It was founded from the Society for the Studies of Soviet Culture to teach about Russian culture to Germans unfamiliar with it. It quickly turned into a propaganda tool and eventually changed its name.[citation needed]
Due to the immense popularity of Mikhail Gorbachev with ordinary East Germans disillusioned with their own hardline Communist leaders, the DSF's membership grew massively in the last years of the regime which many interpret as a sign of support of Gorbachev's glasnost and perestroika by the East German people.[citation needed] In 1989 there were 6.3 million members.[1]
^Jurich, Dirk (2006). Staatssozialismus und gesellschaftliche Differenzierung: eine empirische Studie [State Socialism and Social Differentiation: An Empirical Study] (in German). LIT Verlag Münster. p. 32. ISBN3825898938.