The National Socialist Physicians League, was a professional medical organization founded upon the same ideologies that shaped the broader National Socialist agenda. Despite the vast historical and ethical literature focused on physician involvement in Nazi atrocities during the Holocaust, little attention has been paid to the NSDÄB. However, the establishment of this group is important to understanding the forces shaping physician participation in the Nazi party. Physicians often look to professional medical organizations as a source of moral (...) guidance; thus, ideologies of racism and the active harassment of ethnic or racial minority groups by this professional organization may have contributed to the establishment of this behavior as not only permissive but normal. This article will explore how this organization contributed to normalizing, desensitizing and legitimizing behavior that could not be justified by any normative theory of professional medical ethics. (shrink)

ArgumentBy breaking decisively with the predominantly apologetic and hagiographic literature on science during National Socialism and employing compelling terms such as “irresponsible purity” and “collaborative relations,” Herbert Mehrtens profoundly influenced both his contemporaries and the subsequent generation of historians working in this field.

Romano Guardini was one of the most important intellectuals of German Catholicism in the twentieth century. He influenced nearly an entire generation of German Catholic theologians and was the leading figure of the German Catholic youth movement as it grew exponentially in the 1920s. Yet there are many open questions about his early intellectual development and his academic contribution to religious, cultural, social and political questions in the Weimar Republic and in National Socialist Germany. This article draws upon Guardini’s (...) publications, the secondary literature on Guardini and on some archival material, seeking to outline his early development and his engagement with the ideological context following World War I and in National Socialist Germany. Here Guardini’s criticisms of the modern age are presented. Besides this many other issues are addressed, such as his criticism of the women’s movement, his understanding of the youth movement, reception of Carl Schmitt, views of race, interpretation of the controversial Volk-concept, contribution to a Jewish journal in 1933, and his basic positions on the issues of obedience, order and authority. While Guardini was viewed critically by some National Socialists in the Third Reich, the administrative correspondences on him in the 1940s actually show that there was an internal debate about him among the National Socialist officials. This involved different figures, including a diplomat who came to Guardini’s defense. The internal disagreements were made more complicated because Guardini’s brothers were apparently members of the Fascist Party in Italy at this time. (shrink)

The Synthetic Theory of Evolution (SyntheticDarwinism) was forged between 1925 and 1950.Several historians of science have pointed outthat this synthesis was a joint venture ofSoviet, German, American and Britishbiologists: A fascinating example of scientificcooperation, considering the fact that theevolutionary synthesis emerged during thedecades in which these countries were engagedin fierce political, military and ideologicalconflicts. The ideological background of itsAnglo-American representatives has beenanalyzed in the literature. We have examinedthe scientific work and ideological commitmentsof the German Darwinians during the ThirdReich. We (...) based our analysis on four criteria:1) General attitude towards the Third Reich. 2) Membership in the NSDAP and other nationalsocialist organizations. Endorsement anddisapproval of the state ideology in 3) scientific and 4) other publications. We willmainly discuss the various authors that havecontributed to Die Evolution derOrganismen (1943), a collection thatrepresented the evolutionary synthesis inGermany. Most of the authors promoted eugenicideas, but not all of them adopted the racistinterpretation of the Third Reich. Anotherfinding is that there existed no directconnection between party membership andpromotion of the state ideology. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Diacritics 30.4 (2000) 102-122 [Access article in PDF] How To Tell a Mestizo from an Enchirito® Colonialism and National Culture in the Borderlands Michael Hames-garcia I began to think, "Yes, I'm a chicana but that's not all I am. Yes, I'm a woman but that's not all I am. Yes, I'm a dyke but that doesn't define all of me. Yes, I come from working class origins, but (...) I'm no longer working class. Yes, I come from a mestizaje, but which parts of that mestizaje get privileged? Only the Spanish, not the Indian or black." I started to think in terms of mestiza consciousness. What happens to people like me who are in between all of these different categories? What does that do to one's concept of nationalism, of race, ethnicity, and even gender? I was trying to articulate and create a theory of a Borderlands existence.... I had to, for myself, figure out some other term that would describe a more porous nationalism, opened up to other categories of identity. —Gloria E. Anzaldúa, InterviewsOne of the most crucial questions facing leftist activists and intellectuals today is the question of nationalism and its relation to liberation struggles. 1 A century ago, the period [End Page 102] of nation-state consolidation in Europe seemed to come to an end with the unification of Germany and Italy. European leftists of the era tended to address "the national question" primarily with regard to those European nations that were shut out or suppressed by nation-state formation. Debates about national culture resurfaced in a revolutionary context when independence movements swept Africa and Asia during and after World War II, and a substantial body of literature attempting to integrate anticolonial struggle, national liberation, and socialism arose from the capitalist "periphery." Much of this literature, and the wars for independence out of which it grew, adapted the language of nationalism to its own purposes. These movements gave new hope that national liberation struggles would prove compatible with greater human freedom and equality. Despite that hope, the destructive effects of nationalism are today visible everywhere: for example, the devastating wars in the Balkans, the repression of indigenous peoples by national bourgeoisie throughout the Americas, religious-national strife between Sinhalese and Tamils in Sri Lanka, the vertiginous intensification of national chauvinism in the United States, Western Europe, and Australia. Simultaneously, and in the context of feminist criticisms of nationalism [see, for example, Chatterjee, Nation; Lutz et al.; Mosse], attempts to unite the struggle to liberate "the nation" from colonial or neocolonial domination with progressive struggles against capitalist exploitation and against sexual- and gender-based domination continue [see, for example, Trask]. In Latin America, anticapitalist struggles lauded by Western socialists regularly take the form of national liberation struggles, such as the EZLN (Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional [Zapatist National Liberation Army]) in Mexico and the FSLN (Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional [Sandinist National Liberation Front]) in Nicaragua. Additionally, lesbian and gay activists and theorists in the United States have frequently sought to appropriate nationalist rhetoric even as black and Chicano nationalist movements have been on the decline [see, for example, Berlant and Freeman; Moraga 145-74].Debates about anticolonial struggle and "Third World" nationalism may seem at first to be an odd context into which to introduce the work of Gloria Anzaldúa. Critical writing on Anzaldúa's work has tended not to consider its relevance to debates on the relations among capitalism, colonialism, and national culture. 2 Instead, her major work, Borderlands/La Frontera, is usually discussed (or, more often than not, simply cited) as a contribution to feminist and antiracist discussions about the construction of the self within multiple contexts of domination and about that self's resistance to oppression and struggle for recognition. 3 While acknowledging the importance of Anzaldúa's contributions to these discussions, this essay examines Borderlands as offering a forward-looking alternative to nationalism, specifically, to Chicano cultural nationalist positions articulated during the... (shrink)

The decision to start the uprising rested chiefly with a few persons from the high command of the Home Army. Political authorities, including Kazimierz Pużak, PPS and the National Unity Council leader, had no influence on the Uprising outbreak and date decisions.Immediately after the uprising outbreak, the socialist movement joined the action, both in the civilian and military area, as did all socialist movement factions. A very important role was played by the well-developed and influential press, coming out in (...) all districts of liberated Warsaw. Socialist activists repeatedly appealed to the allied authorities for active aid for fighting Warsaw.In the city military socialist groups took active part in military operations in all Warsaw’s districts, and in particular in Śródmieście, Wola, Stare Miasto, Powiśle and Żoliborz. Similarly socialist activists took active part in organizing relief for civilian population. The socialist movement was the largest and the most influential political movement in the fighting Warsaw. In the face of insufficient aid from the allied states and the Soviet Army, Warsaw had to capitulate which was reported by socialist Robotnik in words full of sorrow and pathos on 4 October 1944. (shrink)

"Fritsche's book, which is closely researched, carefully argued, and philologically rigorous, will become an indispensable point of reference for further debates on Heidegger's ambiguous political and ethical legacy."—Richard Wolin, author of The Politics of Being "Unquestionably, Fritsche has a highly unusual command of the Heideggerian idiom, which he uses to very good effect."—Tom Rockmore, author of On Heidegger's Nazism and Philosophy.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Historical Destiny and National Socialism in Heidegger's 'Being and Time.'Robert C. ScharffJohannes Fritsche, Historical Destiny and National Socialism in Heidegger's 'Being and Time.'Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999. Pp. 356 + xix. Cloth, $60.00.Focusing on the relatively neglected fifth chapter of Being and Time's Division Two (BT, Sections 72-77), Fritsche argues that BT is an essentially political work. Even Victor Farías, although he talks (...) of "shared attitudes" and "implicit direction," settles for the conclusion that "in no sense can we read National Socialism into Being and Time, but we can identify philosophical beliefs that foreshadow Heidegger's later conviction."(Victor Farías, Heidegger and Nazism, trans. Paul Burrell and Gabriel R. Ricci [Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1989], 60.) Fritsche, however, evidently intends to out-Farías Farías. For him, BT just is "a brilliant summary of the politics of the revolutionary Right" (xii; cf., xv, 216).Following Tom Rockmore, Fritsche insists that by grounding ontological inquiry in a distinction between authentic and inauthentic existence, Heidegger is "committed" to "a political understanding of human being" that "culminates" in the analysis of authentic historicity in Section 74 (29). According to Fritsche, BT proceeds, "in conventional metaphysical fashion," to work out a "hierarchical" presentation of the structures and activities of our existence as a "drama in three acts." The first act is Heidegger's analysis of the conflicted, inauthentic, "downward plunging" condition of everyday life. In act two, there arises out of this condition a "crisis" (of conscience) that calls for a "dramatic solution." The third act "consists in authentic Dasein stepping out of the world in which it has been living as ordinary Dasein, turning back to this world, and canceling it... in order to rerealize the past" (x, 29-30).Fritsche plays BT off primarily against three sources, Richard Wolin's Politics of Being (1990), articles by Peg Birmingham (1991), and Charles Guignon (1992), in order to distance BT from "decisionist," "anarchist," and "politically neutral" interpretations, respectively. Like this selection of foils, Fritsche's comparison of texts often seems merely convenient. In general, if two people use the same term, they probably mean the same thing; and key concepts are typically assumed to have uniform definitions. Hence, if Scheler speaks of a hierarchy of values and Hitler, of a hierarchy of races, they must be employing "the same logic" (108-9). And because vorlaufen [anticipating/running ahead] was the term used by right wing German authors to mythologize the gallant but foolish young "heroes of Langemarck" who "stepped out of their trenches, into the open," and "ran toward" French lines, one should also employ this image a "methodological ideal type to interpret Heidegger's concept of resoluteness" (3, 196, 233). Finally, Fritsche makes no systematic distinction between what an author has once said and what either we or the author might later make of it. Hence, if Heidegger says in 1933 that he is drawing on BT for political purposes, he must have had these purposes in mind when writing it ten years earlier (216ff.). And obviously, choosing "Volksgemeinschaft" to talk of community in BT's Section 74 already unmistakably reveals "Heidegger's option for National Socialism" (217-18).One need carry no brief for an apolitical Heidegger to see that Fritsche's reading is problematic on several levels. Heidegger's own account of BT's purpose and method is ignored rather than challenged. Numerous Heideggerian notions are construed, without [End Page 455] argument, as "really" being just right-wing political or "conventional metaphysical" usage. Moreover, categories of Left and Right are sometimes handled so loosely that, for example, Scheler writing in 1913, Heidegger writing in 1921-24, and Hitler in Mein Kampf, all must "belong" to the revolutionary Right, because they all privilege traditional Gemeinschaft over modern Gesellschaft. By the same reasoning, Heidegger's concept of historicity is "identical" to Scheler's and Hitler's. This has to be right because "Heidegger's text is just too excellent a summary of the revolutionary rightist notion to be the result of a somnambulistic thinking" (136). Fritsche's handling of technical terminology, when not outright political, often seems poorly... (shrink)

National Socialism did not only constitute a political doctrine; it was also a kind of worldview that left its mark on German and pan­-European culture of the 20th century. The drastic changes that were linked to Hitler’s takeover of power confronted writers and poets with a completely new reality and wholly new conditions of the creative process. Those who could not or would not emigrate had to submit themselves to the policies and norms decreed by the National (...) Socialists. National Socialism – a conglomerate of different ideologies and ideologemes – perverted certain middle­-class values and ultimately aimed towards the total subjugation of all areas of life, culture being among them. The fact that the German middle­-class partly shared the values propagated by the Nazis led to an overhasty and unjust assessment of the attitude of writers belonging to the so­-called ‘Inner Emigration’. The article at hand outlines the principles of National Socialist cultural politics as well as its relationship to artists. The complicated creative situation of writers and poets in the Third Reich will be shown by representative examples. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Dostoevsky and Schiller:National Renewal Through Aesthetic EducationSusan McReynoldsDostoevsky's novels pivot upon scenes of spiritual transformation, moments of revelation that resolve dilemmas for which no logical solution can be found. Raskolnikov, for example, analyzes his crime from philosophical and sociological angles until he almost dies; he is saved by his dream of the plague and by the image of Sonia's face. When insight and progress come to Dostoevsky's fictional (...) characters, they come as dream, memory, and rapture before images of beauty and suffering. The choice between spiritual and logical solutions confronting Dostoevsky's characters is also a choice between Russia and the West. The rationalism and corollary doctrine of egoism that drives characters like Svidrigailov, Stavrogin, and Ivan Karamazov to madness and death are clearly associated in Dostoevsky's novels with Western philosophy. The ability to surrender to the beneficial power of images is associated with characters like Dmitry Karamazov, who is able to accept the primacy of spiritual truth—the truth of his need for expiation—over the fact of his legal innocence of his father's murder. The breadth of spirit that renders Dmitry receptive to the truth revealed in his dream image of the suffering child is clearly identified in The Brothers Karamazov as a distinctively Russian national trait.The contrast between reason, death, and the West, on the one hand, and receptiveness to imagistic truth, salvation, and Russia, on the other, [End Page 353] drives the plots of Dostoevsky's novels. This familiar feature of Dostoevsky's art is first articulated in texts unfamiliar to most readers; the historical essays of the early 1860s that were among his first published works after his return from exile. In 1849, Dostoevsky was arrested as a member of the Petrashevsky Circle, an association dedicated to disseminating the tenets of Western socialism in Russia. For his participation in the Circle, Dostoevsky was initially condemned to death; the sentence was commuted to four years of hard labor in Siberian prison camp, to be followed by an indefinite period of military service in Siberian exile.When Dostoevsky returned to St. Petersburg and public life in 1860, he and his older brother Mikhail launched the journal Time. Mikhail served as editor. Dostoevsky would publish The Insulted and Injured and Notes from the House of the Dead in its pages, in addition to numerous essays dedicated to contemporary literature and events. The essays on Russia and Europe published in Time were a creative workshop in which some basic features of his later novels—most notably the contrast between Western positivism and Russian spirituality, conceived as the capacity to embrace imagistic revelations of the truth—were first developed. The pressure of Dostoevsky's developing artistic craft is clearly apparent in these non-fictional texts from the early 1860s, which narrate modern Russian and European history as a story structured by a dual plot of death and redemption.Before Dostoevsky wrote novels structured around the contrast between characters like Dmitry and Ivan Karamazov, he wrote essays structured around the contrast between Russia and Western nations like France and England. Before Crime and Punishment portrayed Raskolnikov's resurrection as the surrender to images offering glimpses of something that eludes rational analysis, Dostoevsky's essays in Time predicted national renewal for Russia through her embrace of the truths conveyed by the images of fine art. Some essays in Time compose a plot of national rebirth through the effects of artistic images for Russia, but others admonish readers with what Dostoevsky believed would be the terrible consequences of positivism for the West. Winter Notes on Summer Impressions, published in Time in 1863, casts France and England as mortally ill victims of a materialist worldview that can only grasp the challenges of modernity as scientific and political problems. The spiritual solutions that will be revealed to Russia through images of beauty, Dostoevsky warns, will elude nations ensnared in rational approaches to their problems. [End Page 354]Throughout his post-exile life, Dostoevsky believed that political improvement results from changes in the moral condition of individuals, inner changes that are catalyzed by images, not reached through rational deliberation. In 1861, he writes of the Imperial edict... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal 10.2 (2000) 175-188 [Access article in PDF] Scope Note 38 Bioethics Resources on the Web * Once described as an "enormous used book store with volumes stacked on shelves and tables and overflowing onto the floor" (Pool, Robert. 1994. Turning an Info-Glut into a Library. Science 266 (7 October): 20-22, p. 20), Internet resources now receive numerous levels of organization, from basic directory listings (...) to elaborate "links" (cross-references to other Internet documents) that flash and glow in the dark. In many ways, the Internet functions as a direct extension of the traditional library. Following linked references across various sites is an electronic version of browsing library stacks, and the serendipitous discoveries made while "surfing the Net" recall the wonders of physically going "book-to-book." Although many of the Internet's best aspects augment library strengths by eliminating physical distance from sources, Net resources pose unique problems for researchers. It is not always clear who is responsible for the content of Web documents, when the document was produced, or how often (if ever) it is updated. Internet resource tools, then, must enable researchers to identify appropriate resources and to evaluate what they find when they get there. Web Research as Taking "Snapshots" Given the Internet's visual nature and fluid content, the process of conducting research on the Web has been likened to taking an informal picture of information on a specific date at a particular time. This metaphor also conveys the "zoom-in" aspect of searching through Web pages by going from general to specific categories. In the first section of this Scope Note, National Reference Center for Bioethics Literature (NRCBL) staff present a snapshot of bioethics resources taken during the spring months of 2000. Entries are divided into the categories of directories, electronic journals, full-text documents, news/current awareness, and teaching resources. In the two subsequent sections, this series of categories is repeated for entries on a specific topic within bioethics-genetics-and again for general search and evaluation tools. Where a Web site may contain pages applicable [End Page 175] to more than one category, multiple entries are made for that site with appropriate information for each category.Much as telecommunication advances have strengthened the relationship of patients and providers as partners, the dynamic nature of the Internet acknowledges that the researcher functions as a librarian whenever accessing the Web. It is our hope that BIOETHICSLINE and the other NRCBL databases not only will enable researchers to search the Web more efficiently, but also will help them to evaluate what they find when they get there. Bioethicsline on the Web: An International Plan in Progress Once only available through libraries, the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM), the funding agency for the ongoing development of the BIOETHICS LINE® database from the Kennedy Institute, has provided free Web access to that database of 63,000 citations since September 1998 through Internet Grateful Med. Plans are now underway to eliminate such specialty databases and incorporate all citations into PubMed (for journal articles) or LOCATORplus (for book-like materials and chapters in books). Both of these databases are likewise available at no cost on the Web. In the transition to PubMed and LOCATORplus some features of BIOETHICSLINE that presently are available may be lost. Researchers are encouraged to contact the National Reference Center for Bioethics Literature with search requests or for search strategy assistance with either the current or the future system ([email protected]).The inclusion of bioethics citations in PubMed and LOCATORplus will have several advantages. First, unique keywords from the Bioethics Thesaurus will be considered for inclusion in Medical Subject Headings (MeSH), the indexing vocabulary for PubMed and LOCATORplus, thereby enhancing retrieval of relevant clinical literature by offering more precise terminology covering ethical issues. Second, it will be easier to identify foreign-language materials, which are not currently included in the scope of BIOETHICSLINE. Third, the updating schedule will become more frequent. On the other hand, there may be some loss of searching precision because certain specialized features... (shrink)

In the past two decades academic and research literature on “corruption” has flourished. During the same period organizations and initiatives fighting against corruption have also significantly expanded, turning “anti-corruption” into a new research subject. However, despite a few exceptions there is a division of labor between scholars who study corruption itself and those who study the global anti-corruption industry. Juxtaposing corruption’s local discourses and anti-corruption international practices, this article is an attempt to bring together these two intertwined research dimensions (...) and explore how an ethnographic approach might contribute to framing them together. Firstly, it describes how corruption in Romania is often conceptualized and explained in terms of national heritage, something related to old and recent cultural history, including traditional folklore. Secondly, it explores how anti-corruption works in practice, focusing on international legal cooperation projects monitoring the progress and shortcomings both prior to and post Romania’s accession to the European Union. Finally, revealing the articulations of these two apparently unrelated research fields, the article argues that corruption’s local explanations and the circular logic of auditing observed within the anti-corruption industry share a common developmental ideology mirroring the crypto-colonialist structure of power relations and dependency among European nation-states emerging out of the Cold War. (shrink)

The existentialist philosopher Karl Jaspers is the father of a discourse on the spiritual consequences of the Holocaust. First addressed as the Schuldfrage (the question of guilt) by Jaspers immediately after the Second World War in his famous Heidelberg lecture, it has reappeared in various forms in German life and letters. Post-unification Germany has witnessed the valorization of the German experience of the Second World War. This ongoing re-evaluation has its antecedents in the generational literature of the 1970s and (...) 1980s. Whereas the Vaterliteratur of the 1970s (by authors such as Christoph Meckel, Uwe Timm, and Peter Henisch) was often embedded in a left-wing critique of the establishment, recent contributions to this growing genre (by Marcel Beyer, Stephan Wackwitz, Wibke Bruhns, and Ulla Hahn among others) speak to the issue of collective identity and transgenerational family trauma outside distinct left- and right-wing interpretations of National Socialism. The current writings on the life during the Third Reich (filtered through the experiences of discrete generations) are a confluence of historical writing, memorial literature, biography, and fiction. They are closely related to the discussions that W. G. Sebald initiated in his 1997 lecture series on the silence of German postwar literature with respect to German suffering. The subsequent debate on how to bring closure to this ?German suffering? was intensified by Günter Grass's widening of the concept of German victimization beyond the air war controversy in his book Crabwalk (2002). As Grass distinguishes clearly between the various post-World War II generations (and their different perspectives on historical events), the question becomes whether these recent writings will bring about a final so-called ?zero hour? in German postwar history. (shrink)

According to Trawny, Heidegger’s Black Notebooks show that he turned away from any National Socialism in 1938 and that his thinking could be “contaminated” by National Socialism and anti-Semitism only between 1931 and 1944/1945. However, in this paper it is argued that already in Being and Time Heidegger had made a case for National Socialism; that he discovered in 1938 the “true” National Socialism, and that Trawny’s main criterion regarding Heidegger’s anti-Semitism is (...) false. Heidegger’s case is compared with Max Scheler, who, because of Hitler, turned from the right to the centre. In addition, alternatives to Trawny’s detailed interpretations of three of Heidegger’s anti-Semitic remarks are offered, it is shown that Trawny misconstrues Heidegger’s anti-Semitism, and the anti-Semitic aspects of Heidegger’s history of Being are presented. (shrink)

This article reconstructs the forgotten friendship between Georges Bataille and the Russian émigré poet and philosopher Boris Poplavsky. Comparing their solar metaphysics, I focus on conceptions of friendship, sacrifice and depersonalisation. First, I retrace Bataille’s relationship to early Surrealis and Russian circles in interwar Paris, with a focus on his friendship with Irina Odoevtseva. I then offer a novel reading of Poplavsky’s poetry through the lens of Bataille’s philosophy, analysing a recurring motif that I call ‘dark solarity’. Uncovering a hidden (...) intertextual dialogue between Poplavsky and Bataille, I argue for Poplavsky’s lasting impact on Bataille’s anti-Icarian sun cult. Finally, my paper demonstrates how Poplavsky’s writings on solar sacrifice, excess and friendship left marks on Bataille’s vision of a solar community, embodied in the secret society Acéphale. The dialogue between Poplavsky and Bataille, I finally suggest, is a missing piece in the entangled history of Russian and French philosophy, as well as an original contribution to discourses on friendship in twentieth-century continental thought. (shrink)

The Nacional Socialist totalitarian project unleashed an unprecedented savagery in Europe, giving raise to the largest war to have taken place in our history and to a never before seen systematic genocide. In opposition to those who consider this way of savagery as something purely irrational, the truth is that Nazism’s savagery was product of a “rational” project which would have its roots in the period of the Enlightenment. The cruel and inhuman murder of millions of people was the result (...) of a perfectly planned, systematic, and rational act, supported in a bureaucracy which made easier the creation of a series of psychological barriers by perpetrators and whose traces were intended to be erased from history. From this point of view, National Socialism showed that Reason by itself does not save the world from savagery. (shrink)

Works by Henryk Sienkiewicz, a Polish writer and the winner of the 1905 Nobel Prize for Literature, were subjected to verification by the DDR’s censorship apparatus several times. Censors considered his novellas which discussed 19th-century social issues as desirable and worth promoting among East German readers. His novel Krzyżacy, which was set in the Middle Ages, was accepted eagerly both by publishing houses and the censorship office as it enabled national socialism in Germany to be viewed in (...) critical terms, as the DDR distanced itself from the system. Reviewers did, however, find a major ideological threat for young readers in East Germany in a young adult novel entitled W pustyni i w puszczy, and for that reason it was withdrawn from the publishing procedure. (shrink)

The writers Thomas Mann and Erich Kästner took in the years between 1933 and 1945 extreme positions of inner and outer emigration, which can be shown concerning autobiographical aspects and concerning their works which they wrote during the time of national socialism. While Kästner, who represents the inner emigration, wrote humorous stories like "Drei Männer im Schnee" and "Der kleine Grenzverkehr", Mann completed his tetralogy of "Joseph und seine Brüder", which deals with the foundation and development of the (...) monotheistic jewish world religion, in France, Switzerland and America where in 1943 he began his dark artist novel "Doktor Faustus", while in Europe internicine warfare and the Shoa were in progress. While Erich Kästner, who was a very engaged political author in the so called Weimar Republic, was captivated during the period of national socialism by his inwardness, Thomas Mann released himself from this attitude in view of the Third Reich and became an emancipated author who was politically engaged and with moral integrity. (shrink)

This essay by the Dutch modernist writer Menno ter Braak, ‘National Socialism as a Doctrine of Rancour’, was written in 1937 just before the German annexation of the Netherlands. It is a rare examination of how the concept ressentiment can be used to analyse 1930s National Socialism, outlining the ways in which the fascist variant of ressentiment is both distinctive and also, nonetheless, connected to its democratic and socialist versions. The essay develops Nietzsche’s and Scheler’s understandings (...) of ressentiment by applying them to fascism, insisting on the centrality of the moral sentiment of ressentiment not just to populism but to all forms of democracy, and to any philosophical or political orientation committed to an ideal of equality, indeed to all of modern society, culture and politics. (shrink)

This article is based on the assumption that core concepts of National Socialism—different from Marxism—turn not on economic, but on moral concepts, or categories heavily related to such concepts as honour, loyalty, decency and comradeship. The article investigates National Socialism from the standpoint of moral judgments, and turns this investigation into part of a moral history. It further is concerned with the continuing impact of National Socialism beyond the military, political and ideological defeat of (...) 1945; the moral historical approach can show how this influence continues at a level hitherto relatively unexamined. The moral history of National Socialism involves more than a shift of perspective. It opens up a specific, barely explored, field of research. This draws upon a variety of sources, especially films (Hotel Sacher—1939 and Downfall—2004 are discussed). The examination is directed to the concept of loyalty within this framework; it is a concept of virtue, which is moreover suited to illuminate some aspects of the functioning of Nazi morality, and its subsequent influence. (shrink)

In the article the mutual influence of folk theatre, Austrian Singspiel and Viennese opera in the genres of comic opera, operetta and drama performances involving music, singing and dancing is studied. The powerful influence of Italian and French opera schools, as well as the Italian Commedia Dell'arte led to the flourishing of music and theatre art in Austria: opera buffa (A. Salieri, Ch. W. Glück, J. Haydn, W. A. Mozart), fairy-tale comedies of F. Raimund and satirical dramas of Nestroy. Their (...) game-like nature finds its expression in musical turns, satirical songs and duets. Viennese dance operetta has absorbed the traditions of Viennese popular comedy and comic opera. Recitative, vocal music and folk dances were the key elements of operettas (J. Strauss junior, F. von Suppe, K. Millöcker, K. Zeller, F. Lehar). The music and the game in Austria are the results of theatralization of life: the life turns into something like art. Austrian culture, which is addressed directly to the human being and short of complex philosophical musings and speculative schemes, has genetically built-in playful, musical and theatrical basis, as well as German. Strongly-pronounced playful and musical source as an important national component of the culture, its code, determine its highly fictitious character (staginess) and integrity (both genre and intermediately), thereby maintain its special status in the European culture. (shrink)

When Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) came to power in 1933, the new Nazi government focused the German health system on their priorities such as the creation of a racially homogeneous society and the preparation of war. One of the measures to bring nursing under their control was the foundation of a new sisterhood. In 1934, Erich Hilgenfeldt (1897–1945), the ambitious head of the National Socialist People’s Welfare Association (Nationalsozialistische Volkswohlfahrt), founded the National Socialist (NS) Sisterhood (Nationalsozialistische Schwesternschaft) to create (...) an elite group that would work for the goals of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, NSDAP). Hilgenfeldt proclaimed community nursing as a priority for NS Sisterhood nurses. Catholic and Protestant sisters, who were traditionally dedicated to community nursing, were to be gradually replaced. However, other competing priorities, such as hospital service for the training of junior nurses and work in conquered regions, as well as the lack of NS nursing personnel, hampered the expansion of community nursing. The paper also addresses areas for future research: everyday activities of NS nurses, the service of NS Sisterhood nurses for NSDAP organisations such as the elite racist paramilitary force SS (Schutzstaffel, Protective Squadron), and involvement in their crimes have hardly been investigated as yet. (shrink)

Heidegger's connection with Nazism is well known and has been exhaustively debated. But we need to understand better why Heidegger believed National Socialism to be the best cure for the ills of modern society. In this book Christopher Rickey examines the internal logic of Heidegger's ideas to explain how they led him to become a powerful critic of liberalism and a Nazi supporter. Key to Rickey's interpretation is the radically antinomian conception of religiosity he finds at the core (...) of Heidegger's challenge to modernity. Heidegger responds to the crisis of modernity with a philosophy attuned to the fundamental need for humans to live with the proper stance toward the divine. Inspired by Lutheran and mystical theology, Heidegger outlines an essentially religious conception of authentic human being. Like his radical Lutheran forerunners, Heidegger politicizes the radical strains of Luther's theology to create a potent revolutionary brew: the revolution of the saints. Rickey traces out the ways in which these currents fundamentally shape Heidegger's thought: the Lutheran background to his critique of modern science and the technological rationality it spawns; his transformation of Aristotle's prudential conception of practical wisdom into the total revelation of being that lays the basis for revolutionary political action; and his mystical and sectarian understanding of authentic community. Rickey shows how this political-theological vision forms the basis of Heidegger's concrete political action, and concludes with an analysis of the fundamental problems this vision poses to our political thinking today. (shrink)

The article examines the ethical choices that are implicit in acts of memorialization. By engaging literature on the rhetoric of memorials and pragmatist aesthetics, we argue that memorialization involves a range of important ethical choices in who is remembered, how they are remembered, and the experience the act of memorialization evokes in viewers. By using John Dewey's nascent account of memorial aesthetics, we construct an exploratory typology of the ways that memorials can use and evoke the experience of viewers. (...) The means of experiential reconstruction are also found to involve important ethical decisions. We explore the usefulness of this typology in reference to two different memorials: Ambedkar Memorial Park in Lucknow, India, and the Memorial for the Unknown War Deserters and for the Victims of the National Socialist Military Justice System in Erfurt, Germany. (shrink)

Ernst Wiechert’s prose written in the 1930s is best symbolized by Friedrich Hölderlin’s poem "Abendphantasie", in which the persona describes his loneliness and resignation, describing them as a thorn in his chest. The question of the identification of these feelings with the East Prussian writer is a major problem raised in the article. Wiechert certainly belongs to the group of writers associated with the so called Inner Emigration, and the studies by Herbert Wiesner, Ralf Schnell, Reinhold Grimm and Friedrich Denka (...) support this thesis. Also, the method developed by Hubert Orlowski allows us to include or exclude literary works from inner emigration literature. This method turns out to be helpful in the interpretation of Wiechert’s works. Moreover, the question of Wiechert’s position on National Socialism is considered, which is full of contradictions, as well as his coming close to the Inner Emigration. On the basis of selected prose works created in the 1930s, the writer’s evolution from the ‘breakthrough of grace’ to becoming an inner emigrant will be presented. Particularly noteworthy are some relevant themes in his works such as World War I, the mother figure as a prefiguration of the ‘Great Mother’ myth, the writer’s stand on National Socialism or the Mazurian landscape. (shrink)

This abridged and revised edition of the original book (Springer-Wien-New York: 2001) offers the only comprehensive history and documentation of the Vienna Circle based on new sources with an innovative historiographical approach to the study of science. With reference to previously unpublished archival material and more recent literature, it refutes a number of widespread clichés about "neo-positivism" or "logical positivism". Following some insights on the relation between the history of science and the philosophy of science, the book offers an (...) accessible introduction to the complex subject of "the rise of scientific philosophy” in its socio-cultural background and European philosophical networks till the forced migration in the Anglo-Saxon world. The first part of the book focuses on the origins of Logical Empiricism before World War I and the development of the Vienna Circle in "Red Vienna" (with the "Verein Ernst Mach"), its fate during Austro-Fascism (Schlick's murder 1936) and its final expulsion by National-Socialism beginning with the "Anschluß" in 1938. It analyses the dynamics of the Schlick-Circle in the intellectual context of "late enlightenment" including the minutes of the meetings from 1930 on for the first time published and presents an extensive description of the meetings and international Unity of Science conferences between 1929 and 1941. The chapters introduce the leading philosophers of the Schlick Circle (e.g., Hans Hahn, Otto Neurath, Rudolf Carnap, Philipp Frank, Felix Kaufmann, Edgar Zilsel) and describe the conflicting interaction between Moritz Schlick and Otto Neurath, the long term communication between Moritz Schlick, Friedrich Waismann and Ludwig Wittgenstein, as well as between the Vienna Circle with Heinrich Gomperz and Karl Popper. In addition, Karl Menger's "Mathematical Colloquium" with Kurt Gödel is presented as a parallel movement. The final chapter of this section describes the demise of the Vienna Circle and the forced exodus of scientists and intellectuals from Austria. The second part of the book includes a bio-bibliographical documentation of the Vienna Circle members and for the first time of the assassination of Moritz Schlick in 1936, followed by an appendix comprising an extensive list of sources and literature. (shrink)

This article demonstrates the existence of a national socialism in Germany long before the founding of the Nazi movement, and not just in the dark recesses of racial antisemitism but at the very heart of German bourgeois society. The article focuses on two major cases of pre-Nazi national socialism: left-leaning bourgeois reformist Friedrich Naumann; and the ideology supporting Germany's war effort from 1914 to 1918, a phenomenon also known as the 'ideas of 1914'. National (...) class='Hi'>socialism in both these cases rested at its core on a national existentialism: a conviction that Germany is facing a struggle for its very existence as a nation, and that all domestic socioeconomic forces must be systematically regimented andmobilized in the service of the nation's purportedly 'existential' struggles. National socialism emerges from this article. (shrink)

Reedition of papers in English spanning from 1986 to 2009 /// Historical background -- An imposed legacy -- Twentieth century contemporaneity -- Appendix: The philosophy of teaching legal philosophy in Hungary /// HISTORICAL BACKGROUND -- PHILOSOPHY OF LAW IN CENTRAL & EASTERN EUROPE: A SKETCH OF HISTORY [1999] 11–21 // PHILOSOPHISING ON LAW IN THE TURMOIL OF COMMUNIST TAKEOVER IN HUNGARY (TWO PORTRAITS, INTERWAR AND POSTWAR: JULIUS MOÓR & ISTVÁN LOSONCZY) [2001–2002] 23–39: Julius Moór 23 / István Losonczy 29 // (...) ON THE SURVIVAL OF ILMAR TAMMELO’S LETTER AND MANUSCRIPT ADDRESSED TO PROFESSOR MOÓR [2009] 41–44 // PROFESSIONAL DISTRESS AND SCARCITY: ALEXANDER HORVÁTH AND THE LEGACY OF NATURAL LAW IN HUNGARY [2005] 45–50 // HUNGARIAN LEGAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE 20TH CENTURY [2011] 51–72: I. The Pre-war Period [1. Bódog (Felix) Somló (1871–1920) 52] / II. The Inter-war Period [2. Gyula (Julius) Moór (1888–1950) 54 / 3. Barna Horváth (1896–1973) 55 / 4. József Szabó (1909–1992) 57 / 5. István Bibó (1911–1979) 58 / 6. Tibor Vas (1911–1983) 59 / 7. István Losonczy (1918–1980) 60] III. The Post-war Period (Communism) 61 [8. Imre Szabó (1912–1991) 62 / 9. Vilmos Peschka (1929–2006) 63 / 10. Kálmán Kulcsár (1928–2010) 65] IV. Contemporary Trends and Perspectives 66 [11. Csaba Varga (b. 1941) 66 / 12. András Sajó (b. 1949) 69 / 13. Béla Pokol (b. 1950) 70] V. Our Understanding of the Law Today 71 --- AN IMPOSED LEGACY -- LOOKING BACK [1999] 75–94: 1. On Ideologies and Marxism in general 75 / 2. Life of an Intellectual in Communism 79 / 3. On Marxism and its Socialist Cultivation in Particular 82 / 4. Legal Philosophising [4.1. Approaches to Law 87 / 4.2. Arriving at a Legal Ontology 91] 5. Conclusion 94 // LEGAL PHILOSOPHY OF THE MARXISM OF SOCIALISM: HUNGARIAN OVERVIEW IN AN INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVE [2003] 95–151: I. Development and Balance of Marxist Philosophising on Law in Hungary [1. Preliminaries (until 1948) 96 / 2. Stalinism (from the Soviet Occupation on) {a) Liquidation of the »Residues« 98 / b) Soviet-type Uniformisation [Gleichschaltung] 99 / c) Denial of the Past, with a Dual Effect 99 / d) »Socialist Legality«, Drawn from the Progressive Past of Western Europe 103 / e) Search for the Germs of Scholarly Evolution 103} 3. Institutionalisation Accompanied by Relaxation (from the 1960s) [a) Epigonism Becoming the Scholarly Ideal 104 / b) Stalinism in a Critical Self-perspective 105 / c) Disciples Diversified Launching their own Trends 107 / d) Comparatism 110 / e) (Re)discovery of the Western Legal Philosophy as a Competitor 112 / f) A Leading Mediatory Role within the »Socialist World Order« 114} 4. Disintegration (in the 1980s) {a) Attempt at Laying New Foundations for Marxism with Epigonism Exhausted 115 / b) Competitive Trends Becoming Exclusive 115 / c) Western Legal Philosophy Acknowledged as a Fellow-traveller within the Socialist Orbit Proper 116 / d) Hungarian Legal Theory Transforming into a National Corpus 118 / e) The Practical Promotion of Some Balance 119} 5. End-game for a Substitute State Religion (in the 1990s) 120] II. Marxist Legal Philosophising in an International Perspective [Ad 1: To the Preliminaries 122 / Ad 2: To Stalinism 124 / Ad 3: To Institutionalisation Accompanied by Relaxation {a) Late Separation from Vishinskiy’s Theory 125 / b) From Ideological Self-closure to an Apparently Scholarly Openness 127 / c) From Political Ideology to Genuine Scholarship 130 / d) International Recognition of Socialist Jurisprudence as an Independent Trend 135 / e) Together with Western Trends 137} Ad 4: To Disintegration {a) Loss of Attraction as Mere Epigonism 139 / b) Exclusivity of Competing Trends 139 / c) Fellowship with »Bourgeois« Trends 140 / d) An own Trend, Internationally Recognised 141 / e) A yet Progressive Role 142} Ad 5: To the Present state 143] III. A Temporary Balance 145 // AUTONOMY AND INSTRUMENTALITY OF LAW IN A SUPERSTRUCTURAL PERSPECTIVE [1986] 151–175: 1. The Strange Fate of Concepts 151 / I. A Relational Category 2. Basis and Superstructure: The Genuine Meaning 154 / 3. Exerting Social Influence as a Conceptual Minimum 156 / 4. Relationships within the Prevailing Totality 158 / 5. Attempts at Interpretation in Hungary 159 / 6. The Lukácsian Stand 162 / 7. Lukács’s Recognitions 168 / 8. Some Criticism 169 / II. The Law’s Understanding 171 / 9. Law Interpreted as Superstructure 171 / 10. Conclusions Drawn for the Law’s Understanding 173 // LEGAL THEORY IN TRANSITION (A PREFACE FROM HUNGARY) [2000] 177–186 // DEVELOPMENT OF THEORETICAL LEGAL THOUGHT IN HUNGARY AT THE TURN OF THE MILLENNIUM [2006] 187–215: 1. International Environment 188 / 2. The Situation in Hungary 190 / 3. Outlook I: The Historical-comparative Study of Legal Cultures and of the Lawyerly Way of Thinking 203 / 4. Outlook II: The Paradigmatic Enigma of the Transition to Rule of Law 207 / 5. Incongruity in Practice 213 / 6. Perspectives 214 --- TWENTIETH CENTURY CONTEMPORANEITY -- CHANGE OF PARADIGMS IN LEGAL RECONSTRUCTION: CARL SCHMITT AND THE TEMPTATION TO FINALLY REACH A SYNTHESIS [2002] 219–234: 1. Dangers of Intellectualism 219 / 2. Schmitt in Facts 221 / 3. Schmitt and Kelsen 222 / 4. On Bordering Conditions 226 / 5. With Kelsen in Transubstantiation 230 / 6. Polarisation as the Path of Theoretical Development 232 // KELSENIAN DOCUMENTS IN HUNGARY: CHAPTERS ON CONTACTS, INCLUDING THE GENESIS OF AUTOBIOGRAPHY [2006] 235–243: 1. Preludes 235 / 2. The Search for Moór’s Bequeath 235 / 3. Moór’s Collegiality 238 / 4. Bibó as a Disciple Translating 241 // THE »HART-PHENOMENON« [2002] 245–267: I. The Hart-miracle 246 [1. The Scene of Britain at the Time 247 / 2. The Personal Career 250 / 3. The Opus’ Career 252 / 4. Verbal Sociologism 255 / 5. Growing into the British Pattern 259] II. The Hart-phenomenon 260 [6. Origination of a Strange Orthodoxy 261 / 7. Mastering Periods of the 20th Century 263 / 8. Raising the Issue of Reception in Hungary 365] // LITERATURE? A SUBSTITUTE FOR LEGAL PHILOSOPHY? [2007] 269–287: 1. The Enigma of Law and its Study 269 / 2. “Law and Literature” 271 / 3. Varieties of “Law and Literature” 274 / 4. The German Study of Artistic Representations 280 / 5. Some Literary Reconsiderations 285 / 6. Conclusion 287 --- APPENDIX -- THE PHILOSOPHY OF TEACHING LEGAL PHILOSOPHY IN HUNGARY [2007] 291–320: I. Why and How to Philosophise in Law? 291 / II. The State of Teaching Legal Philosophy 294 / III. The Philosophy of Teaching Legal Philosophy 296 / IV. Programme at the Catholic University of Hungary 300 [1. Graduate Studies 300 {a) Basic Subjects 301 / b) Facultative Seminars 305 / c) Closing Subjects 309 / d) Written Memoranda and the Thesis 312} 2. Postgraduate Studies 313 / 3. Conclusion 317] V. Perspectives 318 /// Index of Subjects 321 / Index of Normative Materials 328 / Index of Names 329 . (shrink)

A philosophical study of the concept of _Heimat, home and homeland, is still lacking. This article examines Gadamer's linguistification of Heidegger's concept of _Heimat that includes moments of both regional identification and language. Gadamer eliminates the references to a home-land and, thus, rids the concept of unwanted associations with National-Socialist propaganda of blood and soil. Yet a merely linguistic notion of _Heimat offers not enough potential for identification in an age of world civilization. The essay suggests to resort to (...) Schelling's notion of an _Unvordenkliches as the ground of both poetic speech and the customs of a polity as _Heimat. (shrink)

The aim of this chapter is to clarify the meaning and the use of the concept of relativism in the context of National Socialism (NS). This chapter analyzes three aspects of the connection between relativism and NS: The first part examines the critical reproach that NS is a form of relativism. I analyze and criticize the common core of this widespread argument, which is developed in varying contexts, was held in different times, and is still shared by several (...) authors. The second part investigates the ideological debate among Nazi philosophers themselves concerning whether NS is indeed a form of relativism. I focus on the epistemological consequences of Nazi anthropology and analyze both its relativistic tendencies and the strategies used to reject relativism. In contrast to the received view, I argue that Nazi philosophers attempted to overcome both absolutism and relativism. The third part investigates the academic debate on relativism during NS, using the example of the prize question on relativism that was announced by the Prussian Academy of Science in 1936. By examining the academic approaches to the problem of relativism, I also address the question of how broader philosophical debates were related to the core of Nazi ideology. Academic philosophers took the self-understanding of Nazi philosophers seriously. They saw the shared aim of overcoming relativism as an opportunity to collaborate with NS. The brief conclusion summarizes the findings of the chapter. I conclude that, in the context of NS, critics, ideologists, and academics understand and use the concept of relativism in the same way. (shrink)

In 1933 the philosopher Martin Heidegger declared his allegiance to Hitler. Ever since, scholars have asked to what extent his work is implicated in Nazism. To address this question properly involves neither conflating Nazism and the continuing philosophical project that is Heidegger's legacy, nor absolving Heidegger and, in the process, turning a deaf ear to what he himself called the philosophical motivations for his political engagement. It is important to establish the terms on which Heidegger aligned himself with National (...) Socialism. On the basis of an untimely but by no means unprecedented understanding of the mission of the German people, the philosopher first joined but then also criticized the movement. An exposition of Heidegger's conception of Volk hence can and must treat its merits and deficiencies as a response to the enduring impasse in contemporary political philosophy of the dilemma between liberalism and authoritarianism. (shrink)

This paper is an exploration of the ideology of National Socialism in the work and activity of the German terrorist group and Black Metal band Absurd. Historians are divided—and many have criticized how postwar Germany dealt with denazification—, but the fact is that Nazi ideology has been part of the political and social spheres in Germany since then. Neo‑Nazism saw a revival especially in the first years after unification, which coincided with the beginning of Absurd’s story and career. (...) Today, they hold the title of the National Socialist Black Metal act par excellence, with a 28‑year music career actively supporting and promoting Nazi ideology. Absurd makes a very interesting case study, since the band has played a key role in preserving and transmitting Nazi ideology, not just in Germany, but also worldwide. (shrink)

This book contains two essays by Pöggeler, one forty-five pages long with the same title as the book, the other some thirty pages long entitled "Heidegger’s Topology of Being." In the first essay, "politics" is taken in an admittedly wider sense than usual, because it refers to the establishment of a sense of life for a people over a historical period; it is a Politik des Volkes. The agents of such political action are the poets and thinkers who found a (...) new age. Pöggeler examines Heidegger’s analysis of our own period, the place of technology in society, and the question of how authentic appreciation of being can still occur. The question of politics is then moved beyond that of a people, to "politics in the horizon of this world-civilization". In treating this subject Pöggeler analyzes many other themes in Heidegger with his customary skill and lucidity. The second essay is an examination of the questions Heidegger raises in regard to what stands beneath any division of kinds or areas of being. There are fifteen long footnotes which fill almost fifty pages. They are very interesting and cover much literature about Heidegger, and also examine at some length Heidegger’s attitude toward National Socialism in 1933 and in the years following. The chief question one can address to Pöggeler and to Heidegger, of course, is whether human association on the scale of a Volk or on the scale of world-civilization is still political in anything but a metaphorical sense.—R.S. (shrink)

The aim of this chapter is to clarify the use and meaning of the concept of relativism in the context of National Socialism (NS). Section 1 examines the critical reproach that NS is a form of relativism. I analyze and criticize the common core of this widespread argument which has dominated discussions about the topic up to the present. Section 2 sketches the general debates on relativism before and during NS. I show that fascist thought could be associated (...) with both relativism and anti-relativism. In contrast to the received view, I argue that Nazi intellectuals regarded relativism as problem, and presented NS as the overcoming of relativism. Subsequently I turn to two major philosophers who connected their philosophy with NS. Section 3 investigates Bruno Bauch’s (1887–1942) nationalist philosophy. I show that he linked his concept of the nation with an objectivist value theory intended to oppose all kinds of relativism. Section 4 turns to Erich Rothacker’s (1888–1965) cultural anthropology. I argue that the revision of his philosophical views in the 1930s was accompanied by a political turn towards NS and a withdrawal from relativism. The brief conclusion (Section 5) summarizes the findings of the chapter. I conclude that, in the context of NS, relativism is mostly used in a pejorative sense. (shrink)

This article examines the contending redefinitions of national identity in contemporary Germany's memorial culture, focusing particularly on the ensemble of monuments and parade fields known as the former Nazi Party rally grounds in Nuremberg. In a detailed case study, I analyse the recent conversion of one of the physical remnants of National Socialism – Albert Speer's transformer station – into a fast-food restaurant and interpret this conversion as a novel contribution to the discourse on German nationhood. I (...) argue that the provocative commercial reutilisation of the former Nazi monument gives expression to a renewed self-confidence that Germany has gained from displaying a willingness to face up to its past as perpetrator nation. While the intervention thus deviates from the self-indicting spirit that had been characteristic for Germany's memorial culture after World War II, an ironic note is conspicuous in this act of commemorative politics that indicates a way of dealing with the fascist legacy that is, surprisingly in some respects, superior to more conventional memory strategies. (shrink)

This paper explores how national socialist aesthetics and semiotics are regimented within the Swedish Nazi milieu today. In order to treat fascism as contemporary ideology, the article applies intertextuality and provenance as analytical concepts in the analysis of how Nazism is re-emerging discursively. The analysis contributes unique insights, as the dataset consists of extremist discourse aimed at providing members of the most prominent Swedish Nazi movement with guidance on how to embody and express national socialism in their (...) everyday lives. The analysis reveals that common-sense notions about ‘a natural life’ and mainstream aesthetics concerning an outdoor lifestyle emerge as central expressions of a ‘natural’ and ‘healthy’ embodiment of national socialism. This aesthetic finds its ideological motive in opposition to a ‘sick’, ‘Jewish’ and ‘parasitical’ way of living. Mainstream notions are thus turned into vehicles for political extremism. (shrink)