Suchergebnisse

Der Autor weist zunächst auf die Bedeutung einer Geschichte des Umweltschutzes bzw. einer Geschichte der Ökologie-Bewegung hin. Sodann wird das gegensätzliche Bild des Naturschutzes während des Nationalsozialismus herausgearbeitet. Dieses wird in der Funktionalisierung der (romantisch) anti modernistischen Haltung des Bürgertums zu Zwecken einer ökonomisch orientierten Wachstumspolitik gesehen. Der Autor wirft sodann einen Blick auf den Beginn des Naturschutzes und des Heimatschutzes während der Jahrhundertwende. Im weiteren wird die Ideologie des Naturschutzes und der Naturschutzpolitik während des Nationalsozialismus näher untersucht. Abschließend werden die (negativen) Folgen der nationalsozialistischen Natur-Ideologie für die heutige Ökologiedebatte diskutiert. ; The discipline of Environmental History research should include studies which examine the acknowledgement, evaluation and resolution of environmental crises of ecological movements. There are just some few authors who have explored ecological movements under the era of National Socialism. Protection of nature is one of those movements which, even before 1933, presented a contradictory, ambivalent image: One the one hand, the protectors of nature had been deeply influenced by contemporary cultural criticism and by the distinctive German-nation consciousness integral to large parts of the educated middle-classes since the Wilhelminian era. On the other hand, however, rearmament and war preparations demanded a partial autarchy of the Reich with regard to the provision of food; consequently the struggle to raise the level of food production and the Four-Year Plan demanded the conversion of ecologically valuable natural and cultural land into cleared farming and grazing areas. Nature protectors were forced to collaborate in bringing forward this development, as their concept of nature protection demanded a cooperation with the government as the only possible alternative, regardless what direction it would take them. Besides, they were unable to argue, and more so to recognize the fundamental conflict between economy and ecology. Even in the time after 1945, and scarcely nowadays is the past of the nature protection movement adequately investigated. Reasons form this situation may be found in the training of the protectors in the natural sciences, who had begun to recognize the social dimensions of their work and to develop a democratic conception of protection. The propagation of an 'ecological ethic' and the rejection of an anthropocentric notion of nature protection have the same roots, and give evidence of an ahistorical way of seeing what hinders rather than furthers the cause of protection.

Con_05_Fol_04 File contains newspaper clippings in German and English dealing with democracy, fascism and national socialism.

This paper engages with the growth of contemporary fascism by arguing that affect plays a key role in its discourse. Departing from an understanding of affect as integral to discourse, the paper explores how the myth of palingenesis is employed by the most prominent Swedish Nazi movement to recruit new members. A methodological combination of affective – discursive theory, detailed representational analysis, and a critical reading that buys into the representations reveals the recruitment discourse as offering an affective script of feeling angry, insulted, and ashamed, as well as courageous, proud, and hopeful. These findings offer important insights into how affective–discursive practices are employed to create gateways to radicalization and ideologically motivated violence. In order to make sense of the attractiveness of contemporary fascism, the paper concludingly argues for multifaceted readings and contemplative critical engagement with the far and extreme right.

Aside from equating it with Hitlerism, there have been few scholarly attempts to define national socialism and specify its relation to the broader category of fascism. This article posits that national socialisms are a sub-genus of fascism, where the distinguishing feature is an ultaranationalism based on a palingenetic völkisch racism, of which anti-Semitism is an essential element. Thus, national socialism is not just mimetic Hitlerism, as Hitler is not even necessary. National socialist movements may even conceivably be opposed to the goals and actions of Hitlerism. To test this definition, the case of Latvia's Pērkonkrusts [Thunder Cross] movement is analysed. Based on an analysis of its ideology, Pērkonkrusts is a national socialist movement with a völkisch racialist worldview, while also being essentially anti-German. The case study even addresses the apparent paradox that Pērkonkrusts both collaborated in the Holocaust, and engaged in resistance against the German occupation regime.

by Matthias Küntzel ; ursprüngl. erschienen in: Jewish political studies review, spring 2005, selbstst. Fassung von Matthias Küntzel

This dissertation is a rethinking and critique of the concept of "national socialism." I show that this concept not only emerged in Germany years before Nazism, but also arose within the mainstream of German society, alongside and independently of parallel developments in the radical right. Alarmed by the dramatic rise of an internationalist, Marxist socialism in the years following German unification, a succession of prominent public figures gave voice to an alternative, nationalist reading of the social problems accompanying capitalist industrialization. This endeavor involved a wholesale reconceptualization of social life and social reform, and a marginalization of the concern for social justice and emancipation in favor of a preoccupation with national order, homogeneity, and power. The dissertation focuses on two variants of national socialism developed in Germany prior to the First World War, one by the left-leaning bourgeois reformist Friedrich Naumann and the other by the right-wing völkisch antisemite Theodor Fritsch. Their differences notwithstanding, both strands of national socialism shared two major ideational foundations. First, both were underpinned by a national existentialism: the claim that the nation is facing a "struggle for existence" which necessitates aggressive international expansion, colonization, and ethnic purification. The social reforms demanded by national socialism were, accordingly, geared at systematically harnessing all socio-economic forces in the service of these purportedly "existential" struggles. Second, both variants of national socialism adhered to a national productivism that, by stressing the need for cooperation among all the "productive" strata of the nation, elided the class-based exploitation characteristic of industrial capitalism. On the basis of their national productivism, both Naumann and Fritsch were opposed simultaneously to Marxism with its class-conflict view of society on the one hand, and to liberalism with its individualistic worldview on the other hand. Given that Naumann and Fritsch were pivotal figures in their respective social, cultural, and political milieux--Naumann in the reformist bourgeoisie, Fritsch in the radical right--their articulation of a national-existential claim on the social is indicative of a profound generational shift in the ideational climate of Imperial Germany. This generational shift did not consist in the appearance of national socialism itself, which had already been articulated in the 1870s by prominent figures such as political economist Gustav Schmoller and Christian socialist Adolf Stoecker. Rather, the shift consisted in the shedding of the ethical-conservative sensibility of the first generation of national socialism in favor of a sense of existential urgency grounded in a biologistic imagination. The impact of national socialism on the generation of Naumann and Fritsch reached its apex in the First World War, when an existential national socialism constituted the ideological underpinning of Germany's war economy, i.e. the systematic regimentation and mobilization of the national economy in service of the war effort. Beyond the fresh perspective it offers on the historical dynamics of Imperial Germany, the dissertation also sheds new light on the intellectual-historical context in which national socialism made its way into the name and program of the Nazi movement from 1920 onward. The study suggests that the conceptual field of national socialism into which Nazism entered after the First World War was more variegated, more sophisticated, and had deeper historical and intellectual roots than previously believed.

This article considers the involvement of Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany at the 1939 New York World's Fair. It considers the form, function, and content of the Italian Pavilion designed for this fair and asserts that the prefabricated monumental structure would be best interpreted, not in isolation, but as an element of the larger architectural conversation which continued to unfold across contemporary fascist Europe. Such reconsideration of this building makes it possible to evaluate the relationship between Fascist design, the assertion of political will, and the articulation of national identity and cultural heritage within a larger, transnational context. The author also investigates the American exhibition committee's earnest and persistent, yet ultimately unheeded, solicitation of Nazi German participation and argues that motives behind German withdrawal from this event had as much to do with the threat of popular protest as economic pressure. ; Publisher PDF ; Peer reviewed

Michel Foucault's concept of bio-politics entails the management and regulation of life processes within the population as a whole. This administration of the biological was perhaps most manifest in the German state under National Socialism. Indeed, Foucault remarks that there was no other state of the period in which "the biological was so tightly, so insistently regulated." However while the Nazi regime evinced this bio-political concern with the management of life, it also released an unprecedented murderous potential. It is this paradox, that the care of life can become the administration of death, or what Foucault deemed the transition from bio-politics to thanato-politics, that I wish to investigate through an examination of the construction of the Jewish subject through Nazi medical discourse. This paper will examine how medico-political discourse facilitated the construction of medically authorized norms that constructed the Jew as both a biological and social threat to the body politic, and how this discursively produced "Other" informed the transition from bio-politics to thanato-politics within the confines of the German medical establishment.

Background Hans Asperger (1906–1980) first designated a group of children with distinct psychological characteristics as 'autistic psychopaths' in 1938, several years before Leo Kanner's famous 1943 paper on autism. In 1944, Asperger published a comprehensive study on the topic (submitted to Vienna University in 1942 as his postdoctoral thesis), which would only find international acknowledgement in the 1980s. From then on, the eponym 'Asperger's syndrome' increasingly gained currency in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the conceptualization of the condition. At the time, the fact that Asperger had spent pivotal years of his career in Nazi Vienna caused some controversy regarding his potential ties to National Socialism and its race hygiene policies. Documentary evidence was scarce, however, and over time a narrative of Asperger as an active opponent of National Socialism took hold. The main goal of this paper is to re-evaluate this narrative, which is based to a large extent on statements made by Asperger himself and on a small segment of his published work. Methods Drawing on a vast array of contemporary publications and previously unexplored archival documents (including Asperger's personnel files and the clinical assessments he wrote on his patients), this paper offers a critical examination of Asperger's life, politics, and career before and during the Nazi period in Austria. Results Asperger managed to accommodate himself to the Nazi regime and was rewarded for his affirmations of loyalty with career opportunities. He joined several organizations affiliated with the NSDAP (although not the Nazi party itself), publicly legitimized race hygiene policies including forced sterilizations and, on several occasions, actively cooperated with the child 'euthanasia' program. The language he employed to diagnose his patients was often remarkably harsh (even in comparison with assessments written by the staff at Vienna's notorious Spiegelgrund 'euthanasia' institution), belying the notion that he tried to protect the children under his care by embellishing their diagnoses. Conclusion The narrative of Asperger as a principled opponent of National Socialism and a courageous defender of his patients against Nazi 'euthanasia' and other race hygiene measures does not hold up in the face of the historical evidence. What emerges is a much more problematic role played by this pioneer of autism research. Future use of the eponym should reflect the troubling context of its origins in Nazi-era Vienna.

The German occupation of Norway during the Second World War caused unprecedented problems for the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Norway and other Christian denominations. The subordination of the church to the de facto Nazi state eventually led its bishops and most of its pastors to sever their ties to the government while remaining in their ministries. Churchmen and scholars have explored dimensions of this challenging episode in Norwegian church history, but little has been published about the plight of most of the para-church organizations. This article explores crucial dimensions of the ministry of the Norwegian Christian Student Association. Particular attention is paid to how both its pietistic heritage and tradition of social ministry continued to nurture its members and to how the exigencies of living under an oppressive regime compelled the leadership as well as the members of the organization to shift certain emphases in their proclamation and ministry. ; http://apps.ufs.ac.za/journals/dl/system/docs/5/142/1155/Acta%20Theologica%2031%282%29_Hale.pdf ; http://dx.doi.org/10.4314/actat.v31i2.4

The German occupation of Norway during the Second World War caused unprecedented problems for the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Norway and other Christian denominations. The subordination of the church to the de facto Nazi state eventually led its bishops and most of its pastors to sever their ties to the government while remaining in their ministries. Churchmen and scholars have explored dimensions of this challenging episode in Norwegian church history, but little has been published about the plight of most of the para-church organizations. This article explores crucial dimensions of the ministry of the Norwegian Christian Student Association. Particular attention is paid to how both its pietistic heritage and tradition of social ministry continued to nurture its members and to how the exigencies of living under an oppressive regime compelled the leadership as well as the members of the organization to shift certain emphases in their proclamation and ministry.

The history of medicine this century is darkened by the downfall of the German medical profession, exposed during the doctors' trial at Nuremberg in 1946. Relying largely on documents published during 1933 in German medical journals, this paper examines two widely accepted notions of those events, metaphorically termed "slippery slope" and "sudden subversion." The first connotes a gradual slide over infinitesimal steps until, suddenly, all footing is lost; the second conveys forced take over of the profession's leadership and values. Both concepts imply that the medical profession itself became the victim of circumstances. The slippery slope concept is a prominent figure of argument in the current debate on bioethics. The evidence presented here, however, strongly suggests that the German medical community set its own course in 1933. In some respects this course even outpaced the new government, which had to rein in the profession's eager pursuit of enforced eugenic sterilizations. In 1933 the convergence of political, scientific, and economic forces dramatically changed the relationship between the medical community and the government. That same convergence is occurring again and must be approached with great caution if medicine is to remain focused on the preservation of physical and medical integrity.

International audience ; The central question of this chapter is about socio-historical implications of colonialism for ways of dealing with deviance in the metropoles. Postcolonial studies metaphorically talk about the colonies as "laboratories" of modern societies. Indeed, a series of political reforms and interventions aiming at society as a whole or, to put it more strongly, at creating the "ideal society", have been experimented with in the colonies. The historical development of the European metropole was heavily affected by the colonial experience (either simultaneously or with some time-delay), an insight that leads to rejecting any assumption of a uni-directional "modernisation"-flow.We will see that there are obvious continuities in terms of social thought. Concrete connections between organizational, institutional and juridical forms of dealing with deviance are more difficult to describe in clear-cut terms, if we do not want to fall into simplistic accounts of a complex story. In the conclusion, we will have to reconsider Baumann's claim that the Holocaust has to be understood as the product of modern society and of a highly developed civilization.

This book provides a view of literary life under the Nazis, highlighting the ambiguities, rivalries and conflicts that determined the cultural climate of that period and beyond. Focusing on a group of writers – in particular, Hans Grimm, Erwin Guido Kolbenheyer, Wilhelm Schäfer, Emil Strauß, Börries Freiherr von Münchhausen and Rudolf Binding – it examines the continuities in völkisch-nationalist thought in Germany from c. 1890 into the post-war period and the ways in which völkisch-nationalists identified themselves in opposition to four successive German regimes: the Kaiserreich, the Weimar Republic, the Third Reich and the Federal Republic.

This dissertation examines sermons delivered by Confessing Church pastors in the Nazi dictatorship. The approach of most historians has focused on the history of the Christian institutions, its leaders, and its persecution by the Nazi regime, leaving the most elemental task of the pastor – that is, preaching – largely unexamined. The question left unaddressed is how well did Confessing pastors fare in articulating their views of the Nazi regime and the persecution of the Jews through their sermons? To answer this question, I analyzed 910 sermons by Confessing Church pastors, all delivered or disseminated between 1933 and the end of World War II in Europe. I argue that new trends in preaching popular among Confessing Church pastors discouraged deviation from the biblical text in sermons, and thus one result was few criticisms concerning German politics and society. Nevertheless, a minority of pastors criticized the Nazi regime and its leaders for their racial ideology and claims of "Aryan" superiority, and also for unjust persecutions against Christians. They condemned Nazism as a morally corrupt ideology in contradiction to Christianity. Further, I argue that these sermons provide mixed messages about Jews and Judaism. While on the one hand, the sermons express admiration for Judaism as a foundation for Christianity and Jews as spiritual cousins; on the other hand, the sermons express religious prejudice in the form of anti-Judaic tropes that corroborated the Nazi ideology that portrayed Jews and Judaism as inferior. In the final section of the dissertation I explore the ministries of German pastors of Jewish descent and argue that they not only experienced persecution from the Nazi state, but also from their own congregations. Nevertheless, the themes of their sermons are consistent with those found in those of their colleagues.My research demonstrates that the German churches were in fact places to offer criticism of the Nazi regime, which was often veiled through biblical imagery and metaphor. Yet the messages reveal criticism from a position of obedience and subservience to the state, and at the same time the expose a confused ambiguity about the Jews and Judaism and their relation to Christians in Nazi Germany.