[The Guardian] Enemies everywhere: photos show absurdity of life under the Stasi

Enemies everywhere: photos show absurdity of life under the Stasi

East German secret police saw evidence of western sabotage in the most mundane events

A football kicked over a wall, a lightbulb thrown out of a window, a suspiciously unkempt lawn: for East Germany’s secret police, even the most mundane event was recorded as potential proof of the capitalist enemy trying to sabotage life in the socialist republic.

Thirty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, researchers at the Stasi Records Agency have for the first time systematically analysed the vast photographic archive the surveillance state amassed as a result of its untrammelled paranoia.

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