66,000 SED Members Quit as Politburo Faces No-Confidence Vote
By Vera Kessler ·
Ruling party officials watched 66,000 members vanish as citizens demanded a no-confidence vote and diplomats pushed for a Polish-style round-table to replace the Politburo.
At 11:40 am on November 9, 1989, Ambassador Gheorghe Caranfil of the Romanian Embassy in Berlin sent an information note to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Bucharest. The city was in a state of agitation, but the defining event of the evening—the opening of the border crossings—had not yet occurred. Caranfil’s dispatch, an English translation of the Romanian original published by the Wilson Center Digital Archive, captures a ruling party attempting to perform a controlled descent while the floor was already giving way.
66,000 Resignations
The Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED), which public records describe as the ruling Marxist-Leninist party of the GDR from 1949 to 1989, was bleeding members faster than it could replace them. The document cites figures provided by Günter Schabowski: 66,000 people had resigned or been excluded from the party that year, while only 36,000 had been accepted. Caranfil notes that within diplomatic circles, the actual number of resignations was believed to be "much greater."
This membership collapse mirrored a broader crisis of legitimacy. A demonstration intended to show support for Egon Krenz and the newly elected Politburo had instead become a venue for dissent. Spontaneous attendees demanded an extraordinary party congress, a move the embassy analyzed as "implicitly, a no-confidence vote for the Politburo." Krenz’s response, according to the note, was that he "cannot, on his own, decide the faith of the whole party."
"Information and Policy of Mass Media"
Amidst the instability, the SED attempted a semantic pivot. The document lists the responsibilities of the Central Committee secretaries, noting that Günter Schabowski was now in charge of the "directorate of information and policy of mass media." Caranfil explicitly points out that this office was previously called "propaganda and agitation," and that those specific titles "are no longer used."
Despite the name change, the leadership remained rooted in the old school. The embassy lists several Politburo members and candidate members who had completed their political studies in the Soviet Union or had been active in party life in the USSR, including Egon Krenz, Hans Modrow, Günter Schabowski, Gerhard Schurer, Johannes Chemnitzer, and Margarete Müller. This alignment with Moscow was a constant in a period of erratic change.
A Round-table in Berlin
By November 9, the diplomatic community in Berlin was looking toward Poland as the blueprint for the GDR's future. Caranfil reports that Western diplomats believed the current Politburo was merely "temporary" and would be entirely replaced at the first representative meeting. The prevailing theory in diplomatic circles was that the situation was evolving in a direction that would "bring the GDR closer to [the situation in] Poland."
This shift was evidenced by Schabowski’s admission that the SED might theoretically "lose the [future] elections" under a new electoral law. He also responded positively to the possibility of a "Round-table" discussion with other political forces. The document mentions the emergence of several newly created organizations seeking legalization: New Forum, Democratic Opening, the Social-Democratic Party, Democracy Now, and the Peace and Human Rights initiative.
These groups, alongside cultural figures, had issued an appeal to the population not to leave the country. The novelist Christa Wolf is specifically mentioned as having broadcast an appeal on TV and radio, arguing that "those who leave now are reducing our hopes."
The Failed Candidates
The internal friction within the SED is highlighted by a list of political casualties. Günter Kleiber, who had been considered a candidate for Prime Minister, failed to receive enough votes for the Politburo. Other nominees, Horst Dohlus and Gerhard Müller, were also not elected. Meanwhile, Werner Krolikowski, the former secretary for agriculture, requested to be relieved of his position and was not nominated for re-election.
In a final, peculiar administrative detail, the embassy notes the creation of two new Politburo committees for culture and science, led by Klaus Hopke and Gregor Schirner. Because neither man was a member of the Central Committee, they could not be formally elected to the Politburo; instead, they were permitted to attend meetings based on their nominations. Caranfil concluded the note by stating that it was expected they would eventually be elected to the CC and the Politburo at the next party congress.