MASS MEDIA IN DIVIDED GERMANY 555
and it remained at this high level until the fall of the Wall.^13 Between
1963 and 1988, the number of daily newspapers printed jumped from
5.8 million to 9.5 million, rising most rapidly in the 1970s.^14 On average,
this meant 1.5 newspapers per household, which was twice as much as
in West Germany. Parallel to this increase in circulation, a larger variety
of newspapers and magazines appeared in both states. The number of
popular magazine copies almost doubled in West Germany from 56 mil-
lion in 1968 to 105 million in 1988.^15 In the GDR, too, this fi gure climbed
in the 1970s and 1980s by about 25 to 50 percent, and in some cases
(such as Guter Rat) by even 100 percent.^16 The demand for some titles
was even much higher in the GDR, but a lack of paper as well as political
directives generated a gap between supply and demand. On the days on
which these sought-after magazines appeared, lines usually formed at
the newsstands in the mornings, especially since it was sometimes im-
possible to get a subscription for them.
This parallel press boom cannot be put down just to cheaper prices,
which had been made possible by state subsidies in the GDR and the
sharply rising income from advertising in the West.^17 Rather, the shared
historical heritage of the two Germanys factored into this development:
both countries drew on a German newspaper and reading tradition that
can be traced back to the late eighteenth century. As early as around 1900,
as part of the fi rst mass press boom, the reading of periodicals became
a permanent part of leisure and everyday life in Germany. This corre-
sponded to the predominantly Protestant culture of writing, as well as
early reading ages that were generally prevalent in northern Europe. In
southern Europe, on the other hand, daily newspapers never enjoyed the
same popularity, even after 1945, and radio and television dominated the
media landscape.^18 As a result, newspaper use was much more similar
between the two German states than it was compared to respective polit-
ical allies, such as Italy or Romania.
Furthermore, the press boom was connected to a politicization of the
societies in East and West, but also to the development of an increas-
ingly diff erentiated culture of leisure, entertainment, and consumption
that ultimately had a depoliticizing eff ect. In particular, the politicization
of society at the beginning of the 1970s corresponded to the expansion of
the daily press and the weekly political magazines. The need for political
information grew on both sides of the Wall just as the press became even
more politically active. The rapid growth in the number of government
decisions that aff ected the personal lives of Germans also surely played
a role, as did the promise that citizens were supposed to be able to par-
ticipate more in these decision-making processes. In West Germany, the
growth of the daily press was followed by a rise in party and trade union