Hitler's National Community 1933-1941 Flashcards
Define gleichschaltung
‘The process of switching onto the same wavelength’
- approach taken by nazis in 1933-4 to nazify/abolish major institutions/ organisations
Introduction - why was a national community necessary?
- social Darwinism - races=species, competing, weak conquered
- nazis believed Germany democratic= weak. Indoctrinated, Catholics or workers not Germans
- national community would make people prioritise patriotic duty to country, Germans first
- volksgemienschaft achieved through gleichschaltung ‘bringing into line’
Gleichschaltung and the political parties
- ‘sectional’ parties who only appealed to their own were a cause of weakness and disunity
- June 1933 SDP outlawed. KPD already outlawed. DVP/DNVP/CE/Democrats not formally abolished, pressured into dissolving selves
- law against formation of new parties in July 1933
- trade unions disbanded in May 1933
- 150 000 left wing enemies imprisoned 1933-4
Gleichschaltung through violence
- murder of socialists and communists in mid 1933
- taken to ‘wild camps’ disbanded after bad publicity
- responsibility for dealing with political threats goes to Himler’s ss
- 1933 80 concentration camps
Gleichschaltung through the churches INITIALLY
- Christians incompatible with volksgemienschaft due to conflict of interests
- no cause to attack, not threat,1933/4
- Protestant churches (middle class, voted nazi) organised into reich church. Minority set up confessional church
- nazi papal agreement: no interference from either
Gleichschaltung and the churches LATER
- opposition increased after 1933
- leader of confessional church arrested 1937, opposed racism
- imprisonment of catholic priests by 1937 for same reasons
- violation of 1933 agreement, condemned by pope in ‘with burning anxiety’
- relations deteriorated but no all out conflict
What caused the night of the long knifes?
- SA, headed by Ernest rohm, started to make demands of hitler
- 3000 000 strong wanted to merge with army. Hitler worried it would make them undisciplined and undermine their power
- SA leaders socialistic, anti capitalist, wanted to take on big businesses but hitler wanted to use them to rebuild military
The events of the ‘night of the long knives’
- 30th June 1934 hitler strikes, sensing collision with SA
- 50+ of top SA leaders, including Rohm, murdered
- also Gustav Vohn Kahr, Gregor Strasser, Kurt Von Schleicher
- carried out by SS
- received poorly from outside Germany but inside seen as purge of worst nazi associates
- SA still existed but had no functioning purpose or power
Gleichschaltung timeline
March 1933: communist party outlawed
May 1933: trade unions abolished
June 1933: SDP outlawed
June 30th-July 2nd 1934: night of the long knives
July 1933: Law against the formation of new parties
July 1933: Nazi/Papal agreement
July 1933: Reich church established
Contribution of propaganda to volkgmeinschaft
- March 1933 goebbels made minister of propaganda and national enlightenment
- aim to unite nation
- slogans: one nation one people one leader
- the Hitler myth: cultish worship, bday celebrated, seen as exemplary for sacrifice of family life for German community,founder of national revolution
- huge rallies/marches regularly. September Nuremberg rally annually
- winter aid programme for poor ‘stricken comrades’
- people’s receiver radio, film > written word
Appealing to the working class for volkgmeinschaft
- KDF ‘strength through joy’ movement
- part of German labour front est. 1933 to replace trade unions to fill gap left by loss of KPD/SPD
- replaced these efforts with similar ones offering cultural opportunities such as evening classes/sports leagues/choirs…
- new ideas: cheap travel in Germany, travel abroad on KDF cruisers (28500 Siemens workers holiday)
- people’s car, 1938, pre order at 5 marks weekly. No car or refund due to car factory used in war effort
- -> to persuade working class that national community disintegrated class boundaries and gave them previously unknown opportunities
Timeline of anti semitism 1933-9
April 1933: one day boycott of Jewish shops
April 1933: law for the restoration of the professional civil service
May 1933: book burning in Berlin
September 1935: Nuremberg laws
April 1938: beginnings of Goering’s ‘aryanisation’ policy
9th November 1938: kristallnacht: Jews fined 5 billion marks
Why were Jews excluded from the national community?
- national community was selective, members must be aryan
- Jews, German gypsies, Roma and Sinti excluded
- Jews specifically targeted as…
(i) seen as race not community, bent on world domination
(ii) believed they were ruthless, would use communism to cover objectives, believed Russian communism Jewish controlled and that they had conspired to take over financial institutions
(iii) believed Jews had intentionally contributed to WW1 defeat
German Jewish community
- 1933: only 0.7% of population and declining
- not dominating, underrepresented in big industry. Most middle class ( teachers, doctors, retail)
- members of Jewish community saw no incompatibility between race and nationality. Major organisation ‘Union of German citizens of Jewish faith’. 100 from 500 000 fought in WW1, 12 000 died
Persecution of Germany’s Jews 1933
- uncoordinated violent SA attacks
- spring, shops destroyed and Jews beat up
- gave impression nazis did not demand control,
- April
(i) one day boycott of Jewish shops
(ii) law for the restoration of the professional civil service, all non rayan civil servants dismissed apart from Jewish war veterans
