Chapter 5
The Media during the Cold War
Media and Socialism in the GDR
After 1945 the media in nearly every country that had been involved in the
Second World War experienced a transformation. This was especially notice-
able in Soviet-dominated Eastern Europe and explains why media experts
speak of an autonomous socialistic media model (cf. Thomaß 2007: 33f.). In
contrast to the right-wing dictatorships of the twentieth century, the socialistic
media system was not merely controlled and directed by the State, but owned
almost exclusively either by the State or the Communist Party. This applied
to radio, news agencies, cinema and press – with a few exceptions like church
publications and the Samizdat, that is, media banned by the State and so dis-
seminated clandestinely.
The Soviet Union was the model that the Central and East European
public were forced to emulate when they reorganised their public spheres.
Compared to the Fascist dictatorships, Soviet Communism at first relied very
little on modern mass media. After the Revolution of 1917 almost everything
was in short supply: paper, experienced journalists and a literate populace.
For this reason the high circulation numbers of popular newspapers that had
initially been distributed to the country free of charge (like Bednota) tumbled
drastically during the 1920s when they had to be purchased. In 1924 the
circulation of 2.5 million copies was still significantly less than before the Rev-
olution, amounting to only one-eighth of the numbers in Germany (Lenoe
2004: 16). The enormous circulation for which the party organ Pravda was
famous only set in during the 1950s. Radio and television, however, expanded
a little later: radio became a real mass medium in 1960s and television in the
1970s (Roth-Ey 2011: 11).
As far as content was concerned, the Communist media gave priority to
indoctrination of the public rather than information. Numerous censorship