The File: A Personal History

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Prior to the unification of Germany, The Ministry for State Security in East Germany was commonly referred to as the Stasi, which was the official security service of the state. It had its headquarters in East Berlin and was run from a huge compound in the Berlin – Lichtenberg area. Additionally, Stasi had several other smaller facilities across the entire city. It was considered amongst the most effective and oppressive intelligence agencies in the world. The agency recruited plain clothes citizens who acted as informers and were known as IMs (Inofizielle mitarbeiters). They were also referred to as unofficial collaborators, implying that they worked unofficially for the East German Ministry of State Security (Stasi). The extent of the recruitment of MFs was to such a large extent that there was one informer for every sixty-five people (Fulbrook, 2005).

During the period when the Stasi was at the height of its power it was considered to be the shield of the Communist Party in East Germany. About one million full time and half a million part time informers worked for the agency while it’s massive fortified complex operated from an entire city block that was equipped with remand cells, a spy school, an arms depot, gymnasium and a hospital. All officers were connected with telephone networks in being facilitated with knowing everything about every person. The agency’s archives comprised of documents that could stretch for a hundred miles and contained information about over sixteen million people. The subjects of these documents varied from stolen letters, records of casual conversations and accusations by the unofficial collaborators. The records also contained details of the assault plan for invading West Berlin and there ...

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...s do not add much to the methods of theoretical understandings pertaining to moral choices of individuals. At the end of the book Ash has attempted to search for common biographical characteristics amongst the people that worked in providing information about him to the Stasi. In this context, his narrative appears to transform into becoming stressed and weak, especially in the context of matters such as audacity and the devious search for self interests. This is not satisfactorily explained by way of the different classifications of developmental psychology.

Works Cited

Ash, Timothy garton. The File: A Personal History, Vintage, 1998.

Fulbrook, Mary, The People's State: East German Society from Hitler to Honecker. London:

Yale University press, 2005.

Koehler, John O. Stasi: the untold story of the East German secret police. Westview Press, 2000.

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