On 27 August 1987 the SPD’s commission on basic values and the Academy of Social Sciences of the SED, the ruling party of East Germany, published a joint paper. Its subject was the dispute of ideologies and common security. The paper called for eine Kultur des politischen Streits und des Dialogs, a culture of political dispute and dialogue. It said that mutual criticism must not count as interference in internal affairs, and that each system needed free information and open discussion. The East German party newspaper Neues Deutschland printed it. Intellectuals, parts of the opposition and the Protestant church in East Germany took it up. Its influence on the daily policy of the SED leadership remained marginal.