Sixth MZES Research Programme 2005 - 2008

B-A1 The Impact of the Comintern on the Western European Party System

The German-Russian Historians Commission, founded in 1998, declared the research on the Communist International (Comintern, 1919-1943) as its main focus of research. Within this frame, the project will investigate the influence of the Comintern (and therefore of the foreign politics of the Soviet Union) on the parliamentary systems of Western Europe exercised via the communist parties (“sections” of the Comintern) in Germany and France within the period from 1924 to 1928.

The relationship toward Germany was given the highest priority within the Comintern as well as in the KPdSU. This is not only illustrated by the fact that the leaders of the German communist parties had private correspondence with Stalin, now published by Hermann Weber and Bernhard Bayerlein.

The expansion of the project by the German-Russian Historians Commission (financed by the Ministry of the Interior, Berlin) and its extension (from 2004 to 2006) allows for the publication of a book on “The End of the Communist Internationale” on the Stalin-Hitler-Pact and its consequences for the overall research question in autumn 2005. A substantial publication on the project as a whole is planned for 2006 which will then also include Russian historians.

This book which will explain the various facets and “channels” of the Comintern influence on the political system of the Weimar Republic (as well as its extent and structure) and to the wider interconnection of Soviet foreign politics. The documentation shall demonstrate the uniqueness of Soviet politics in its plurality toward Germany or France (communist parties, Comintern, Soviet foreign politics, secret services, cultural relations, Soviet domestic and economic policies). Resolutions of the KPdSU toward German affairs shall be published within this work.