The importance of childhood and adolescence in shaping a person’s worldview has often been underlined (for instance Zuckerman 2012). This was true also in political regimes that tried to enforce atheism on their population. In communist-ruled Eastern Europe, the will to create a ‘New Man’ led to transformations in all areas of daily life, some of which were explicitly aimed at eradicating religion (Krakovský 2014; van den Bercken 1989: 133–136). Not all measures proved conclusive and long-lasting, and not all regimes could afford radical positions. Moreover, the political objective of communism did not necessarily go hand in hand with an emphasis on atheism (Guigo-Patzelt 2025a). In post-war East Germany, the communist elite did not lose sight of atheism as an important objective (Hoffmann 2000); however, it had to deal with an allied Christian-Democratic party, very powerful religious institutions, an overwhelmingly religious population and keen international attention. Thus, it preferred to give the German Democratic Republic, founded in 1949, an air of respectability by granting religious freedom, as well as a favourable legal status, to more than 30 Churches and religious communities. The Socialist Unity Party of Germany (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands, SED) would rather divide and instrumentalise existing institutions than provoke underground Churches.
In 1946 communists had found 82% of the population affiliated to the main Protestant and 12% to the Roman Catholic Church. These figures declined to 60% and 8% in 1964 and about 23% and 4% at the regime’s breakdown in 1990 (Maser 1992: 82; Talandier 1994: 17). Although these figures show an unmistakable decline, they also document a significant proportion of the population declaring themselves religious after 40 years of communist rule. They contradict early predictions by Marxist specialists as to the complete ‘withering away’ of religion while society progressed towards communism. Religious disaffiliation obviously did not occur automatically, and atheism even less so, as one form within the broader range of nonreligion.
With the ideological imperative to foster atheisation, attempts to understand its mechanisms have been on the political and academic agenda since the 1960s, mainly at the Central Institute for Studies on the Youth (Zentralinstitut für Jugendforschung, ZIJ) and the Jena university chair of scientific atheism (Schuster 2020; Guigo-Patzelt 2025b). Psychologists, sociologists, pedagogues, philosophers, and policymakers sought to identify causal factors for atheism and hoped they might act on these parameters to consolidate atheism on the individual and the societal level. Their analyses, many of which remained highly confidential up to 1990, yield interesting material on the historical evolution of a relatively unexplored spiritual landscape. Yet they do not necessarily reflect historical reality: as Minois put it, ‘disbelief, as a phenomenon of consciousness, remains beyond the historian’s reach’ (1998: 452), and Borowik, Ančić and Tyrała underlined: ‘We do not know how the atheism as experienced by people living under the Communist regime was understood.’ (2013: 635) Atheism is always part of the socially and culturally constructed phenomena whose underlying assumptions are worth analysing (Remmel, Václavík and Bubík 2020: 5). When they are not taken at face value, the preserved documentation gives insight into ways of conceptualizing atheism within a very specific political and ideological framework. Empirical work in the social sciences produced under communist rule did not always fit with the official discourse, thus obliging scholars to question assumptions and measures, and to adjust either the goals or the political course (in this case, in order to halt the decline of atheism among the youth). This paper will analyse how the ZIJ researchers defined atheism and what they thought to be the most effective means of encouraging the intended form of atheism among East German youth. As documented by their own surveys, and by the level of remaining religiosity in 1990, success was not entirely achieved. The concrete, practical implementation of their ideas in all areas of young people’s lives would go beyond the scope of this article. However, it remains to be questioned whether part of the failure was not already inherent in the proposed concept of atheism and the mechanisms of atheisation. After an introduction to the historical context of East German youth research, I will analyse the definitions and scale of the phenomenon of atheism. The last part of this paper will focus more specifically on the mechanisms that were explored to foster atheisation, as well as their shortcomings.
‘Tomorrow’s Heads of Household’ as an Object of Study and Education
Children, teenagers and students were exposed in specific ways to the regime’s efforts to spread atheism. Religious education was excluded from the state school system, classes on Marxism-Leninism became compulsory for all students in 1951, the Protestant Church’s extensive youth programme gave rise to major conflicts: in the 1950s–1960s, religious education was made difficult even outside the school, ‘young communities’ in parishes and student communities were bullied and some of their pastors arrested, in the 1980s Churches welcomed young people considered by the regime to be dissidents or anti-social (Henkys 1983; Maier 1993; Heise 1993 and 1998; Hoffmann 2000; Talandier 1994 and 1995). The 14-year-olds were enrolled in the classes at the coming-of-age ritual called Jugendweihe: 17.7% of the age group took part in 1955, 96.1% in 1974 (Pinther 1975: 420). This ritual was maintained with an ambiguity as to its meaning: Church leaders perceived it as competing with their own confirmation rites, while the ZIJ researchers saw it as one marker among others of the ‘new social position’ of young people (Pinther 1981: 105) and even avoided worldview questions in a study on its effectiveness (ZIJ 1968). The scientific atheist Hans Lutter defined substitution rites as ‘a further step after secularisation’1 and his colleague Olof Klohr repeatedly affirmed that it meant commitment to the socialist state, not to atheism.2 A similar ambiguity surrounded the Free German Youth (Freie Deutsche Jugend, FDJ), which held a monopoly on organising leisure activities. In the 1960s, FDJ membership rose to around 40% of young people aged between 14 and 25/26, and even to 63.1% among pupils and students in 1965 and 78.6% in 1966 (Dähn 1994: 253–255). This organisation was supposed to work as ‘support and mediator of very specific ideological positions, namely those of “scientific atheism”’ (Dähn 1994: 257). Nevertheless, an unspecified proportion of its members were and remained Christians.
In the 1960s, for the first generation untouched by Nazism, education was supposed to work ‘according to a simple input-output model’ (Wierling 2000: 630). The 14–25-year-olds, albeit less numerous than other generations–between 15.1% and 16.6% of the population, between 2.6 and 2.9 million individuals (Schulze 1995: 26–27)–embodied the hope of a bright communist future. A Politburo’s communiqué of September 1963 claimed: ‘Today’s youth-tomorrow’s heads of household-trust in youth and responsibility’.3 This hopeful regard changed completely, turning into deep mistrust at the 11th plenary session of the Central Committee in 1965, which ushered in a much stricter policy (Krenzlin 2000).
Be it as ‘saviours’ or as ‘destroyers’ (Wierling 2000: 637, 635), the youth of the 1960s had to be closely monitored. A Politburo commission for youth affairs and an academic advisory board for youth research were established (Friedrich 2007: 35–37) and, most notably, the Central Institute for Studies on the Youth was set up in Leipzig in 1966. These initiatives were in line with similar developments in other socialist countries and in West Germany, as well as with the revival of sociology in the GDR and the Eastern Bloc (Sparschuh and Koch 1997; Wiedemann 1998). The ZIJ was directed by Walter Friedrich, professor of psychology and member of the Academy of Educational Sciences (see also Friedrich and Hennig 1976; Hennig and Friedrich 1991; Friedrich 1996, 2002 and 2007; Friedrich, Förster and Starke 1999; Braun and Schlegel 2014). Over the years, it carried out more than 450 empirical studies, mostly by means of questionnaires, resulting in more than 200 papers (on the methodology, see also Friedrich and Hennig 1980; Müller 1981; Förster 1999; Bathke and Starke 1999). ‘Positions on worldview’ (weltanschauliche Positionen) were absent most of the time. According to Friedrich, these issues were not only not commissioned, but also discouraged by the authorities and a study specifically dedicated to worldview was stopped in 1973 (Friedrich 1996: 93; Friedrich 1999: 189–190, 194, 203; quoted in Braun and Schlegel 2014: 194). Their inclusion was due to the researchers’ own interest, his colleague Schauer claimed.4 A former member of the Lutheran Church himself, Friedrich later mentioned ‘questions about the “real reasons” for my leaving the church that plagued me for a long time’ (quoted in Braun and Schlegel 2014: 204).
Some research on worldview was carried out in collaboration between the ZIJ and scholars of ‘scientific atheism’. In 1966 the only university chair in this field, under the direction of Olof Klohr at Jena (1963–1968), was supposed to reorient all its work towards the atheistic education of the young. Assisted by Walter Berg and Johann Klügl, Klohr prepared surveys among students and pupils. Klohr’s interest in the ‘atheistic-ideological permeation’ (weltanschaulich-atheistische Durchdringung) of teaching and its improvement can be traced from the 1950s to 1990.5 From 1972 onwards scientific atheism has seen a revival (Guigo-Patzelt 2025b): not without connection, some scholars think, with a new ideological offensive towards the young manifested by the 1974 Youth Act which no longer mentioned freedom of belief (Heise 1998: 157; Dietrich 2018).
Indeed the stronger emphasis on atheism was to make ‘a contribution to communist education’, a Politburo resolution of 1972 stated.6 This was nothing new. The ZIJ’s mission was focussed on ‘the socialist personality development of young people’, its ‘objective and subjective conditions, causes, factors and lawful connections’ in order to support the youth policy and the work of the FDJ.7 Interest in atheism could only be justified as an element of ‘communist education’, linked to a social problem that needed to be solved (Vetter 1976: 77); atheism was no goal in itself (Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 4). The Youth Act defined as the objective of youth policy ‘to educate all young people to become citizens who are loyal to the ideas of socialism, think and act as patriots and internationalists, strengthen socialism and reliably protect it against all enemies’ (quoted in Friedrich 1975a: 27–28). Each new generation was said to have its own role and to face new challenges (Friedrich 1975a: 27; Schneider 1976: 10; Müller 1976: 65). The role of the atheistic component within these objectives, the interactions with political and other elements, and the possible causal connections remain to be investigated. But before, the–implicit or explicit–definition of the diversely used term ‘atheism’ must be made as clear as possible.
What Proportion of –What Exactly? Atheism and Its Definitions
In the GDR, as elsewhere, contemporaries and historians alike have observed a variety in forms of nonreligion. The ZIJ quickly established the following standard question, which remained in use over nearly three decades, in order to ensure comparison:
‘How would you assess yourself?
I am
1 a convinced atheist
2 convinced of a religion
3 a follower of other views
4 still undecided in this regard’.8
Mentioning atheists first suggests a priority to this option. Further, the dynamics conveyed by ‘still’ is very frequent in the scientific atheists’ questionnaires.9 As comments on worldview questions show, the respondents’ change was to proceed in only one direction: a ‘worldview position’ was said to be ‘stable’ or ‘stabilised’ (gefestigt), and no more ‘labile’ (labil), when it tended towards atheism and socialist ideology (Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 13; Friedrich 1975a: 29; Starke 1980; Schauer 1980; Lange 1990).
The self-designation question revealed a regular decline of atheists among the general population of 14–25-year-olds, dropping from 53% in 1962 to 51% in 1964, 47% in 1966 and 43% in 1969 (Friedrich 1996: 94; Friedrich 1999: 185, 188; Förster 1999: 78–81; Braun and Schlegel 2014: 195). In 1971, a study by Walter Friedrich (ZIJ), Olof Klohr and Peter Förster (ZIJ) estimated 35–40% atheists in the general young population. In the 1970s and 1980s, the proportion of atheists was highest among students, regularly increasing between 1970 (71%) and 1974 (83%), with a slight drop in 1975 (77%), and again an increase in 1989 (85 %) (ZIJ 1981: 1; Friedrich 1999).
Among apprentices and young workers, there were consistently between 60% and 70% declaring themselves atheists in the 1970s and 1980s (Lange 1990: 544; Friedrich 1999: 185, 188). In 1962, 53% of pupils questioned in secondary school declared themselves to be ‘convinced atheists’, against 50.6% in 1964.10 The proportion of young people declaring themselves ‘convinced of a religion’ remained around 10–15% of the general young population (Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971; ZIJ 1981; Roski 1982; Lange 1990: 544; Friedrich 1996: 94; Braun and Schlegel 2014: 195), that is, much lower than in the whole East German population (as already observed by Lange 1990: 543). This was largely perceived as harmless, as the scientific atheists predicted that up to 10% of East German society would remain believers, without calling into question the overall withering away of religion.11 Besides, the regime’s policy included winning over some of the believers to an active participation in socialism. Indeed, for some scholars, the continued existence of believers seemed rather stimulating. They were more worried about the ‘still undecided’: this group amounted to 22–28% of the general young population in the 1960s (Friedrich 1996: 94; Braun and Schlegel 2014: 195) and, together with ‘followers of other views’-that is, ‘many ideologically opposed, including sect members, “nature lovers” etc., but also simply unthinking, indifferent, enthusiasts’-could reach up to 50% (Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 9). Their proportion was perceived as being on the increase while self-declared atheism was losing ground (Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 12–13; ZIJ 1971; Schauer 1980: 16; ZIJ 1981: 2; Schauer and Zeugner 1987: 58). This concern was not specific to East Germany: indifference was growing in several socialist countries (van den Bercken 1989: 140; Walters 1993: 28; Smolkin 2018; Tesař 2019: 316), and young people turned away from atheism in a number of countries, including late Yugoslavia (Dragišić 2023) and the Soviet Union (Martin 2022).
As Friedrich put it in 1996, ‘the decisive processes of change in worldview/religious consciousness took place among young people as early as the 1950s’ (1996: 94). Which young people were still individually likely to become atheists and increase the share of atheists in the following decades? The ZIJ set up several longitudinal studies allowing them to follow individuals over time. According to their analysis, worldview positions fixed quite early, before the age of 16, maybe even around the age of 13–14.12 Starke, a specialist on students, again detected some movement towards the end of the fourth year of the students’ university programme, especially among the undecided, either towards atheism or religion (1980: 80). Other studies either confirmed or refuted transitions from the undecided to atheism (Schauer and Zeugner 1987; Friedrich 1999: 194) and confirmed possible transition to religion (ZIJ 1981: 4). Schauer deemed breaking with religion possible (1980: 32), but several scholars still saw movement from undecided to atheism as more promising.13 And he warned: ‘The transition from non-Marxist atheistic positions to Marxist-Leninist positions is more complicated than it appears at first glance.’ (1980: 32)
Not all forms of atheism were seen as equal; a look beyond the self-declaration was required. The documents left by the ZIJ contain a wealth of information about their conception of atheism(s). Some questionnaires specified: ‘Atheists hold that there is no God or other supernatural forces.’14 Some analyses framed a clear alternative between atheism and theism (Schauer 1980: 14). Klohr’s colleague Walter Berg criticised ZIJ works for being too much in the opposition between Christianity and atheism (Pawelzik 1998: 189). They did not always avoid focussing on religion, taking its simple absence for atheism (Schmidt and Lauer 1984: 23, 26), and wondering about the reasons for religiosity instead of possible pull-factors for atheism (ZIJ 1981: 4). From 1987 onwards, Schauer (ZIJ) and Klohr’s colleague Zeugner tried to escape the paradigm by emphasising instead the existence of ‘worldview hybrids’ (1987: 10–11).15
As religion itself struggled to find its place, defining atheism as its alternative proved difficult. There was no antireligious, freethinking or other declared nonreligious association in the GDR before June 1989. Religion was made explicit through ‘direct religious-church orientations’ (Friedrich 1999: 194), aspirations and meanings of life–but not always. If such orientations and aspirations were required for an alternative, then atheism did not qualify as an alternative.16 In his introduction to a significant study on young people’s opinions on the meaning of life, ZIJ researcher Günter Roski nevertheless refuted the religious way of thinking by stating: ‘From a materialistic point of view, Man is an end in himself and the highest being to himself’ (1982: 4); his life is not given a meaning by ‘God’. The universe has no objective meaning. Instead, ‘human activity acquires its specific significance and meaning in the context of a larger whole, a society, class or social group’ (Roski 1982: 4). As to the individual, ‘actively helping to shape social living conditions fulfils the purpose of individual existence’ (Roski 1982: 5). Such statements were perfectly in line with Klohr’s definition of atheism: questionnaires that he was responsible for suggested that ‘Human beings are creatures that have only themselves to help’.17 In the researchers’ minds, atheism became connected to a certain concept of ‘humanism’, a a prominent term, especially at the Academy of Social Sciences. Its specific understandings in the RDA, and in presumably much wider circles than the ZIJ and scientific atheists, would be worth further investigation in comparison to other national and historical contexts.
Another way of grasping atheism is to examine its links not with religion but with ‘worldview’, ‘Marxism-Leninism’, ‘Marxist-Leninist’ or ‘scientific worldview’, ‘political worldview’, and ‘ideology’. Indeed, respondents could also choose, on some occasions, between ‘the Marxist-Leninist worldview’ (in the best position), ‘another atheist worldview’, ‘a religious worldview’, ‘other worldview opinions’ and ‘I haven’t made up my mind yet’.18 In talks, discussions, papers and publications, the alternative to religion or the competitor with undecidedness was not always atheism and might be ‘Marxism-Leninism’, a ‘Marxist worldview’, a ‘Marxist-Leninist worldview’ or being a communist.19 A 1971 ZIJ paper called atheism ‘an important subsection’ of the ‘Marxist-Leninist worldview’ (ZIJ 1971: 10). Schauer and Zeugner preferred to talk about it being ‘the core of the Marxist-Leninist worldview’ (1987: 57). Nevertheless, young people happened to be invited to scale themselves independently as Marxist-Leninists and atheists20 and some students declared to be one but not the other (Schauer 1980). Far from being a theoretical question about the place of atheism inside Marxism, these variants refer to the interactions between different elements of the ‘socialist personality’ and the perceived role of atheism.
Atheism as a Cause, a Consequence – Or Something Irrelevant to Young People’s Personality?
The ‘ideological and worldview position’, several ZIJ researchers argued in the 1970s and 1980s, had a key role to play in shaping a person’s values and personality (Friedrich 1975a: 29; Friedrich 1976: 26; Starke 1980: 84; Friedrich 1980: 19; Müller 1985: 26). Friedrich wanted his work to be ‘social-psychological’; in fact, his ZIJ team was convinced of ‘the social determination of ideological attitudes and behaviours’, prioritised social factors and set out to study the young as part of society.21 As Müller put it, ‘attitudes are acquired individually through experience; they are learnt. […] Attitudes are determined from the outside; they do not arise from within.’ (1975: 124) Even though they did not want their work to be understood as a causal analysis in the strict sense of the term,22 the importance of certain social factors for worldview seemed to them to be an established fact.
The first and most undisputed influence on a young person’s atheism or religiosity was his or her parents’ atheism or religiosity, according to ZIJ studies.23 84% of the children of two atheists turned out to be also atheists, 1989 and 1991 surveys discovered, whereas two religious parents had religious children only in 64% of cases (Friedrich 1999: 193; see also Lange 1990: 546–547). Another survey found 74% of atheist children with atheist parents and 77% of young religious children with religious parents (Keiser 1991: 47). Beyond their parents’ atheism, children of SED members proved to be much more likely to be atheists than children whose parents were members of no political party (62% against 34%, see ZIJ 1971: 21).
Despite this strong family influence, both ZIJ researchers and scientific atheists were convinced of the possibility for young people to change sides. Young people did not mechanically become atheists, they argued, and those who had reached a form of detachment from religion all too often came to a standstill before becoming atheists–hence the significant proportion of indifferent young people. Generational change alone would not achieve full atheism. On the contrary they had to personally and actively embrace Marxism-Leninism and atheism. Several factors and people could help them do so.24 A first, and unfortunately often missing condition for their transition to or consolidation of personal atheism, the scholars thought, was to engage them with questions about worldview (Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 31). Their own interest in these issues was low: only 1% of respondents indicated a strong interest in ‘worldview problems’ in their preparations for Jugendweihe (ZIJ 1968: 13, 27, 30), only 23% of 12–13-year-olds mentioned great interest in such ‘worldview questions’ as ‘whether there is a God, or whether everything is governed by natural laws or by human beings themselves’ (ZIJ 1971: 11), Marxist-Leninist courses at university were not popular (Schauer and Zeugner 1987), friendship groups fostered ‘ideological ease’ and indifference instead of conversations of worldview, and exciting atheist youth literature was rare (Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 25–26). However, Friedrich, Klohr and Förster argued in reference to an experiment conducted by Wolfgang Kaul, Klohr’s future right-hand man: ‘The steady decline in the number of conscious atheists among young people, which has been going on for years, is by no means an inevitable phenomenon. Purposeful, conscious education and upbringing of young people in atheism leads to completely different results.’ In the secondary school in question, atheism increased from 53% to 66% between 1968 and 1970 (1971: 13). Rather than making them see education as hopeless, then, the quoted results reinforced the scholars’ ideas and their efforts to gain more influence in education.
What ought ‘worldview and atheistic education and upbringing’ be like to be successful? Young people needed ‘confessing atheists’ outside the family to identify with, Friedrich, Klohr and Förster thought (1971). But more emphasis was put on knowledge transfer about basic notions of Marxism-Leninism: ‘The Marxist-Leninist world view includes in the first place a certain basic knowledge of the theoretical statements of Marxism-Leninism.’ (ZIJ 1982: 14; see also Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971; Mehlhorn 1975: 176). Such notions as atheism and ‘Marxist-Leninist worldview’, their content and relation, were often unknown even to those who declared to hold them. An internal document from 1971, for instance, mentioned 77% of the surveyed being convinced of the primacy of matter, against 20% convinced of the primacy of consciousness. Such was the ‘fundamental philosophical question’ put forward in more philosophical approaches to atheism in the GDR; nevertheless 79% of respondents were unable to define ‘atheism’.25 The absence of knowledge went hand in hand with ‘unstable worldview positions’ (Müller 1975: 136), it was often repeated, as it made these atheists vulnerable to religious influence (Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 17). The scientific atheists were particularly troubled by this and pleaded for overcoming a ‘spontaneous’ or ‘implicit’ form of atheism.26 Whether the inverse was true–‘the higher the level of education, the more developed the ideological consciousness of young people’–was a matter of dispute.27 How it could be that religious young people were the best-informed ones about Marxism and yet hung on to their faith, was not explained (Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 16).
The emphasis on knowledge transfer in making young people become atheists raised two problems. The first was presenting too intellectual a form of atheism to be accessible to all young people (Müller 1985: 25). The second was a difficulty in translating intellectual understanding into personal behaviour (Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 24; Müller 1975: 125; Müller 1976: 66–67; Haltinner 1976: 86; Koch and Bisky 1976: 329–336; Schauer 1977: 43; Starke 1980; Schauer 1980: 332). The latter problem was addressed by fostering an engagement with politics and society, which was thought to produce a virtuous circle where atheist and socialist convictions would reinforce each other (Friedrich 1975a: 31). Young people were to engage in the project of building communism and have life goals that benefited society. Such positive social experience would, it was hoped, consolidate their atheist and political convictions. A concrete example was enlistment and a responsibility in the FDJ and later on membership in the SED, as researchers found a strong positive correlation between membership and atheism and positive effects on atheisation.28 But the FDJ alone did not prove strong enough to retain young people from turning to religion (ZIJ 1981: 4).
Those becoming religious and quitting the FDJ in turn seemed to illustrate a correlation that has long been proclaimed in East German social science: that is, that Marxism-Leninism and its atheism was seen as a necessary foundation for an unwavering commitment to the socialist project (Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 3–4, 18–22; ZIJ 1971: 5; Koch and Bisky 1976: 332–333; Schauer 1980: 14, 18–19; Starke 1980: 118; Friedrich and Müller 1980: 133; ZIJ 1982: 15). The religious or the undecided were found to be less ‘proud of being citizens of the socialist GDR’, less optimistic as to the final victory of socialism, more hedonistic and focused on personal goals or small-scale charity, longing for peace but without being prepared to make personal sacrifices, and less willing to work hard.29
The perceived link between socialist political convictions and atheism offered an opportunity to influence those who were attracted by the political project despite religious faith or undecidedness as to worldview (ZIJ 1971: 11; Schauer 1980: 30). From the middle of the 1970s onwards, when atheism among the young started to decline, the ‘unity of politics and worldview’ began to be questioned under the impression of pro-communist Christians inside and outside the GDR.30 The scientific atheists finally declared Christians to be good partners with converging values, compared to the less socially minded undecided, and engaged in dialogue with Christians (Guigo-Patzelt 2022). Some ZIJ documents of 1989 confirm this tendency.31 Atheistic education as part of ‘communist education’ became less urgent.
Not only did the long-held link between communism and atheism start to dissolve: when the dimensions were related, hesitation about one of the terms could lead to the weakening of the other. After the collapse of the socialist regime, Friedrich drew a parallel between three evolutions: the decline of atheism among the young, the decline of their support for socialism and the political difficulties in the GDR and the Eastern Bloc. Young people, he argued, lost faith in the socialist future and as a result, felt less sure of their atheism (Friedrich 1996 and 1999; Friedrich in Braun and Schlegel 2014: 191–193). Müller, when documenting a decline in political convictions in 1985, had already warned that religion might benefit (1985). Friedrich’s retrospective vocabulary was clearly religious, with faith to be put in socialism.
At the same time, Friedrich expressed regret about the missing plausibility that atheism had had for young people’s personal lives. When they got involved in social and political activism, this did not consolidate their Marxist and atheist convictions as had been expected, and often even, on the contrary, called them into question. In 1973, he recalled, only 45% of the young accepted Marxism-Leninism as a way to ‘explain to me personally what I live for’. Agreement to the statement ‘Marxism-Leninism helps me to find the right answer to all the important questions in life’ had fallen from 27% of apprentices and 23% of pupils in 1979 to 3% and 2% in October 1989 (Förster 1999: 147; see also Friedrich 1999: 189). The problems of Marxism-Leninism having no answers to the questions of life and no importance for personal lives, providing no guidance in personal and collective crisis, of Christian morals being more attractive to young people and Church activities better meeting their expectations, had been perceived by several researchers.32 The importance of an emotional and not just intellectual adherence had been recognised (Mehlhorn 1975: 184; ZIJ 1968: 20–21, 26; Müller 1975; Friedrich and Müller 1980), and some work had been done on the transmission of atheism by emotions (Neef 2024). The scientific atheists, however, were suspicious of an emotional atheism they could only think of as anticlerical and aggressive towards believers.33 Only the creation of an association of freethinkers in June 1989 made them imagine measures making atheism the ‘help for life’ some ZIJ researchers had already called for (Guigo-Patzelt 2025c).
Conclusion
The newly created association of freethinkers might have welcomed teenagers, but it came too late to reverse the trend. In 1990–1991, different surveys found around 70% of 14/15-24/25-year-olds were nonreligious, and in the middle of the 1990s, Friedrich estimated their proportion around 80% (Friedrich 1996 and 1999; Braun and Schlegel 2014: 200–201). Rather than ‘scientific atheism’, observers note overwhelming indifference in the Eastern part of reunited Germany. The communist regime succeeded in secularisation, but not in enforcing a specific type of active atheism.
The atheism proposed by the ZIJ reflects many of the difficulties of atheisation in communist-ruled countries, as far as current research allows us to conclude: it proved unable to develop attractive features by itself, relied on the appeal of a political project, and its promotion was legitimate only within a framework of the ‘socialist personality’ to which it was not essential. Since the ambiguities surrounding atheism’s nature and significance in Russia in the 1920s (Gleixner 2024), different generations of Marxist specialists struggled against indifference (Smoklin 2018) and sometimes even against the greater attractiveness of religion to individuals (Martin 2022; Dragišić 2023) and its usefulness for instance for managers eager for better control.34 To situate atheism within the East-German worldview landscape, Marxist scholars explored several configurations: atheism vs. religion, a ternary scheme with atheism, religion and undecidedness, and a gradation comprising several types of atheism. They did not feel comfortable with definitions of atheism that would go beyond self-declaration. But they could not accept self-declared atheism only because the true atheist was supposed to possess certain knowledge and self-declared atheists often lacked it. None of the explored definitions was able to help these scholars make the population become atheists. The result of their extensive reflection resembled a basic form of humanism, contrasting a definition of religion rooted in Christianity, without considering other religious or non-religious forms of spirituality.
Notes
[1] Berlin Institute for Comparative State-Church Research (BISKF), collection Kaul, box 13 Lutter, Thesen zur Dissertation, July 1965, p. 4.
[3] Der Jugend Verantwortung und Vertrauen. Kommuniqué des Politbüros des Zentralkomitees der Sozialistischen Einheitspartei Deutschlands zu Problemen der Jugend in der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik. Neues Deutschland, 21 September 1963, 1–3.
[4] Bistumsarchiv Erfurt, Sekretariat bzw. Vorsitzender der BOK / BBK und Außenstelle Berlin des Sekretariats der DBK, box III.7 Teil 2, Anlage zum Protokoll der ÖSPK vom April 1989.
[5] For 1958–1962, see Rostock University Archives (UAR), collection SML, and BISKF Kaul and Klohr; for 1973–1989, Federal Archive (BArch) DR 3, 2. Schicht; BISKF Klohr and Kaul; journal Wissenschaftlicher Atheismus.
[6] Foundation Archives of the Political Parties and Mass Organisations of the GDR in the Federal Archives (SAPMO-BArch) DY 30/J IV 2/2/1421 Die Aufgaben der Agitation und Propaganda bei der weiteren Verwirklichung der Beschlüsse des VIII. Parteitages der SED. Beschluß des ZK der SED vom 7.11.1972.
[7] SAMPO-BArch DY 24/7874 ZIJ, Entwurf, Schwerpunktethema der Jugendforschung für den zentralen Forschungsplan der marxistisch-leninistischen Gesellschaftswissenschaften für die Jahre 1976–1980, 19 March 1974, 2.
[11] BISKF Kaul 13 Klohr, Jugend – Atheismus – Religion, 20; BISKF Klohr 302 Klohr, Kaul, Ursachen und Tendenzen des Absterbens.
[12] SAMPO-BArch DY 24/14521 Friedrich, Diskussionsbeitrag, 14 October 1987, 3; Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971; Friedrich 1980; Starke 1980; Schauer and Zeugner 1987.
[13] BISKF Kaul 13 Gottschling, Thesen zur Dissertation, October 1969, 8; Leipzig University Archives (UAL) FMI 29, 41; BArch DR 3, 2. Schicht, 544 Klohr, Kaul, Zum Stand der atheistischen Bildung und Erziehung der Studenten … 1976/77, 13 March 1978; Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971; Schauer 1977.
[14] Zentralarchiv für empirische Sozialforschung, ISW, Kl. 10, 1; BArch DC 401/34 Fragebogen SIL B.
[15] Bistumsarchiv Erfurt, Sekretariat bzw. Vorsitzender der BOK / BBK und Außenstelle Berlin des Sekretariats der DBK, box III.7 Teil 2, Anlage …, 1.
[16] BArch DC 401/34 Fragebogen SIL B, handwritten: SIL-C-Streichungen gegenüber SIL B; Roski 1982; Müller 1985.
[17] Federal Commissioner for the Records of the State Security Service of the former German Democratic Republic (BStU) MfS – HA XX/4 2835 Bd. 2, 484.
[18] BArch DC 401/92 ZIJ, Abteilung Studentenforschung, Indikatoren (bzw. Indikata) SIS 5 (Entwurf), 5; BArch DC 401/92 ZIJ, SIS 5, [1976] Fragebogen, 4.
[19] SAMPO-BArch DY 24/14521 Horn, Information über die Tagung des Wissenschaftlichen Rates für Jugendforschung am 12.4.1988, 25 April 1988, 5; Friedrich and Müller 1980: 118; Friedrich 1999.
[21] BArch DC 401/63 (several documents); BArch DC 401/113 Bericht über die Durchführung des internationalen wissenschaftlichen Seminars …, 25 September 1989; BArch DC 4/827 Friedrich, Zu theoretischen Problemen der marxistischen Jugendforschung; SAMPO-BArch DY 24/14521 Friedrich, Diskussionsbeitrag, 14 October 1987; Friedrich 1976: 19, 21; Schneider 1976: 10; Müller 1976 and 1985; Friedrich 2007.
[22] BArch DC 401/63 Friedrich, Der Forschungsprozeß; Friedrich 1975a; Starke 1980: 73–75.
[23] BArch DC 401/92 ZIJ, Abteilung Studentenforschung, Indikatoren (bzw. Indikata) SIS 5 (Entwurf), 5; BArch DC 401/114 Müller, Zu Veränderungen von Wertorientierungen im Verlaufe des Jugendalters; SAMPO-BArch DY 24/14521 Lange, Thesen zur ideologischen Entwicklung im Jugendalter; Bistumsarchiv Erfurt, Sekretariat bzw. Vorsitzender der BOK / BBK und Außenstelle Berlin des Sekretariats der DBK, box III.7 Teil 2, Anlage …, 1; Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971; Pinther 1975; Friedrich 1976; Friedrich and Müller 1980; Schauer 1980; Kabat vel Job 1981; Schauer and Zeugner 1987: 60; Lange 1990; Keiser 1991.
[24] BArch DC 4/827 Friedrich, Zu theoretischen Problemen der marxistischen Jugendforschung; BArch DC 401/34 ZIJ, Information über Arbeitsergebnisse des Jahres 1983, 4; SAMPO-BArch DY 24/14521 Wissenschaftlicher Rat für Jugendforschung, Ratstagung am 12.4.1988, 14; SAPMO-BArch DY 30/96213 Entwurf, Forschungsplan des wissenschaftlichen Beirates für Jugendforschung; Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971; Friedrich 1975b: 6; Starke 1980: 82, 105; Schauer 1980: 4; Roski 1982: 5.
[25] SAPMO-BArch DY 24/7874 Erste Informationen über empirische Werte der P 70 des ZIJ, 1971. Other examples of this ignorance: BISKF Kliem 72 Questionnaires; BArch DR 3, 2. Schicht, 544 Klohr, Kaul, Zum Stand der atheistischen Bildung und Erziehung der Studenten … 1976/77, 13 March 1978, 3; Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 8, 14, 16; Schauer and Zeugner 1987: 12; Lange, Dennhardt and Schubarth 1989: 18.
[27] SAMPO-BArch DY 24/14521 Lange, Thesen zur ideologischen Entwicklung im Jugendalter, 8; SAPMO-BArch DY 24/7874 Erste Informationen …, 1971, 4; SAMPO-BArch DY 24/14521 Wissenschaftlicher Rat für Jugendforschung, Ratstagung am 12.4.1988; Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971: 15–17, 38–40; Friedrich 1975a: 32; Friedrich 1996: 111.
[28] SAPMO-BArch DY 24/7874 Erste Informationen …, 1971, 4; BArch DC 4/827 Fragespiegel–Auswertung 1964; Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971; Schauer and Zeugner 1987: 62–64.
[29] See especially Roski 1982, but also ZIJ 1971: 11; Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971; Hoffmann 1975: 317, 322; Müller 1985: 44; Lange, Dennhardt and Schubarth 1989; Friedrich 1996: 100; Friedrich 1999; BISKF Kaul 13 Kaul, Thesen zur Dissertation, January 1974, 4; BISKF Klohr 303 Baum, Jahresarbeit, April 1978; BISKF Klohr 305 ZIJ, Konzeption zur Untersuchung ‘Jugend und Weltanschauung’ (überarbeitete Fassung), November 1973, 5; BArch DR 3, 2. Schicht, 544 Klohr, Kaul, Zum Stand … 1976/77, 13 March 1978.
[31] Bistumsarchiv Erfurt, Sekretariat bzw. Vorsitzender der BOK / BBK und Außenstelle Berlin des Sekretariats der DBK, box III.7 Teil 2, Anlage …, 1; Lange, Dennhardt and Schubarth 1989: 19; quotes in Hoffmann 2000: 242.
[32] SAMPO-BArch DY 24/14521 Wissenschaftlicher Rat für Jugendfragen, Ratstagung am 12.4.1988, 10; BArch DC 401/106 Müller, Wissenschaftliche Konferenz des ZIJ vom 8.–10.10.1975 in Leipzig, Bericht über die Tagung der Sektion 2, 1, 3; BArch DC 401/63 Sektor Jugend und Ideologie, Soziale Triebkräfte und Grundbedürfnisse Jugendlicher an der Schwelle der 90er Jahre; SAMPO-BArch DY 24/14521 Lange, Thesen zur ideologischen Entwicklung im Jugendalter; Friedrich, Klohr and Förster 1971; Schauer 1980; Müller 1985: 39–41, 44; see also Lange 1990.