174. When was the German Democratic Republic (GDR) founded?

Answer options

1. 1947
2. 1949
3. 1953
4. 1956

Explanation

The GDR was founded on 7 October 1949, when the German People’s Council put the 1949 GDR Constitution into force and convened the Provisional People’s Chamber—a response to the establishment of the Federal Republic of Germany on 23 May 1949 in the western zones. Constitutionally, the Soviet Occupation Zone became a socialist one-party state under SED dominance, fundamentally different from the liberal democratic rule-of-law order of the Basic Law. In constitutional and international law, the Basic Law affirmed the continued existence of Germany as a whole (Preamble, former Art. 23), realized in 1990 through the GDR’s accession and the Two Plus Four Treaty.