The Political Role of Official Statistics in the Former German Democratic Republic

The political role of official statistics in the former German Democratic Republic

Prof. Dr. Peter von der Lippe, Universität Duisburg-Essen,Universitätstr. 12, 45117 Essen Germany [email protected]

1. Official statistics of the former GDR as a subject for investigation The statistical office of the former (East) "German Democratic Republic" (GDR), the so-called ‘Central Administration of Statistics’ (CAS), has been described repeatedly in terms of its organisational aspects, internal structure, and statistical responsibilities. Here, however, drawn on documents from archives,we are dealing with the political role of the CAS and its relations to the political leadership of the GDR1. It should be expressly emphasised that we do not try to make general statements regarding the quality of data published by the CAS but only to show how some of those figures were demonstrably subject to political influence. The CAS was almost entirely an instrument of the SED2 with the result that in certain fields at least the general public both at home and abroad has been deliberately deceived. A false picture of the GDR emerged in the (former) Federal Republic on the basis of CAS’ official statistics (though not without the ignominious involvement of the West Germans). It should be noted that although the competence of the statisticians3 was beyond doubt the structure of statistics along with the CAS’ communist self-image made sure that there was no question of being objective or neutral.According to ‘Western’ (democratic) thinking the information given by respondents (micro data) is subject to secrecy (confidentiality) and may leave its mark on aggregate data (macro data) in unidentifiable form only whereas, by contrast, statistical findings (macro data) are made available to everyone and are considered public property, an ‘informational infrastructure’ that no-one is excluded from using. In the GDR, as in all socialist countries, both principles were completely reversed4. The CAS was first and foremost an extended arm of state authorities, publication of statistical data and international cooperation, were of little interest, and matters exclusively decided upon by the party leadership (as a rule on the basis of political usefulness).

2. Integration of the CAS in the power set-up of the party The ideological self-image of official statistics and the Cold War were the basis of everything and a disciplinary factor that should not be underestimated. Objectivity and neutrality were not only discarded but frowned upon as relics of a false bourgeois consciousness. For East Germany, dealing with statistics always

1 Our account is based on an investigation by the author undertaken in the summer and autumn of 1993, and on reactions of (mainly GDR) statisticians about it An abridged version of the report which had been commissioned by a German Parliament’s commission of inquiry and published in 1995 in ‘Die politische Rolle der amtlichen Statistik in der ehemaligen DDR’, in: Jahrbücher für Nationalökonomie und Statistik (or Jahrbücher for short), vol. 215/6 (1996), p. 641ff. There were many reactions and my last paper, among other things commented also on an article by Prof. Dr. Arno Donda (from the early-1960s until 1989 the leader of the CAS) is ‘Ein Blick zurück auf die amtliche Statistik der DDR, Schwierigkeiten mit einer Abschlußbilanz’, in: Jahrbücher, vol. 222/5 (2002), p. 609ff. 2 i.e. East Germany’s communist party. 3 This applies as far as purely statistical aspects were concerned, such as speed and efficient coordination in carrying out of inquiries, verification of responses and the control of data flows etc. 4 Unlike the (West) German Federal Statistical Office (FSO), the CAS was also responsible for corporate accounting, central data processing and training in statistics in colleges of further education. had a similar quality to the work of the intelligence services. The three major political instruments of power were the personnel policy, the Party monopoly on information, and the control of statistical definitions and methods. 1. The CAS was officially an organ of the council of ministers. In actual fact, however, it was spoon-fed down to the finest detail by the Secretariat of the Central Committee (CC) of the SED, or more specifically by Dr. G. Mittag (‘G.M.’) from whom the CAS received instructions on an almost daily basis. Reports commissioned by the CAS were in return appraised and criticised by G. M. himself. It was not uncommon for the CAS to be methodically criticised and referred back with instructions for resubmission. In all this collusion, the CAS gave the impression more of being a private research institute for G.M. than for a government office. 2. The SED managed to control the public dissemination of statistical data completely at its own discretion. The instrument it used was the so-called ‘distributor’5, which made it possible to transmit to (or withheld from) the authorities required specific statistical information either fully or partly, dressed up or not. Interestingly to the extent that as the economic situation became worse the party’s control over the distributor became increasingly rigid over the years. In the West it was not uncommon to consider the cover-up or dressing-up of statistics as less critical than the falsification of statistics, and to think that though the SZS had published only a small amount of data, the few figures published nonetheless were correct at least. It can be shown, however, that general appraisals regarding the reputability of published data among the Western analysts based on such assumptions turned out completely flawed. It was not uncommon not only for the public but also for state bodies to learn of only ‘half-truths’, if not being deliberately misinformed. 3. The party’s most spectacular intrusion in statistics refer to the control of definitions and methods, and all sorts of publications and verbal interpretations, in that it not only included the laying down of statistical methods but also of 'findings', i.e. alleged numerical results. Statisticians were required to comment on their figures in a ‘constructive’ and ‘forward-orientated’ manner, as the contemporary ‘technical term’ put it, even when that was not what the figures suggested. Their documents were drawn up word for word by the CC (Central Committee) with a predetermined picture to be given with words and figures. Only after reunification it became known that there were regulations regarding particular definitions to be used so that the corresponding counts would lead to the big or small figures required by the party. The best known instances of this include the wide-ranging terms for ‘housing constructions’, ‘industrial robots’, ‘microprocessor techniques’, or ‘CAD/CAM systems’ etc. Much of this has become well known, it should be pointed out however 1. such interventions seem to have gone back further than was previously assumed; 2. the extent of overestimates of the GDR made in this way were actually considerably higher than previously suspected in the West. For example, in 1982, the number of ‘industrial robots’ according to the common international definition as against East Germany’s was 1:17. Hence the misinformation established quite consciously was considerable. It was no coincidence that the party intervened in particular in indicators of the social situation of the population and the international standing of East Germany as a modern industrialised country. The more East Germany strove for its reputation and the more discernible it became that its great technological leap forward had not succeeded, the greater the dilemma it found itself in: it wished to be described in

5 It laid down in detail who should obtain what (which more or less detailed variant) statistical information and analyses. The CAS had to submit a proposal to the distributor, which then had to be approved. It is true and it was generally held unbelievable (in the West), but there were indeed different variants submitted for the more explosive reports (for internal purposes and for public relations work), which allowed varying degrees of insight into the matter. international statistics ‘as a developed socialist industrialised state’, and on the other hand, it also wanted to play it close to its chest (by which it became increasingly isolated within the COMECON6 and from the Soviet Union7).

3. The result: confusion, manipulation and falsification Following party instructions and proposals made by statisticians, the capitalist ‘class enemy’ was consciously deceived with confusing terms and methodical tricks. This went as far as ‘revising’ figures that had been correctly determined for publication upwards or downwards by certain figures, so that we can rightly speak of ‘falsification’. But a number of ‘less serious’ practices that (unfortunately) may seem ‘harmless’ should also be dealt with. a) Creating confusion, selective publication The GDR managed to use certain terms in order to create deliberate misunderstandings and ambiguities among foreign users of their statistics. The two best known examples are the Non socialist economic territory (NSW)8 and the so-called ‘Exchange mark’ (Valutamark VM)9. Evidence could be provided of prohibition of publication of data on things such as emigration, suicides etc. Since 1975 imports and exports were no longer separated in figures on foreign trade, but only the total foreign trade balance (imports plus exports) was disclosed10. b) Manipulation of words and numbers Written commentary on statistics was very important for the SED, as they are probably even more decisive for forming an opinion11. The appropriate CAS proposals for one-sided ‘forward-orientated’ textual commentaries were continually checked in detail by the CC who had the last word. We also found the shady practice of deliberately leaving terms unexplained or indicating changes in the sample of reporting units with a footnote in ‘all the CAS’ source documents’ but not in the tables for public relations work. By making a cunning choice of a base year for measurements and indices one can be sure of achieving certain effects. Altering the choice of goods is a very popular method of data manipulation: · in CAS draft reports of output figures for G.M. only those goods were listed where output had risen; where output had dropped no mention was made in the publications; · a similar practice in the area of price statistics involved routinely changing the choice of goods in absolute published prices, so that only those goods appeared in the list where the price had dropped or at least remained the same. If a growth rate should be higher than it actually is over the previous year’s, obviously it is arithmetically possible to simply reduce the previous year’s figures, an operation known as ‘base-adjusting’. The term can also be found in official files of the GDR, together with formulations such as the following: to ‘ensure the scheduled growth rate’, or the ‘scheduled’ base-adjusting is no longer possible, as the previous month’s figures are already in Geneva.

6 Council for mutual economic assistance. 7 This applies to such matters as the definition of ‘industrial robots’ in the GDR. The ‘provision of figures’ to international organisations was increasingly a thorn in the side of the political leadership. 8 often misunderstood as ‘capitalist industrialised countries’ or even ‘hard currency countries’. 9 Its equivalent value in ‘East German Marks’ or in a hard currency (such as West German Marks) was usually unknown; the conversion factor would fluctuate and was kept secret. 10 The professed aim of this instruction from G.M. was to conceal the balance of trade. 11 Since most people find it easier to take in texts than bare figures, biased comments are also a form of manipulation of statistics that should be taken seriously. c) Falsification of figures for international organisations There was at least one example for a genuine falsification on the command of political leaders, viz. the provision of foreign trade data to international organisations12 (October 1987). This involved routine proposals on those figures relating to East Germany’s foreign trade, in particular with the NSW that were to be submitted13. In one of them we see that ‘In the interests of showing an export surplus’, a number of changes were made to the half-yearly results (first half-year of 1987), and ‘revisions’ of the same amount were proposed for the first three quarters, which would have transformed an import surplus to the value of (minus) 579 million VM into an export surplus of (plus) 521 million VM14. There was a whole series of such occurrences. What makes this case interesting, is the fact that G.M. apparently intervened because he would not accept a balance of + 521 million VM, demanding one of + 910 million instead. This balance would then be disclosed and submitted to international organisations. Furthermore, it is quite amusing to see how easily the required balance of + 910 million VM was ‘produced’ by the CAS: imports were simply reduced from 18428 to 17893 in order to arrive at 910. A closer look at the ‘revisions’ in the figures shows that the task was 1. to display constantly an increase in exports in the NSW, as well as 2. a foreign trade surplus over the NSW and finally also 3. an increasing export surplus over the course of the year. In the East German statistics yearbook of 1990, the foreign trade figures of previous years were reported. This revealed that the state of East German foreign trade in relation to Western industrialised countries was precarious as far back as 1986, whereas, until the fall of East Germany, seemingly great export achievements had been reported (and believed by the West). d) Inadvertent consequences, some rather more subtle aspects Drawbacks of a somewhat more subtle nature were: the absence of a critical public, incorrect data as a basis for statistics and most embarrassing genuine ‘self-deceit’. There is ample evidence that major errors emerged when collecting data in the GDR since, in a command economy, there is a great tendency to create false data. It says a lot that the CAS was genuinely convinced that East Germany fared better in international comparisons than was actually the case. For example, the CAS submitted calculations to the CC alleging that East Germany had outstripped the United Kingdom in terms of per capita national income and Italy in terms of labour productivity and prosperity. Moreover, in an internal paper CAS was alleged that East German labour productivity was higher than in Japan. Le rôle politique du Service Officiel des Statistiques de léx-République Démocratique Allemande Les structures de la Centrale Officielle pour les Statistiques (SZS) étaient telles que malgré un travail sérieux de certains statisticiens il arrivait que les statistiques soient volontairement lóbjet de manipulations et de falsifications, motivé en grande partie par la politique. Le SZS était entièrement sous la coupe et le contrôle du parti. Elle servait dínstrument de propagande et de tromperie vis à vis de sa propre population et de lÉtranger durant la guerre froide. Léssai de faire croire aux Pays de lÓuest et aux Organisations Internationales au succès de leur économie déxportation – et ce malgré des faits contraires – amena néanmoins de plus en plus de problèmes aux dirigeant du Parti.

12 In particualr the UN and COMECON. 13 These proposals had to be submitted to the CC of the SED for approval and to be agreed upon with a number of top politicians. It is interesting to note the blatant efforts made to hush this up as illustrated by some most revealing quotations. 14 For the exchange mark as a unit of currency in East German foreign trade, roughly the following conversion rate applied: 2.776 VM = 1 US $. The ‘revisions’ therefore amounted to a balance of + 306 million $, instead of - 90 million $, which was not insignificant, as with this revision, East Germany’s exports to the West increased by about 20% over this period.