Between 1995 and 1998 she worked as a senior hospital administrator in Berlin's Prenzlauer Berg quarter. She nevertheless remained politically concerned, in December 1996 switching her political allegiance from the Social Democratic Party (SPD) to the CDU (centre-right party) because she objected to her SPD party (former) comrades entering into political alliances with the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS). She was joined in switching from national left-wing parties to the CDU by other former citizen rights activists from the East German period, such as Günter Nooke and Vera Lengsfeld. It was also in 1996 that Barbe was a co-founder of the Berlin Citizens' Office for Evaluating the Consequences of the SED Dictatorship ("Berliner Bürgerbüro zur Aufarbeitung von Folgeschäden der SED-Diktatur"). In 2001 she became a member of the National Executive of the umbrella organisation for Communist Tyranny Victims' Associations ("Union der Opferverbände Kommunistischer Gewaltherrschaft" / UOKG), serving as the organisation's deputy chair until 2007. She has also been actively involved between 2000 and 2017 (when she retired) with the Saxony Regional Office for Political Education ("Sächsische Landeszentrale für politische Bildung"). References 1951 births Living people People from Brandenburg an der Havel 20th-century German biologists Members of the 10th Volkskammer Members of the Bundestag for Berlin Members of the Bundestag 1987–1990 Members of the Bundestag 1990–1994 Christian Democratic Union of Germany politicians East German dissidents Female members of the Volkskammer People from Treptow-Köpenick Members of the Bundestag for the Social Democratic Party of Germany