The Federal Foundation for the Reappraisal of the SED Dictatorship (german: Bundesstiftung zur Aufarbeitung der SED-Diktatur, alternatively translated as "(Federal) Foundation for the Study of Communist Dictatorship in East Germany") is a government-funded organisation established in 1998 by the

German parliament The Bundestag (, "Federal Diet") is the German federal parliament. It is the only federal representative body that is directly elected by the German people. It is comparable to the United States House of Representatives or the House of Common ...

. Its mandate is to assess the history (1949–1990) of the

socialist Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the e ...

regime of the

German Democratic Republic German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

(GDR, commonly known as East Germany), and its impact on the now

reunified Germany German reunification (german: link=no, Deutsche Wiedervereinigung) was the process of re-establishing Germany as a united and fully sovereign state, which took place between 2 May 1989 and 15 March 1991. The day of 3 October 1990 when the Ge ...

. As its logo, the foundation uses the former East German flag minus its

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the latter two being outer garments). The coat of arms on an escutcheon forms the central ele ...

. In the final months of the GDR, many East German citizens cut out the flag's emblem in this manner. The foundation also initiated a project "Aufbruch 1989" in which 17 organisations cooperated, including the

Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung The Rosa Luxemburg Foundation (german: Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung), named in recognition of Rosa Luxemburg, occasionally referred to as ''Rosa-Lux'', is a transnational alternative policy lobby group and educational institution, centered in Germ ...

which is affiliated with the

SED sed ("stream editor") is a Unix utility that parses and transforms text, using a simple, compact programming language. It was developed from 1973 to 1974 by Lee E. McMahon of Bell Labs, and is available today for most operating systems. sed wa ...

successor party,

Die Linke The Left (german: Die Linke; stylised as and in its logo as ), commonly referred to as the Left Party (german: Die Linkspartei, links=no ), is a democratic socialist political party in Germany. The party was founded in 2007 as the result of th ...

. This was rejected by

Hubertus Knabe Hubertus Knabe (born 1959) is a German historian and was the scientific director of the Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Memorial, a museum and memorial in a notorious former Stasi torture prison in Berlin. Knabe is noted for several works on oppression ...

, and after it was made public, by a public letter signed by

Bärbel Bohley Bärbel Bohley (24 May 1945 – 11 September 2010) was an East German opposition figure and artist. Biography As an artist, Bohley won prizes from the authorities, including a trip to the Soviet Union. Her opposition to the government did n ...

Werner Schulz Werner Gustav Schulz (22 January 1950 – 9 November 2022) was a German politician of Alliance '90/The Greens. Trained in food technology at the Humboldt University of Berlin, he worked as a research assistant. He was an activist for peace ec ...

Lutz Rathenow Lutz Rathenow (born 22 September 1952 in Jena) is a dissident German writer and poet who was haunted by the Secret Police until the German reunification. From then on, his fortunes changed, and he received several literary honors and awards. L ...

, ,

Ralph Giordano Ralph Giordano (23 March 1923 – 10 December 2014) was a German writer and publicist. Life and career Giordano was born to a Sicilian father and a German Jewish mother in Hamburg. He attended the Gelehrtenschule des Johanneums from 1933 to ...

Erich Loest Erich Loest (; 24 February 1926 – 12 September 2013) was a German writer born in Mittweida, Saxony. He also wrote under the pseudonyms Hans Walldorf, Bernd Diksen and Waldemar Naß. Life and career He was a conscript soldier in World War II a ...

and others, with support by

Lea Rosh Rosh in 1990 Lea Rosh (; born Edith Renate Ursula Rosh on 1 October 1936) is a German television journalist, publicist, entrepreneur and political activist. Rosh was the first female journalist to manage a public broadcasting service in Germany a ...

and

Michael Wolffsohn Michael Wolffsohn (born 17 May 1947) is a German historian. Wolffsohn was born in Tel Aviv, in what was then the Mandatory Palestine, British Mandate of Palestine and today is Israel. His parents were German Jews who fled in 1939. In 1954, the ...

References

External links

*
www.bundesstiftung-aufarbeitung.de

''Berliner Morgenpost'' History of East Germany Foundations based in Germany Organisations based in Berlin 1998 establishments in Germany {{Germany-org-stub