Founding members included Wolfgang Schnur, Friedrich Schorlemmer, Rainer Eppelmann, Günter Nooke and Thomas Welz.

Others, like Nooke, who left some time later, resented the growing cooperation with the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) of East Germany, which had been a member of the Communist-dominated National Front of parties and mass organisations that had supported the Communist regime.

Only a few days prior to the elections, party chairman Schnur had to confess to having been an informer for the Ministry for State Security (Stasi), and resigned.

Although Alliance for Germany won the elections, Democratic Beginning only collected 0.9% of votes, amounting to four seats in the Volkskammer.

After the mergers, Merkel was elected in the post-unification election as a member of the all-German Bundestag for the CDU, was immediately appointed a minister in Helmut Kohl's government as a form of East German representation, became party chairwoman in 2000 and eventually Chancellor of Germany in 2005.