan, its journalists were recruited from the party's broad membership. [6]

Before the reunification of Germany in October 1990, ND had a circulation of a million and was second only to the youth newspaper junge Welt in readership. During this period the editor-in-chief of ND was Wolfgang Spickermann. [7] However, it has been claimed that Neues Deutschland failed to reach much of the East German population. [8]

After reunification

Current Editor's office building in Berlin Neues Deutschland (15799932432).jpg
Current Editor's office building in Berlin

After reunification, ND's readership diminished greatly. In 2020, ND had a circulation of 18,595. While most large newspapers in Germany have a problem with declining circulation, ND is particularly vulnerable in that the majority of its readers are over 60 years old. ND produces both a national edition and regional editions for Berlin and Brandenburg.

Jürgen Reents, who had political roots in both the Party of Democratic Socialism and the Green Party, became the editor in chief of ND in 1999. One of his major goals was to transform ND's image from a propaganda leaflet to a more respected newspaper. In October 2005 the editors moved from Elsenbrücke to Franz-Mehring Platz in Berlin. Three months later, Olaf Koppe took over management of the newspaper.

Each issue of the daily between 1945 and 1990 was digitalized by the Berlin State Library in June 2013. [2]

Profile

ND is now oriented towards a democratic socialist viewpoint and was owned partially by the political party The Left, a direct descendant of the SED. The twin goals of the newspaper are to give those in eastern Germany a voice and to represent the democratic socialist viewpoint without being the organ of The Left or any other political party. While eastern German themes dominate the features and the community pages, the political section looks at leftist politics throughout Germany. Authors and politicians from diverse political backgrounds have also been represented on the pages of the newspaper. For example, Friedrich Schorlemmer, a known critic of The Left and the political left in general, has been a guest writer.

Other traditional sections of a newspaper are also included, such as an advice page, a television guide, notifications and classifieds, opinion columns, and theme sections dealing with health, environment, and other issues. The letters to the editor are often cited as examples of viewpoints of the Left party from other media sources. As with most daily German newspapers, ND is published daily Monday through Friday, with a weekend edition published on Saturdays.

In November 2006, the newspaper also started a youth insert called Sacco and Vanzetti.[ citation needed ] Beginning in March 2007, ND started publishing online.

From 1 January 2022, the newspaper is published by a cooperative, thereby becoming independent from The Left. It also officially took on the name "nd". [9]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Horst Sindermann</span> German politician (1915–1990)

Horst Sindermann was a Communist German politician and one of the leaders of East Germany. He became Chairman of the Council of Ministers in 1973, but in 1976 he became President of the Volkskammer, the only member of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany to hold the post.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Communist Party of Germany (1990)</span> Minor political party in Germany

The Communist Party of Germany is a Marxist-Leninist communist party in Germany. It is one of several parties which claim the KPD name and/or legacy. It was founded in Berlin in 1990. The party is also commonly referred to by the name KPD-Ost to differentiate it from other parties with the same name, most prominently the historical Communist Party of Germany.

Wilhelm Kling was a Communist Party of Germany (KPD) functionary, and later an associate in the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) in East Germany.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ulbricht Group</span>

The Ulbricht Group was a group of exiled members of the Communist Party of Germany and the National Committee for a Free Germany, led by Walter Ulbricht, who flew from the Soviet Union back to Germany on April 30, 1945. Composed of functionaries from the KPD and ten anti-fascist prisoners of war, their job was to seek out anti-fascist individuals and prepare the groundwork for the re-establishment of communist organizations and unions in postwar Berlin. There were two additional regional groups, the Ackermann Group in Saxony and the Sobottka Group in Mecklenburg. Many of the group's members later became high-level officials in the government of the German Democratic Republic (GDR).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Max Seydewitz</span> German politician (1892–1987)

Max Seydewitz was a German politician. Between 1947 and 1952 he was the Minister-President of Saxony in the German Democratic Republic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Erich Mückenberger</span> East German politician (1910–1998)

Erich Mückenberger was a German socialist politician. He began his political career in the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). He became a member of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) when the East German branches of SPD and the Communist Party of Germany merged after the Second World War. Mückenberger was one of the most high-ranking former Social Democrats in the German Democratic Republic and held several positions in the SED.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rudolf Herrnstadt</span> German journalist and politician

Rudolf Herrnstadt was a German journalist and communist politician. After abandoning his law studies in 1922, Herrnstadt became a convinced communist. Despite his bourgeois origins, he was accepted into the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) in 1931 and worked for the Soviet military intelligence service Glawnoje Raswedywatelnoje Uprawlenije. As a foreign correspondent for the Berliner Tageblatt, he worked in Prague (1930), Warsaw and Moscow (1933). He emigrated to the Soviet Union in 1939, days before the Invasion of Poland, where he was active in the fight against the Nazi state as editor-in-chief of the newspaper Freies Deutschland in the National Committee for a Free Germany from 1944 during the German-Soviet War.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wilhelm Koenen</span> German politician (1886–1963)

Wilhelm Koenen was a German communist activist and an East German politician. He was married to Emmy Damerius-Koenen and was the father of Heinrich Koenen and Johanna Koenen.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Merger of the KPD and SPD</span> Party merger in Soviet-occupied Germany

The Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and the east German branches of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) merged to form the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) on 21 April 1946. Although nominally a merger of equals, the merged party quickly fell under Communist domination and developed along lines similar to other Communist Parties in what became the Eastern Bloc. The SED would be the only party of the German Democratic Republic until the end of the republic in December 1989. In the course of the merger, about 5,000 Social Democrats who opposed it were detained and sent to labour camps and jails.

<i>Das Volk</i> (1945) Former daily newspaper in Germany

Das Volk was a daily newspaper published from Berlin, Germany. It was the central organ of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). The first issue of Das Volk was published on 7 July 1945. Das Volk was the second "working-class newspaper" to emerge in Berlin after the Second World War — the first having been the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) organ Deutsche Volkszeitung. During its first twenty days of publishing, Das Volk was printed in Berliner format. Das Volk heeded the KPD's calls for building an anti-fascist democratic Germany, a parliamentary democratic republic, and unity of the working class. The newspaper was controlled by the left-wing tendency inside the SPD, and supported merger of the party with the KPD.

<i>Deutsche Volkszeitung</i> (1945) Former daily newspaper in Germany

Deutsche Volkszeitung was a newspaper published daily from Berlin, Germany between 1945–1946. It was the organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Walter Buchheim</span>

Walter Buchheim was an East German politician and Trade unionist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leonhard Helmschrott</span> German journalist and politician (1921–2011)

Leonhard Helmschrott (born 5 June 1921 ; died 28 October 2011 was a German journalist and politician. He was a founding member of the National Committee for a Free Germany . Between 1948 and 1989 he was the chief editor of the Bauernecho .

Christian Mahler (1905-1966) was a Communist Party activist who resisted Nazism and spent most of the Hitler period in forced custody. After 1945 he became a party functionary in the German Democratic Republic and then an increasingly senior Police officer. He concluded his career as the first director of the Sachsenhausen National Memorial.

Hermann Weber was a German historian and political scientist. He has been described as "the man who knew everything about the German Democratic Republic".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Klaus Huhn</span>

Klaus Huhn was a German sports journalist, writer and sports administrator. Huhn worked for the East German mass-market daily newspaper, Neues Deutschland, and was chairman of the Sports Journalists Sub-Association within that country's important Union of Journalists.

Lieselotte Thoms-Heinrich was a journalist and officially mandated feminist. Between 1968 and 1981 she was editor in chief of the mass circulation women's magazine, "Für Dich". She was also a member of the national parliament ("Volkskammer") between 1963 and 1981.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Olga Körner</span> German politician (1887–1969)

Olga Körner was a German political activist and a co-founder of the proletarian women's movement in Dresden. Between 1930 and 1933 she sat as a member of the national parliament ("Reichstag").

Margot Pfannstiel was a German journalist and author. She was Editor in Chief of the East German women's magazine Sibylle between 1958 and 1968. Both before and after her decade at Sibylle she was a chief reporter at the weekly news magazine Wochenpost.

Erich Ernst Kops was a German politician, diplomat, and Holocaust survivor.

References

  1. ↑ "Titelanzeige | Informationsgemeinschaft zur Feststellung der Verbreitung von Werbeträgern e.V".
  2. 1 2 Wilder, Charly (27 June 2013). "Digitizing the GDR: East German Papers Offer Glimpse of History". Der Spiegel . Retrieved 4 October 2013.
  3. ↑ "IVW-Blitz-Analyse Tages- und Wochenzeitungen: Zeit gewinnt erneut Auflage, Welt bricht völlig ein | MEEDIA". 22 April 2020.
  4. ↑ "Zeitung "Neues Deutschland" wird zu "nd" – Genossenschaft startet". Deutschlandfunk Kultur . 1 January 2022. Retrieved 15 March 2023.
  5. 1 2 Schaumann, Caroline (27 August 2008). Memory Matters: Generational Responses to Germany's Nazi Past in Recent Women's Literature. Walter de Gruyter. p. 255. ISBN   978-3-11-020659-3 . Retrieved 28 April 2013.
  6. ↑ "German paper that ignored fall of Berlin Wall still stands up for Socialism" . Financial Times . London. November 2019.
  7. ↑ Willnat, Lars (December 1991). "The East German press during the political transformation of East Germany" . International Communication Gazette . 48 (3): 193–208. doi:10.1177/001654929104800304 . Retrieved 8 April 2015.
  8. ↑ Allinson, Mark (23 March 2000). Politics and Popular Opinion in East Germany, 1945-1968. Manchester University Press. p. 71. ISBN   978-0719055546.
  9. ↑ "Genossenschaft startet – Zeitung "Neues Deutschland" wird zu "nd"". Deutschlandfunk (in German). 31 December 2021. Retrieved 31 December 2021.

Further reading

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.