Campus for Democracy
The people in the GDR showed that it is possible to overthrow a brutal and repressive regime by peaceful means: the so-called Peaceful Revolution is a model for many democracy movements worldwide. One of the central places of spying and repression was the Stasi headquarters in Normannenstraße in Lichtenberg – my home district in Berlin. At this place, up to 7,000 employees organised the surveillance and persecution of the population for almost four decades.
In 1990, this place became a central scene of the Peaceful Revolution. Demonstrators entered the sealed-off area and prevented the Stasi from destroying important documents of the SED dictatorship and its repressive apparatus. Today, parts of the site are used as a place of education about dictatorship and resistance. But many buildings remain empty and are increasingly falling into disrepair.
This should not happen to a place of such national and global importance. That is why I, together with many others, am committed to turning the former Stasi headquarters into a living place of remembrance of the repression organised from this base, of the Peaceful Revolution and the process of coming to terms with the SED dictatorship – and at the same time into a place of learning and exchange about democracy and democracy movements in the here and now. Together we want to turn the site into a living memorial to the Peaceful Revolution: A Campus for Democracy in the heart of Europe and with international appeal. There are democracy movements on every continent. But only a few have been as successful as ours.
We are developing concrete ideas for this vision as well as events and dialogue forums. We do this in partnership and together with local actors and interested citizens. Here you will always find up-to-date information:
- 17. January 2023
Nach einer Führung über das Gelände haben wir uns darüber ausgetauscht, wie das Projekt "Campus für Demokratie" weiter vorangebracht werden kann.
- 19. September 2022
Auf dem Campus für Demokratie wurde das jährliche Campus-Kino mit dem Film "Bettina" eröffntet. Ich habe die Veranstaltung als Moderatorin begleitet.
- 19. May 2022
Ich war bei der Einweihung des neuen Informations- und Leitwegesystems auf dem Gelände der ehemaligen Stasi-Zentrale in Berlin-Lichtenberg mit dabei. Es soll einer besseren Orientierung auf dem Areal dienen.
- 18. March 2022
Together with pianist Igor Levit I organized a #NoWar house concert in Berlin with musicians from Ukraine and Russia.
- 21. September 2021
Das Gelände der ehemaligen Stasi-Zentrale in Berlin wird erhalten und neu gestaltet. Es soll Platz für Kunst und Kultur bieten, Geschichtsvermittlung ansprechend umsetzen und zudem mit Gastronomie und Übernachtungsangeboten aufwarten. Mehr dazu findet ihr hier:
- 6. August 2021
Aus einem Ort der Unterdrückung einen Ort der Aufklärung über Demokratie und Freiheit machen: das ist unser gemeinsames Ziel. Mit unserer Berliner Spitzenkandidatin Bettina Jarasch habe ich die ehemalige Stasi-Zentrale in Berlin-Lichtenberg besichtigt.
- 9. November 2020
31 years after the fall of the Wall, I wrote an essay for the Tagesspiegel. You can read here why we should better commemorate the peaceful revolution and which Berlin monument has the potential for doing so.
- 5. October 2020
Lichtenberg stays colourful! With this slogan in mind, hundreds of people took to the streets last Saturday, on the anniversary of German reunification, to oppose the march of the far right group "3rd Way" in Hohenschönhausen.
- 2. September 2020
Unser Antrag für ein europäisches Berlin wurde im kleinen Parteitag am 26.08. angenommen - mehr dazu hier!
- 1. September 2020
Last Saturday, a mixture of Reich citizens, anti-vaccination activists and Nazis demonstrated in Berlin against the government's corona policy. I was there as an observer and shared my impressions on Twitter.
- 11. November 2019
When I was in eighth grade, my German teacher asked me to choose a poem that meant a lot to me. After giving it much thought, I picked out this one sentence by Andreas Tenzer. It was 1999, exactly 10 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Today, 20 years later, we are celebrating the 30th anniversary of the fall of the wall.
- 24th October 2019
Wir fordern einen Nachtzug zwischen Berlin und Brüssel anlässlich der deutschen EU-Ratspräsidentschaft. Ein Nachtzug zwischen Berlin und Brüssel, „eingefärbt im Blau und Gelb der Europafahne (...) Das wäre ein Zeichen, dass wir es ernst damit meinen, auch unseren eigenen CO2-Abdruck zu reduzieren“, sagte ich dem Tagesspiegel.
