Local Authority and the SS State: The Conflict over Population Policy in Danzig-West Prussia, 1939–1945

1969 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 331-355 ◽  
Author(s):  
Herbert S. Levine
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Political System ◽  
Population Policy ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Popular Imagination ◽  
The Third ◽  
Internal Policy ◽  
The Third Reich

The notion that Hitler's Third Reich was a monolithic and efficient dictatorship has by now been safely buried, although it may persist in the popular imagination. This essay is intended as a contribution to the newer phase of the historical postmortem on National Socialism, the attempt to trace the precise mechanism of decision-making and internal policy-diversion in the Third Reich. Distortion of policy, as the result of disagreements among leaders or of bureaucratic sabotage, is a feature common to all modern political systems. In the grim context of the Third Reich, all attempts to distort or divert policy which tended to ameliorate inhuman aspects of Hitler's rule have been dignified by the term “resistance.” This study will show that successful local resistance was possible, even to the SS, perhaps the most powerful political force in the wartime Reich. The inquiry has its juridical aspects, since admission of the existence of successful resistance to policies and organizations declared by international and German courts to have been criminal, resistance even by those who accepted the basic premises of the regime, implies a varied distribution of criminal guilt. This distribution will not be attempted here, but the judicial analogy should not be forgotten. The historian is relieved of the responsibility of passing sentence, but, like the judge, he is concerned with more than the determination of individual actions. An understanding of the political system of Hitler's state requires as well an investigation of motivation.

The Position of the NSDAP in the German Constitutional Order

1938 ◽  
Vol 32 (6) ◽  
pp. 1059-1081
Author(s):  
Alfred V. Boerner
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Political System ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
The Political ◽  
Constitutional Order ◽  
The Third ◽  
Official Control ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Ultimate Limit

Perhaps no country has ever constructed so elaborate and complicated a mechanism for correlating the political and economic requirements of its rulers as has Germany under Hitler. Under no other political system has the organization of all classes been pushed so close to its ultimate limit. Every conceivable aspect of life in the Third Reich has been closely scrutinized for its value to National Socialism and subjected to some form of official control. Because of the continual state of crisis in which the régime finds itself, both at home and abroad, this control has been expanded to an extent undreamed of in pre-Hitler Germany. To make it effective, there has been constructed a labyrinth of bureaus, agencies, and supervisory offices that is confusing and often incomprehensible to the foreign observer.The task of rationalizing this complex system and justifying the tremendous exercise of authority it requires has been indeed a trying one for the German speculative genius. Seeming contradictions arising from the practical political necessities faced by National Socialism have not made it any easier. For example, the propaganda value of portraying the Third Reich as a bulwark against soviet tyranny has made necessary a complicated explanation of the difference between Russian “regimentation” and German “organization.”

Hitler, for Example: Registers of National Socialist Exemplarity in Contemporary Germany

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-29
Author(s):  
Nitzan Shoshan
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Moral Values ◽  
Moral Life ◽  
Far Right ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Moral Exemplars ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The Third Reich

Abstract This article examines whether and how the figure of Adolf Hitler in particular, and National Socialism more generally, operate as moral exemplars in today’s Germany. In conversation with similar studies about Mosely in England, Franco in Spain, and Mussolini in Italy, it seeks to advance our comparative understanding of neofascism in Europe and beyond. In Germany, legal and discursive constraints limit what can be said about the Third Reich period, while even far-right nationalists often condemn Hitler, for either the Holocaust or his military failure. Here I revise the concept of moral exemplarity as elaborated by Caroline Humphry to argue that Hitler and National Socialism do nevertheless work as contemporary exemplars, in at least three fashions: negativity, substitution, and extension. First, they stand as the most extreme markers of negative exemplarity for broad publics that understand them as illustrations of absolute moral depravity. Second, while Hitler himself is widely unpopular, Führer-substitutes such as Rudolf Hess provide alternative figures that German nationalists admire and seek to emulate. Finally, by extension to the realm of the ordinary, National Socialism introduces a cast of exemplars in the figures of loving grandfathers or anonymous fallen soldiers. The moral values for which they stand, I show, appear to be particularly significant for young nationalists. An extended, more open-ended notion of exemplarity, I conclude, can offer important insights about the lingering afterlife of fascist figures in the moral life of European nationalists today.

scholarly journals Et manifest på dansk må omhandle modersmålet og angribe fædrelandet: Litteraturhistoriske forstudier om kunst og sprog

2009 ◽  
Vol 37 (107) ◽  
pp. 138-162
Author(s):  
Carsten Juhl
Keyword(s):  
Mass Media ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
Mother Tongue ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The Third ◽  
State Of Mind ◽  
The Mass Media ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Danish School

A Manifesto in Danish has to deal with the Mother tongue and attack the Fatherland: Some preliminary studies about art and language presented from the point of view of the history of literature:The study follows five lines of reasoning: The first deals with the impossibility of formulating a manifesto in general; the impossibility of advocating the use of violence and on the other hand the impossibility of using dialogue. So the system of prescriptions and promises normally used in a manifesto no longer have sense.The next line of reasoning concerns the impossibility of presenting fictional preoccupations in the mass media and explaining why literature in Danish has to deal with its contents and form outside the current commentary and celebration hosted by the mass media. In this second line the Vico legacy is introduced to explain a conflict in Danish literature concerning its lack of an epic centre of historical and aesthetical understanding. Benjamin’s defence of the epicity in the work of Brecht is similarly discussed in this second part of the study. The third line of reasoning is presenting some older investigations on Danish prose into this question of what an epic dimension in the residual Danish culture might have been about in the last century. But all the investigations presented failed to get to the point. The point of dissidence was too weak and the point of national-socialism too clever to be manifest: It could easily hide behind the general cover up of theological aesthetics dominating Lutheran Denmark.So the fourth line of reasoning deals with political theology as a sort of interiorised state of mind in Denmark.The fifth line of reasoning presents two examples of something radically different and rather excluded in the political culture of Denmark: The Danish Council of Freedom (Danmarks Frihedsråd) during WWII which failed when it came to attacking the collaboration between Danish democracy and the Third Reich; and the Danish School of Writing (Forfatterskolen) which has been attacked by the local establishment since it was born 25 years ago.

Rituals of Humiliation

2021 ◽  
pp. 46-64
Author(s):  
Edward B. Westermann
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Social Power ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
German Society ◽  
Concentration Camps ◽  
Symbiotic Relationship ◽  
Abusive Behavior ◽  
The Third ◽  
Killing Fields ◽  
The Third Reich

This chapter evaluates the significance of ritual and symbolism to the construction and manifestation of power under National Socialism. It underlines the importance of practices such as the mammoth party rallies at Nuremberg, the universal displays of the swastika on flags, pins, and armbands and the ubiquitous use of “Heil Hitler” as the standard greeting of the Third Reich under the Nazi regime. The chapter also contends that the creation of Nazi power was accomplished in no small measure by the use of ritual, and, in fact, ritual in the Third Reich served as an expression of “social power” that extended into virtually all aspects of German society. These celebratory events of Nazi power involved daily acts of verbal or physical humiliation of Jews, communists, and socialists, as well as organized and exemplary episodes of abusive behavior. Ultimately, the chapter studies the symbiotic relationship between violence, competition, and male comradeship and how it became manifest in the actions, rituals, and celebratory practices of Nazi paramilitary organizations through acts of humiliation by SS and policemen on the streets, in the concentration camps, and in the killing fields.

Friedrich Rainer, National Socialism, and Postwar Europe: The Historical World of an Austrian Nazi

1999 ◽  
Vol 30 ◽  
pp. 103-126
Author(s):  
Maurice Williams
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Major Party ◽  
The Third ◽  
Party Positions ◽  
Postwar Europe ◽  
Adriatic Coast ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Keen Observer ◽  
Historical World

Friedrich Rainer (1903-50?) personified the semiautonomous chieftain who served the Third Reich so well. Born in Carinthia, he worked his way into major party positions in Austria and then, after the Anschluss, moved into crucial posts in the Ostmark. After leading the party in Salzburg, he highlighted his Nazi career by serving as Gauleiter of his native province. Simultaneously he governed the occupied regions in northern Slovenia (Carniola) and later added a role as Hitler's deputy on the Adriatic coast (Istria, Trieste, and environs). He was extremely ambitious, well connected in party circles, a capable administrator, a pronounced Pan-German, and a Hitler loyalist to the end. He also revealed himself as a keen observer of his surroundings, an active propagandist, and an able politician. In short, as a leader of consequence in the Third Reich, he did not differ much from other key Nazi lieutenants.

Der Schatten der Kierkegaard-Renaissance. Eine rezeptionsgeschichtliche Studie über die dezisionistisch-irrationalistischen Kierkegaard-Interpretationen zwischen den Weltkriegen in Deutschland

2015 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Keisuke Yoshida
Keyword(s):  
Present Article ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Interwar Period ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
Strong Influence ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
The Third ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
German Speaking ◽  
The Third Reich

AbstractDuring the first half of the 20th century, especially between the two world wars, the German-speaking countries experienced the so-called Kierkegaard Renaissance. Although at that time a wide range of thinkers engaged with Kierkegaard’s writings, Georg Lukács and Theodor W. Adorno argue that Kierkegaard exercised a particularly strong influence on fascist thought. Furthermore, Wilfried Greve claims that Kierkegaard was widely interpreted in the decisionist-irrationalist fashion during the Third Reich, which resulted in the appropriation of Kierkegaard by the ideologues of National Socialism, particularly by Alfred Baeumler, a leading intellectual of National Socialism, and by Emanuel Hirsch, a leading theologian of the “German Christians” movement at the time. In the present article I examine historical examples of the decisionist-irrationalist Kierkegaard interpretation. Then I discuss Carl Schmitt’s appropriation of Kierkegaard and the critical responses to it from Karl Löwith and Norbert Bolz. This discussion leads to the conclusion that the decisionist-irrationalist Kierkegaard interpretation takes on an “occasionalistic” character and thereby willy nilly renders the arbitrary or accidental content of the decision absolute. It can be maintained that this “occasionalistic” character of the decisionistirrationalist interpretation paved the way for a Kierkegaard appropriation favored by fascist ideologues in the interwar period

Ägyptologen im Dritten Reich: Biographische Notizen anhand der sogenannten „Steindorff-Liste“

2012 ◽  
Vol 5 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 120-247 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Schneider
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Second World War ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
The Third ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
John Wilson ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Second World

Abstract The history of Egyptology in the Third Reich has never been the subject of academic analysis. This article gives a detailed overview of the biographies of Egyptologists in National Socialist Germany and their later careers after the Second World War. It scrutinizes their attitude towards the ideology of the Third Reich and their involvement in the political and intellectual Gleichschaltung of German Higher Education, as well as the impact National Socialism had on the discourse within the discipline. A letter written in 1946 by Georg Steindorff, one of the emigrated German Egyptologists, to John Wilson, Professor at the Oriental Institute Chicago, which incriminated former colleagues and exonerated others, is first published here and used as a framework for the debate.

Von der 'Polizei der Demokratie' zum 'Glied und Werkzeug der nationalsozialistischen Gemeinschaft'

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antonio Vera
Keyword(s):  
Weimar Republic ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Police Force ◽  
Role Function ◽  
The Third ◽  
Highly Effective ◽  
State Authority ◽  
Effective Instrument ◽  
The Third Reich

Interwar Germany represents a highly interesting period from the perspective of police history. This book focuses on the German police force as an instrument of state authority and analyses its role, function and importance in interwar Germany based on the articles published between 1918 and 1939 in the journal ‘Die Polizei’. It reveals that the failure of the Weimar police as an instrument of state authority contributed significantly to the rise of National Socialism and the destruction of the Weimar Republic. After the Nazi takeover, the German police rapidly became a loyal and highly effective instrument of rule for the regime. Hence, the German police in the Third Reich blatantly failed in moral terms, but not as an instrument of state authority.

scholarly journals Share of death: Care crosses camp

2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 629-648
Author(s):  
Georgios Tsagdis
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Concentration Camp ◽  
Total Power ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Death Care

The essay thematises the question of care in conditions of total power - not merely extra muros, in the everyday life of the Third Reich, but in its most radical articulation, the concentration camp. Drawing inspiration from Todorov?s work, the essay engages with Levinas, Agamben, Derrida and Nancy, to investigate Heidegger?s determination of Dasein?s horizon through a solitary confrontation with death. Drawing extensively on primary testimonies, the essay shows that when the enclosure of the camp became the Da of existence, care assumed a radical significance as the link between the death of another and the death of oneself. In the face of an apparatus of total power and its attempt to individuate and isolate death, the sharing of death in the figure of care remained one?s most inalienable act of resistance and the last means to hold on to death as something that could be truly one?s own.

The Repudiation of Rational Natural Law by National-Socialism

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ernst Fraenkel
Keyword(s):  
Political Science ◽  
Legal System ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Third Reich

The chapter describes how the prerogative state was able to completely abolish the inviolability of the law. Since the doctrine of the inviolability of law is part of the heritage of rational Natural Law, it is argued, its explicit rejection in the legal system of the Third Reich raises the question of the whole attitude of National-Socialism toward Natural Law. The chapter describes how the repudiation of Natural Law was achieved and also the form this repudiation took. Despite the fact that Natural Law has been refuted time and again by political science, until the period when this text was written it had not yet lost its vitality entirely.

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