I wonder how much of that was just regular Stasi bureaucrats trying to keep their job. If everyone on their watchlist was a potential spy, then maybe their boss

I wonder how much of that was just regular Stasi bureaucrats trying to keep their job. If everyone on their watchlist was a potential spy, then maybe their bosses stay scared enough to keep them employed? Or maybe that was the metric they used for promotions, and it inevitably became a target, resulting in a massive inflation of potential "spies" within the bureaucracy.