Many Christian democratic parties in Europe were initially on the left, but after the economic recovery and the solution of workers’ material problems, they shifted from social extremes to centrism.
The Berlin organization, like most other CDU organizations, was dominated by left-wing sentiment. Among the Berlin bureau, the most influential were such authoritative left-wing figures as Andreas Hermes and Jakob Kaiser. The reputation of these two politicians was based on the fact that they did not betray their own views and did not compromise with the Nazi regime even in prison.
Both Hermes and the Kaiser were sincere supporters of “socialism based on Christian responsibility,” of Germany’s neutral status, which would become a “bridge” between the Western democracies and the Soviet Union. It was largely thanks to Hermes and the Kaiser that the concept of the “bridge” became popular in Germany at the time.
Given that Berlin was partially part of the Soviet occupation zone, the Soviet authorities could influence the processes in the Berlin bureau. Soviet declassified documents clearly state that the goal of the Soviet authorities was to influence the CDU in all zones of occupation by taking control of the Berlin Bureau. The Soviet occupation authorities could not think of a better option than pressure and repression.
Arrests, searches, intimidation-these were the methods used to put pressure on the Berlin Bureau. Due to the direct demands of the Soviet authorities, the CDU Berlin Bureau changed its leadership several times.
Despite the constant change of leadership and constant pressure on the Berlin CDU, it managed to establish high-quality work with party activists, the evangelical church, and Christian trade unions. The activity of the party’s Christian social welfare committees played a significant role.
In the 1946 state elections in the Soviet occupation zone, the Christian Democrats achieved quite good results despite great administrative pressure. The CDU began to become the second strongest party in East Germany.
The Berlin CDU secured the status of the most authoritative organization among the Christian unions in all zones of occupation. One way or another, the CDU managed to establish partnerships with the Soviet occupation administration. However, like any totalitarian regime, the Soviet government did not need partners. The USSR only needed satellites.
In late 1947 and early 1948, the pressure on the Berlin CDU reached its peak. More than 600 activists of the Christian Democratic Union were forced to leave the Soviet occupation zone. Among them were Andreas Hermes and Jakob Kaiser. In East Germany, although the CDU continued to exist, direct Soviet agents were put in charge of the organizations.
While the leadership of the Berlin CDU had previously been undisputed, in 1948 a leadership vacuum developed in the party. As a result, Konrad Adenauer, who had been uninfluential until then, gradually came to the forefront, pursuing a purely centrist domestic and maximally pro-Western foreign policy.
Later, in the first half of the 1950s, the USSR made enormous efforts to prevent the integration of the Adenauer-led Germany into Euro-Atlantic structures. But Adenauer’s unequivocal pro-Western stance put an end to these plans.
Paradoxically, but for the defeat of the Berlin CDU, left-wing circles would have remained dominant in the party. Most likely, a consensus of the CDU and the SPD would have developed in Germany, so the Kremlin would have easily achieved what it had been trying to achieve so unsuccessfully in the first half of the 1950s.
Centrism as a concept is still relevant for Christian democratic parties today. Although for a long time both left-wing parties, part of the press, and Soviet propaganda labeled Christian Democratic parties as “conservatives,” Christian Democrats themselves tried to avoid this term and continued to persistently position themselves as centrists.
There were two reasons for avoiding the term “conservative” in European continental political culture. First, the political memory was still alive with memories of conservative circles’ support for the rise to power of the Nazis and the Fascists. Secondly, the discourse of the second half of the twentieth century was largely based on the concepts of “progress,” “dynamics,” and “development.” Accordingly, any political force in continental Europe was unwilling to oppose this discourse, even at the semantic level.
Author: Konstantin Kanishev