Civil society engagement in East Germany is hardly behind that in the West. Also because companies actively support us. Now the funding should be strengthened.
Companies are an important pillar of civil society in East Germany. They are particularly committed locally and get involved more often than West German companies when it comes to specific projects. Thanks to them, civil society in the East is basically as strong as in West Germany, even though its resources are limited.
This emerges from the study “Diverse. Local. Networked” by the Stifterverband für die Deutsche Wissenschaft on entrepreneurial and civil society engagement in East Germany. The previously unpublished paper lies tagesschau.de before.
Study author Tahmaz: “East German companies can be role models”
According to Birthe Tahmaz, one of the study authors, East German companies pay close attention to what support their communities need specifically and in the long term. “This means they can be a role model for West German companies,” says Tahmaz, who heads the Stifterverband’s “ZiviZ” think tank.
Tahmaz and her two co-authors write in the foreword, especially in East Germany, “where citizens have been required to have a particularly high degree of adaptability in recent decades.” They counter a “media-driven image of East Germany” with associations such as structural weakness, populism or social aging with new figures on civil society.
The study is based on the ZiviZ survey – a representative survey of civil society organizations that has been carried out since 2012. In 2023, around 12,800 organizations took part. The authors also consulted a survey of more than 7,300 companies and researched association registers. Political orientations were not examined.
Many clubs, hardly any foundations
In 2022, there were a total of 102,096 registered civil society organizations in East Germany, 96 percent of which were associations. They were joined by around 2,100 non-profit corporations, 1,800 legal foundations under civil law and 275 cooperatives oriented towards the common good.
In West Germany, foundations play a larger role: for every East German foundation, there are twelve West German ones. The important role of the clubs, however, is the same throughout Germany.
The organizations focus primarily on the areas of culture, sport, leisure and society, education and upbringing. Sports clubs, fishing clubs and other sports organizations make up the largest group in East Germany at 23 percent. They are primarily in the foreground in smaller communities, while educational offerings such as sponsored kindergartens and adult education are at the forefront in large cities.
Very regional different developments
However, the dynamics vary regionally. Between 2012 and 2022, the number of clubs grew in Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt, while it stagnated in Brandenburg and declined in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Thuringia.
However, Erfurt and Suhl, two Thuringian cities, alongside Leipzig, Potsdam and some neighboring districts, are among the municipalities in which a particularly large number of new clubs have been founded in recent years.
And when it comes to the so-called engagement rate, Thuringia is also above the German and West German average. The quota indicates how many people in the population are involved. According to the Federal Ministry of Family Affairs’ volunteer survey from 2019, it was 40.8 percent in Thuringia. In other East German countries it was between 35 and 38 percent. The national average was 39.7 percent. So East and West are getting closer.
East German companies “pitch in”
At first glance, support for this civil society is similarly strong among East and West German companies. Almost everyone gets involved, and in East Germany three quarters do so regularly. Almost nine out of ten companies give money, four out of five also donate goods. Around a quarter start their own projects.
In some areas, however, East German companies show more commitment than their West German counterparts. They are more likely to leave their own resources available for use (65 to 59 percent) and are more likely to provide free services (63 to 56 percent). And while 60 percent of all companies in East Germany declared that they would “help out” on specific occasions, the figure was 43 percent in West Germany.
This is probably one of the reasons why East German organizations turn more often to companies in search of support. 51 percent of them sometimes or regularly work with companies. In West Germany it is 42 percent.
Financial support has limits
But financial strength remains a problem. An East German company donates an average of around 7,000 euros less per year than a West German company, which gives an average of around 16,000 euros. However, this is mainly due to the large number of financially strong companies in the West, because the median value does not differ.
Birthe Tahmaz sees this as a major disadvantage for East Germany, because for historical reasons the capital of companies and private individuals is lower. “It is all the more important to specifically promote the establishment of foundations and to think ahead when starting up companies in East Germany,” says Tahmaz. The study team also recommends expanding advisory services on funding and simplifying the application and verification procedures of authorities and foundations.
Although East German organizations receive more public funding, little of it reaches the smallest ones: they only get eight percent of their income from public funding. According to the authors, they lack the time and personnel to acquire the latter.
Community initiative for better support
The Federal Government’s Eastern Commissioner, Carsten Schneider (SPD), sees “a diverse and committed civil society in East Germany.” Especially in rural regions, there is often a lack of organizational or material support, said Schneider. “We all have to tackle this together.”
Schneider wants to present a new initiative today: “Future Paths East” is intended to strengthen civil society in East Germany. A community fund is intended to support individual projects in an unbureaucratic manner.
Several private foundations and companies have joined forces for this purpose. In addition to the Cellex Foundation in Dresden, the initiators include the Freudenberg Foundation, the “Citizens for Citizens from Halle” foundation, the “Zeit Stiftung Bucerius” and the Federal Association of German Foundations. Schneider is a patron.