Im Objektiv der Staatsmacht: Wenn Fußballfans zu Staatsfeinden werden

In the organizer's words:

Lecture and discussion

Soccer in the GDR was much more than just sport: it was a stage for stubbornness, protest and the longing for freedom. The event "In the Lens of State Power" sheds light on an explosive chapter in German soccer history and shows how the SED regime marked the stadiums as hotbeds of danger for socialism.

GDR soccer offered spectators, fans and subcultures inside and outside the stadium a broad space for undesirable behavior. Political criticism, civil disobedience or expressions of sympathy towards West German clubs were interpreted by the state leadership as direct opposition to state socialism. The consequences were draconian: the Ministry for State Security (MfS) and the German People's Police (DVP) took repressive and sometimes brutal action against soccer supporters. Peaceful spectators were turned into people under observation, fans were criminalized. Even GDR footballers who fled to the West were monitored by the MfS in West Germany by hired photographers.

The event organized by the Hamburg State Center for Political Education on 9 June 2026 documents these close-meshed surveillance methods comprehensively using original photographs from the MfS and People's Police photo archives. Dr. René Wiese (Zentrum deutsche Sportgeschichte) will present the latest photographic sources from the MfS and DVP archives. Andreas Käckell (NDR) will then discuss with Jens Fuge (fan of Chemie Leipzig) and Norbert Nachtweih (Eintracht Frankfurt/FC Bayern Munich, escape 1976) the realities of surveillance by the GDR inside and outside the stadium. Visitors will gain a rare insight "through the lens of state power" and experience the history of protest, rioting and state despotism in the shadow of the floodlight masts.