Once World War I ended, the goal of the German Democratic Republic was to create a high demand for labor due to the destruction caused by the war. The company needed to be rebuilt because it was buried under an extremely large debt to the Soviet Union. East German culture was heavily influenced by communism and particularly Stalinism. This not only intensified economic and political competition against their West German counterparts, but also gave rise to the repressive character of the German Democratic Republic, to the point that citizens of the German Democratic Republic made numerous attempts to escape this which was essentially a dictatorship. Yet, surprisingly, fertility rates in the German Democratic Republic were higher than in West Germany before unification. Politically, East Germany was controlled by the Soviet Union and West Germany was aided by the democratic West and the United States, which meant that the two countries must have developed separate governments influenced by different ideologies. East Germany's communist leaders wanted to build a system that emphasized a sense of responsibility and obligation to collective society as well as strong moral obedience to socialist goals. Therefore, policies created to reinforce socialist beliefs also impacted birth rates, regardless of marital status. As a result, the relationship between social, economic and political policies and women's lives has played a key role in whether fertility increases or decreases. Unlike West Germany, the Communists desperately needed women in the workforce, so there was an unusual emphasis on the importance of women's employment. There was much at stake, for example, reparation for middle of paper ......d Fertility in East Germany, "Journal of Marriage and Family (1997): 44. Monika Maron, « Letzter Zugriff auf die Frau” [“Final charge against women”], in Monika Maron, “Nach Maßgabe meiner Befreiungskraft: Artikel und Essays”. . Translated by Allison Brown, no. 227, September 28, 1950, p. 1-3; Deutsche Demokratische Republik. Im Zeichen des Aufbaus des Sozialismus [History of social policy in Germany since 1945, Vol. 8: 1949-1961: Under the sign of the construction of socialism. n°8/42 Translated by Thomas Dunlap..