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Die Vision einer deutschen Technik. Ingenieure und das 'Dritte Reich'.

Research output: Contribution in Book/Report/Proceedings - With ISBN/ISSNChapter

Published
Publication date2003
Host publicationUtopie und politische Herrschaft im Europa der Zwischenkriegszeit
Place of PublicationMunchen
PublisherOldenbourg
Number of pages287
ISBN (print)3-486-56642-3
<mark>Original language</mark>English

Abstract

The title translates as ""'The Vision of a 'German Technology' ' Engineers and the Third Reich"" It is still astonishing to see the extent to which the NSDAP succeeded in becoming a people's party by successfully appealing to a wide variety of social groups and ideologies. Many historians stress that the party primarily gained the protest votes of those dissatisfied with the Weimar Republic, but this does not explain why the Nazis further increased their popularity after gaining power. The chapter uses the concept of a 'German technology' as an example to show how Nazism seemed to offer a synthesis to overcome entrenched political conflicts. A 'German technology' - symbolised most prominantly in the German motorways - was supposed to be at the forefront of technological advances but simultaneously in harmony with nature. Such public investment in a new technology offered financial opportunities for companies and career opportunities for employees, but was presented primarily as serving the public as a whole. The Nazis thus succeeded in appealing to both engineers and environmentalists, to both capitalists and those stressing the need for social justice.

Bibliographic note

The chapter was written following an invited participation in an international colloquium on 'Utopias and Political Rule in interwar Europe' at the Historisches Kolleg in Munich. It extends the author's work on environmentalism and the engineering association - published in his book 'Eine andere Moderne? Zivilisationskritik, Natur und Technik in Deutschland, 1880-1933' (1999) - into the Third Reich. RAE_import_type : Chapter in book RAE_uoa_type : History