Contents

Albert Norden

This article's lead section may be too short to adequately summarize the key points. Please consider expanding the lead to provide an accessible overview of all important aspects of the article. (May 2022)

German politician (1904–1982)

Albert Norden
Norden in 1963
Secretary for Friendly Parties of the Central Committee Secretariat
In office 1971 – January 1979
General Secretary	Erich Honecker
Preceded by	Hermann Matern
Succeeded by	Joachim Herrmann
Secretary for Foreign Information of the Central Committee Secretariat
In office März 1955 – January 1979
General Secretary	Walter Ulbricht Erich Honecker
Preceded by	Hermann Axen
Succeeded by	Hermann Axen
Secretary for Agitation of the Central Committee Secretariat
In office März 1955 – 22 April 1967
First Secretary	Walter Ulbricht
Preceded by	Hermann Axen
Succeeded by	Werner Lamberz
Personal details
Born	Albert Norden (1904-12-04)4 December 1904 Myslowitz, Province of Silesia, Kingdom of Prussia, German Empire (now Mysłowice, Poland)
Died	30 May 1982(1982-05-30) (aged 77) East Berlin, East Germany
Resting place	Memorial of the Socialists, Friedrichsfelde Central Cemetery
Political party	Socialist Unity Party (1946–1982)
Other political affiliations	Communist Party of Germany (1920–1946)
Occupation	Politician Party Functionary Academic Carpenter
Central institution membership 1958–1981: Full member, Politburo of the Central Committee 1955–1981: Full member, Central Committee Other offices held 1976–1981: Member, State Council 1960–1979: Member, National Defence Council 1960–1979: Head, West Commission at the Politburo 1955–1967: Head, Agitation Commission at the Politburo 1949–1950; 1958–1981: Member, Volkskammer 1949: Member, German People's Congress

Albert Norden (4 December 1904 – 30 May 1982^[1]) was a German communist politician.

Albert Norden was born in Myslowitz, Silesia on 4 December 1904, one of the five recorded children born to the liberal rabbi Joseph Norden [de]^[2] (1870–1943) and his wife, Emilie Meseritz/Norden (1876–1931).^[3]

In 1919, he joined the Young Communist League of Germany. The following year, he became a member of the Communist Party of Germany. From 1923 onwards, he held editorial positions in various communist publications. Between 1931 and 1933, he was the editor of Rote Fahne ('Red Flag').^[4][5]

In 1933 Norden emigrated to France. He also spent time in exile in Denmark and Czechoslovakia. In 1938, he returned to France. Norden was detained in France 1939–1940. In 1941, he was able to emigrate to the United States.^[4][5] During World War II, his father died in the Theresienstadt concentration camp.^[3][6]

In exile in Paris and New York he worked with various popular front publications. He wrote some chapters, dealing with the international linkages of the German NSDAP, in the widely read 1933 Braunbuch über Reichstagsbrand und Hitlerterror ('Brown Book on Reichstag Fire and Hitler Terror').^[7] In 1940, he married Herta Fischer (1908–1990), and their son, Johnny, was born in October 1942.^[3] In October 1946 he returned to Berlin, where he became editor of the weekly Deutschlands Stimme ('Voice of Germany').^[4]

In 1949, he was assigned as head of the Press Section of the Information Department of Ministerial Council of the German Democratic Republic, working under Gerhart Eisler. In December 1952, he was purged from his position in the Press Department, but obtained a professorship at Humboldt University.^[5][8]

In 1954, he became director of the National Council of the National Front for a Democratic Germany. He would also become director of the Committee for German Unity.^[8] In 1955, he became a member of the Central Committee of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED). He was elected as one of the secretaries of the Central Committee. In 1958 he became a member of the Politburo of the party.^[5]

Norden served as head of the Agitation Committee of the Politburo, 1955–67. He was in-charge of the Information & Foreign Department of the Politburo until 1979. In 1958, he became a member of the Volkskammer (People's Chamber, the parliament of the GDR). In 1960 he became the head of the 'West Commission'.^[5] In June 1965 Norden suggested that regional elections in the German Democratic Republic should be open for alternate candidates.^[9]

In 1963, Norden became a member of the National Defense Council, a post he held until 1979. In 1976 he became a member of the State Council. In April 1981, the then ailing Norden was left out of the Central Committee and Politburo at the 10th SED party congress. In the same year he left the Volkskammer and State Council positions.^[5][10]

After the war Norden argued in several publications, articles and speeches that there was a direct continuation between the Hitler and Adenauer governments. In 1965 the National Front published a work by Norden, Braunbuch ('Brown Book'), in which he accused over 1,900 politicians, state officials and other prominent persons in West Germany of having worked for the Nazi regime in the past. The book became a reference in the West German New Left, which increasingly had begun to question the official historiography on the Nazi period.^[11]

Norden was born into a Jewish petty bourgeois family, the son of a rabbi.^[2] As an adult, Norden declined to identify himself as a Jew. He was however, one of the most prominent persons of Jewish origin in East German society.^[12]

• The thugs of Europe (1942) - a pamphlet on the Third Reich
• Media related to Albert Norden at Wikimedia Commons