APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110019-3
In January 1968 the People's Chamber adopted a new penal code to replace the outmoded code which had formed the basis of civil law in both Germans since 1871. The new code, which was 5 years in the drafting, is a "socialist" model in that it places great emphasis on the political aspects of "socialist legality," i.e., assuring the submission of the individual to the state. The death penalty is prescribed as maximum punishment for 11 crimes, most of which relate to political offenses. Several of these are newly created in the code and include crimes against the sovereignty of the German Democratic Republic and war crimes. In contrast to the harsh sentences meted out for political offenses, the code prescribes more lenient treatment of persons convicted to various criminal and civil misdeeds. For example, the punishment for petty theft, rape, slander, homosexuality, and bigamy has been reduced or completely eliminated. As in the case of its educational reforms, attention on certain relatively progressive provisions of the new code as compared to West Germany's archaic 1871 code.
4. Local government
Theoretically, independent units of self-government are elected at the district, county, city, town, and precinct level. Under the constitution the local bodies are empowered to make decisions and organize the citizens to deal with the political, economic, social, and cultural issues which arise at the various levels of local government. In practice, however, each level of local government is closely supervised and controlled by the SED, almost to the same extent as the central governmental bodies. In 1952 the regime reorganized the subordinate units of government, replacing the five historic states (Laender) with 14 districts (Bezirke) whose boundaries are delineated. These 14 districts are divided into 218 counties (Kreise), and 8,845 communities (Gemeinden). East Berlin, the capital of the German Democratic Republic, functions in practice - but not legally - as the 15th Bezirk.
At each level of local government, the elected assembly selects an executive council, but local autonomy is virtually nonexistent. The local assemblies and their councils actually serve to impose the SED leadership's will at various levels of local government. In 1963 further changes were made at the local level to provide still more control mechanisms for the party. In the heavily populated urban areas 750 new residential subdivisions, corresponding to precincts, were created, and committees were formed within these subdivisions to "help improve life and eliminate shortcomings." Nominally controlled by the National Front, these committees actually work under the direction of closely knit party organizations guided by the central party organization in East Berlin.
C. Political dynamics (U/OU)
1. The SED and its development
The history of the Socialist Unity Party (SED) is for all practical purposes the history of the German Democratic Republic. The SED has created a governmental structure in which all elements of political power are monopolized by the party. Although this system is cloaked in the forms of parliamentary democracy, an interlocking network of party and government controls fixes power in the hands of the SED leadership, headed since May 1971 by Erich Honecker.
Walter Ulbricht and other German Communists who had been political exiles in the USSR during the Hitler period, returned to Germany with Soviet troops in May 1945 to act as the political arm of the Soviet occupation forces. At the outset, Soviet occupation authorities disclaimed any intention of imposing Soviet-style communism, and the German Communists talked of favoring a parliamentary-democratic republic. In addition to the Communist Party of Germany (KPD), three political parties - the Christian Democratic Union, Liberal Democratic Party, and the Social Democratic Party - were allowed to organize.
Behind this façade of multi-party democracy, the Soviet Military Administration manipulated or coerced all parties into following policies compatible with Soviet aims. In April 1946 the SED was created by a forced merger of the re-established KPD, led by Wilhelm Pieck and Ulbricht, and the old Social Democratic Party (SPD), led by Otto Grotewohl. Despite the initial enthusiasm of many Socialists for a unified party, the final merger was in large part the result of coercive acts by the Soviet Military Administration which was determined to develop East German political life according to the Soviet example. Grotewohl and Pieck were elected joint chairmen of the new party, and Ulbricht became the secretary-general. From the outset, elements which did not acquiesce in Communist leadership were deprived of the possibility of giving public expression to their views because of the Communist control of newspapers and other communications media. The SED, conforming to Stalinist policy, proceeded slowly in its attempt to "persuade" the people to choose
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APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110019-3
