Abstract
In their interesting case study about Handelshochschule Leipzig under the Nazi regime, published 2020 in
Introduction
The Nazi reign of terror in Germany from 1933 to 1945 has already been intensively investigated in historical research. Nevertheless, much remains to be done to better understand the role of individuals and institutions, the motives behind decisions and actions, and their contribution to the development of specific structures and consequences during that time. We have learned that extreme totalitarian conditions affected individuals in an Orwellian sense in a psychological and physical way, whether they were perpetrators, victims, or both. From today’s perspective, it is difficult to put ourselves in this position, at least if we enjoy a safe environment, a secure professional position in a democracy based on the rule of law, in which freedom of opinion prevails. However, historical research is still able to shed more light on the facets of this totalitarian pressure. It might help us to better understand how the areas of professional and private life were influenced, how institutions were shaped, and why things developed as they did.
In their paper ‘Accountability and ideology: The case of a German university under the Nazi regime’ Detzen and Hoffmann (2020, hereinafter: DH) contribute to this understanding. They focus on the totalitarian impact on the academic field and choose
With its important findings but also with the gaps and open issues, this case study provides useful starting points for further, different, and deeper research efforts. There is more to say about the totalitarian influence on the many other facets of academic life – at the organizational as well as individual level. The inaugural speeches and other accounts of the Deans, the charters, regulations, and the minutes of the school’s decision-making bodies emphasize the perspective of the school’s management. The reader learns about the sequence of Deans, their ideologized higher education policy intentions and the history of the faculty management. In consequence, the reader learns about the increasing political pressure on professors. But what this really meant for the professors in individual cases remains unclear, especially when they did not behave in a politically opportune manner or belonged to a discriminated group.
It is also an open and interesting question how the totalitarian influence affected the core aspects of academia. What about the impact on teaching and research as core academic activities? What about the changes in teaching and research performance evaluation? Needless to say, core academic values such as the freedom of research and teaching (e.g. Altbach, 2001; Barnes, 2019; Cain, 2012; Cole, 2005) seemed to be heavily affected – but to what extent? And what about other core players such as the students, their role at the universities and their interaction with the professors? Provided that the appropriate data material is available, the case study approach and the focus on only one university might offer further possibilities of a more detailed analysis of all or some of these aspects. Furthermore, it might be interesting to enlarge the sample period to investigate the change and transition period from the time before (the
Accountability is another important aspect of the study. DH use the accountability concept in a multidimensional way and illustrate interesting facets. Open and interesting questions remain with regard to a more individual level, to personal accountability and/or complicity. The institutional level can also be explored further. For example, why is the case of
Against this background, DH provide not only a remarkable case study but also good starting points for further research. There is more to say about German academics and universities during this period. It is my purpose to illuminate some further aspects of this important topic in order to complement DH in their intention to shed some light on academic institutions and individual academics (with impact on several accountability dimensions) under extreme totalitarian pressure. Equally important, I provide a set of complementary missing pieces that qualify as suggestions for future research in this important and still relevant topic area.
Individual situation of a professor
DH illuminate the growing impact of Nazi ideology at a higher education policy and governance level when they focus on changes in the Dean’s office and on respective inaugural speeches. The individual level is only indirectly addressed. In one example, DH (p. 182) refer to the Law for the Restoration of the Civil Service (
In contrast to the two individual fates mentioned by DH, Jewish-born Klemperer survived the first wave of institutional Nazification in 1933 and 1934. He was lucky to be able to remain in his position until 1935, due to his decorated WWI-veteran status and his ‘Aryan’ wife. To understand what it meant to lose the tenured job as a professor, Klemperer illustrates in his records how the dismissal was accompanied by high salary losses, financial distress and serious economic as well as personal consequences. All this is due to the lack of supplementary income, unavailability of bank credits, and the lack of opportunities to obtain an offer from universities abroad. Suicides of similarly affected colleagues were by no means rare (e.g. Klemperer, 1998: 17–21, 59–68).
Another important study about the German university system during the Nazi period is provided by Mantel (2009) and his PhD thesis in the field of economic and social history research with a clear focus on academic institutions and individuals in German-language business administration. With regard to
Nazi ideology and the repressive political environment also led to hiring-process discriminations of applicants without a Nazi-party membership, with ‘unreliable political behavior’ or ‘friendship to Jews’. These applications were often rejected by the higher local Nazi authorities (Mantel, 2009: 225–243). Mantel analyses these individual professorial fates on the field of all German business schools and concludes that the individuals were quite diverse, that is, some of them cooperated with the new political administration and actively implemented the doctrine, driven by opportunistic motives or by firm conviction. Some of them remained passive and conformist. Some quickly fell into the victim role because they openly opposed or were to be segregated by ideology. In more detail, Mantel especially analyzed the individual consequences for those victims. He distinguishes between those who were murdered, driven to suicide, dismissed, forced to emigrate, or seriously handicapped in their academic careers (Mantel, 2009: 59–75, 351–439).
Impact on research and teaching
The specific perspective of DH provides little evidence about the specific Nazi ideology impact on research and teaching as core academic activities. This leaves room for further research. Academic freedom seemed to be effectively obliterated, by direct or indirect restrictions placed on teaching content and other areas (Altbach, 2001: 209). Nazi ideology demeaned ‘ivory tower’ academics (Ericksen, 2012: 139; Noakes, 1993). Consequently, Klemperer (1998: 35) points out that the idea of science was not important during that time. He describes that lectures, for example, were arbitrarily cut and replaced by military sports exercises. This was most likely due to Hitler’s preference for physical education and character-building over intellectual education (Hartmann et al., 2016: 1040–1105, with commented original passages of Hitler’s ‘Mein Kampf’; see also Noakes, 1993: 380). It relates to the Nazi preference of action over thought, and of feeling over rational inquiry (Ericksen, 2012: 62). Based on a totalitarian and anti-intellectual mentality (Noakes, 1993: 381; Hartmann et al., 2016: 1040–1105) that deeply distrusted free spirit and knowledge, young people were not motivated to study at all (Klemperer, 1998: 61–62), especially not the arts nor humanities since they were part of the ‘frivolous studies’ that seemed to be of little help in warfare (MacGregor, 2003: 13). Therefore, Klemperer experienced a double discrimination, due to both his Jewish origin and his ideologically deprived main subject: French literature. Against this background, the total number of students at German universities declined from 138,000 in 1931 to 40,000 in 1939 (Grüttner, 1995, 101; Mantel, 2009, 37; MacGregor, 2003, 14). Business administration suffered from the Nazi mistrust toward universities in general and the anti-market attitude of the ideology, with criticism of profit orientation and free entrepreneurship, in particular (characteristic examples are Hartmann et al., 2016: 563–577; Nicklisch, 1933 with reference to Hitler; see also Brockhoff, 2010: 174–187; Mantel, 2009: 37–39). Klemperer (1998: 12, 16) also mentions the discrimination of evidence-based observations and factual arguments as dangerous lies (today we know the expression as ‘fake news’) where they opposed Nazi ideology.
The devastating effect of the ideology- and fear-driven conditions can be seen, for example, in an emotionally touching protocol of a doctoral examination at
DH raise another important aspect in their paper when they refer to performance criteria in academia, their (disputable) role in measuring research productivity, and the possible change of these criteria in times of a changing environment. This aspect deserves greater attention, especially from the Dean’s and university management’s perspective. Although DH mention several interesting documents (the business report(s) of faculty’s recent activities or the professors’ brief statements about their academic activities), there is still potential to dig deeper here. It seemed that during those times the faculty and the professors concentrated only on teaching aspects, such as student numbers, examinations, and programs (p. 180), whereas research was of less importance (‘research played almost no role’, p. 183). However, due to the unclear role of research beforehand, in the time of the
Role of students
DH do not focus on students as another core group of an academic institution. They only mention with reference to Ericksen (2012: 139) that Hitler’s regime ‘found enthusiastic support in German universities during the transition of 1933, from students and faculty alike’ (DH: 180). However, students’ role and impact on universities and professors’ behavior deserve further attention. Noakes (1993) and Grüttner (1995), for instance, identify the strong influence of extremist students and student groups at universities even before 1933. Starting at the end of the nineteenth century and encouraged by WWI experiences, German students had been increasingly influenced by an extreme nationalism with a strong antisemitism (Ericksen, 2012: 74–84). A very significant example in this regard is provided by Noakes (1993: 378 with further references): On 19 April 1933, Gerhard Krüger, the head of the Nazified Students” Association (. . .), ordered the local student organizations to denounce university teachers who were Jews, Communists or Socialists, who had attacked nationalist leaders, the movement of national uprising or First World War veterans or whose academic approach reflects their liberal or, in particular, pacifist perspective and who are, therefore, unsuitable for educating German students in the nationalist state. Professors who were tough examiners could be particular targets.
Thus, students and well-organized student groups materially changed the atmosphere at universities. They pushed the Nazi agenda, questioned the authority of academics and faculties, appeared martial and even violent, and ran campaigns against political dissidents, pacifists and Jews within the faculties (Ericksen, 2012: 74–84; also Grüttner, 1995; Noakes, 1993). What that meant at an individual level is again described by Klemperer (1998: 10–15). He relates the daily atmosphere of denunciation also by students. The fear of lecturers to express themselves openly, and the danger of being pilloried at the ‘
Despite their rather infrequent references to student activities, DH (p. 188) touch on an important characteristic, the heterogeneity of the student body. In their description of the Hasenack case, they clarify that some students attempted to prevent Hasenack from further critical remarks for his own benefit, others were less forgiving and, in February 1945, again wanted to report him to the Gestapo, arguing that he did not belong in a classroom, but in a concentration camp.
This case is similarly analyzed by Mantel (2009: 237). He additionally emphasizes how dangerous the extremist and militant minority among students was, with some of them working as spies for the feared Nazi secret state police (Gestapo,
Accountability and the question of complicity
The DH paper is not about accounting or accountants; it is about accountability. However, accountability is an ‘elusive concept’ with ‘chameleon quality’ (Sinclair, 1995: 219) and therefore, difficult to apply. DH fortunately abstain from the standard economic understanding of accountability (and accounting), in which individuals just act as rational economic players in contractual relationships. With reference to Messner (2009), Sinclair (1995) and others, their concept is much broader and captures sociological and ethical aspects. Focusing on two of Sinclairs’ five dimensions of accountability, professional and political accountability, they demonstrate the shift from professional values to political pressure to align with the Nazi doctrine after January 1933. In this regard, their main data material, the inaugural speech transcripts, are both a strength as well as a weakness. On the one hand, there is hardly a better source to picture changes in general accountability guidelines of a business school. On the other hand, these speeches might be more susceptible to ideologically colored statements at the higher education policy as well as institutional levels, without being able to illuminate the real implications of this shift at the individual level. This applies not only to the already discussed question of how exactly the performance metrics for research and teaching might have changed.
Also, personal accountability, a third Sinclair dimension used by DH, is presented in fragments. Admittedly, DH (pp. 177, 182) express the obvious difficulty to ‘identify ex post whether individuals only gave lip service to accountability pressures in public settings or whether their surviving statements reflected their personal beliefs’. It is not questioned that analyzing the inner states and attitudes of individual professors with the sources still available today might be challenging. Nevertheless, despite all the difficulties this task remains important for further inquiries to better understand personal accountability, and to contribute to the question of complicity at the individual level. Official political inaugural speeches fall short of examining this area. One might even suspect that garnishing these speeches with ideological set pieces was a kind of routine in order to be otherwise left alone by the regime. Thus, Mantel (2009: 67) notes that even in scientific publications, Nazi ideology garnished the introductions in order to keep the rest of the text clean(er). Consequently, DH use the much more meaningful Hasenack example to expose individual accountability implications. They describe the balancing act of an individual academic to get along in his professional environment under extreme executive forces, while at the same time satisfying the ‘sense of duty that one has as a member of a professional or expert group, (. . .) expertise and professional integrity’ (professional accountability) as well as meeting basic human values ‘such as respect for human dignity and acting in a manner that accepts responsibility for affecting the lives of others’ (personal accountability) (in the words of Sinclair, 1995: 229–230, with further references).
More of these highly valuable examples can be informative for assessing how, and how often, something like this occurred. Was this a rather isolated case or representative for a certain group of professors? In a footnote, DH add that Hasenack was also in close and supporting contact to Eugen Schmalenbach, alumnus of
Further evidence about these forms of balancing acts are only scarcely provided by literature. Thus, it is difficult to say how many of these ambivalent expressions at the professional as well as personal accountability level occurred. On the one hand, the gestures of criticism and opposition were often subtle and small in nature and did not reach the level of open and outright resistance. As a rare example of the latter, Ericksen (2012: 164–166) describes the case of Heinrich Düker at University of Göttingen, who openly and actively opposed the regime and spent several years in prison and concentration camps. MacGregor (2003: 12) mentions Adolf Reichwein, a professor in Halle, who openly opposed Hitler’s ascension to power, which finally lead to his execution in 1944. Well-known is also the example of the White Rose student group of resistance at University of Munich, where involved professors were also executed in early 1943 (Ericksen, 2012: 163; MacGregor, 2003: 11; Michalczyk and Müller, 1997). Ericksen further concludes that only ‘a tiny handful of stories [. . .] demonstrate actual resistance [. . .]. Their very paucity [. . .] demonstrates how little such behavior is representative of the academic community’. For him, only ‘efforts to oppose the regime, sabotage the regime, or even work towards its overthrow’ qualify as opposition (p. 163). In contrast, the less courageous individuals could show only tiny symbols of criticism, if at all, that also exposed them to severe personal consequences for career, family, and life. It is again Klemperer who demonstrates in his diaries the very limited possibilities to oppose. He takes lectures with indirect allusions or provocations as an example, which was still dangerous in an environment of fear and denunciation (e.g. Klemperer, 1998: 25). This is supported by Mantel (2009: 65), who assumes that academics did not have much room for maneuvers in this regard. However, he adds that this room was still larger for tenured and established professors than for non-tenured fellows or even ordinary citizens.
On the other hand, the appropriate terminology of a balancing act indicates the intertwined roles of complicity and victimhood. Ericksen (2012: 140–142) describes how a US student, Edward Yarnell Hartshorne, Jr., who spent one year (1935/1936) in Germany, primarily in Berlin, experienced the German professors. He identified adversities, slights and indignities suffered by professors at the hands of an aggressive ideology and described how some of them were depressed and ‘waited for the Nazi storm to pass’ (p. 141). He also identified many German professors who defended the new Nazi doctrine and its influencing role at the universities (also Hartshorne, 1937; MacGregor, 2003: 6–12). Similar is the observation by Noakes (1993: 377) who points out that most of the professors condemned the rowdyism of Nazi students, while they sympathized with the doctrine and feared to appear ‘out of touch with the current mood’. It is interesting to note that even non-Nazi supporters among the academics adopted parts of Nazi ideology and used standard arguments of that time, such as universities being ‘rotten inside’, having ‘too little connection to the real world’, being ‘degenerated into a nest of quarrelsome clique’s, and having ‘become hot-beds of Judaism’ (Ericksen, 2012: 73, 142; Hartshorne, 1937; also Paletschek, 2001: 41; Jarausch, 1985: 388, indicating that already before 1933, only a minority of academics supported the democratic system of the
The question of complicity (and responsibility) is not at the center of the DH paper, but implicitly touched and it remains important. When the entire faculty of
Against this background, the role of mere opportunism under changing accountability norms is also worth exploring. The intrusion of Nazi ideology in inaugural speeches could also be the consequence of opportunism (‘lip service to the regime’ according to DH: 182). The same applies to other incidents, for example the fact that all faculty members in Leipzig followed the pledge of 1934 under close observation of a totalitarian regime or applied for NSDAP membership after 1933. Mantel (2009: 59, 63, also Noakes, 1993: 378) reports a rather low Nazi party membership in the area of business professors before 1933, which significantly increased after 1933. In conclusion, non-membership after 1933 and membership before 1933 mean much more than membership after 1933, especially with regard to opportunism and personal accountability.
It also remains important to investigate whether the Nazi period was so extreme in its brutal consequences for critical and dissident opinions and individual actions that it is not even suitable as a blueprint for totalitarian regimes and generalizable statements about accountability. For example, can we still discuss opportunism at the individual accountability level when life is immediately at stake?
Institutional level: specific setting in Leipzig and the general role of German universities
Another important question may also be raised at this point. What do we learn here about
At this point, DH address another important issue, at least indirectly, that deserves further investigation. Why did German universities in general, and
Conclusion
DH provide an interesting and important piece of research about one of the darkest eras of (academic) history. They choose a case study about
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
I thank two anonymous reviewers, Thorsten Sellhorn and Utz Schäffer for providing helpful comments, Klara Lösse for editorial assistance and Laura Maran for the opportunity to write a comment about a haunting and still very relevant topic.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
