Volksgemeinschaft

Volksgemeinschaft (German pronunciation: [ˈfɔlksɡəˌmaɪnʃaft] ^ⓘ) is a German expression meaning "people's community", "folk community", "national community", or "racial community", depending on the translation of its component term Volk (cognate with the English word "folk"). This expression originally became popular during World War I as Germans rallied in support of the war, and many experienced "relief that at one fell swoop all social and political divisions could be solved in the great national equation". The idea of a Volksgemeinschaft was rooted in the notion of uniting people across class divides to achieve a national purpose, and the hope that national unity would "obliterate all conflicts - between employers and employees, town and countryside, producers and consumers, industry and craft".

After the November Revolution of 1918, the overthrow of the constitutional monarchy, and Germany's defeat in World War I, the concept of Volksgemeinschaft remained popular, especially on the right wing of German politics, in opposition to the class struggle advocated by Marxist parties like the Social Democrats and the Communists. The monarchist German Conservative Party became the German National People's Party (DVNP) and the National Liberal Party reorganized itself into the German People's Party, with the new names intended partly as references to Volksgemeinschaft.

The concept was notoriously embraced by the newly founded Nazi Party in the 1920s, and eventually became strongly associated with Nazism after Adolf Hitler's rise to power. In the Nazi vision of Volksgemeinschaft, society would continue to be organized into classes (based upon talent, property, or profession), but there would be no class conflict, because a common national consciousness would inspire the different economic and social classes to live together harmoniously and work for the nation. There was also an important racial aspect to the Nazi Volksgemeinschaft: only "people of Aryan blood" could be members.

The word "Volksgemeinschaft" was probably first used in Gottlob August Tittel's 1791 translation of a text written by John Locke, synthesising the expression "in any [particular] place, generally". Among 19th century scholars who used the word "Volksgemeinschaft" were Friedrich Schleiermacher, Friedrich Carl von Savigny, Carl Theodor Welcker, Johann Caspar Bluntschli, Hermann Schulze, Wilhelm Dilthey, and Wilhelm Wundt. Most influential was perhaps Ferdinand Tönnies' theory in his work Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft ("Community and Society") of 1887. Decades later, in 1932, Tönnies joined the Social Democratic Party of Germany to oppose the rise of Nazism and protest against their use of his concept. He had his honorary professorship removed when Adolf Hitler came to power.

In 1914, at the beginning of World War I, the German Emperor Wilhelm II proclaimed before the Reichstag the Burgfrieden ("peace in the castle" or "truce in the castle", a kind of "unity within a besieged castle" for the duration of the conflict), announcing that henceforward all of the regional differences between the different states of the Reich; between rich, middle class and poor; between Roman Catholics and Protestants; and between rural and urban were no longer relevant and the German people were all one for the duration of the war. During the war, many Germans longed to have the sense of unity that the Burgfrieden inspired continue after the war, and it was during this period that many ideas started to circulate about how to convert the wartime Burgfrieden into a peacetime Volksgemeinschaft. People who belonged to the Volksgemeinschaft were known as Volksgenossen (fellow members).

In the aftermath of World War I, the idea of Volksgemeinschaft was used to interpret economic catastrophes and hardship facing Germans during the Weimar Republic era as a common experience of the German nation and to argue for German unity to bring about renewal to end the crisis. It was invoked by the Jewish social anarchists Gustav Landauer (who was killed for his participation in the Bavarian Soviet Republic) and Erich Mühsam (who died in Oranienburg concentration camp) in articulating their vision of a peaceful, non-coercive mutualist society. However, it was subsequently adopted by the Nazi Party to justify actions against Jews, profiteers, Marxists, and the Allies of World War I, whom the Nazis accused of obstructing German national regeneration, causing national disintegration in 1918 and Germany's defeat in World War I.

There is an ongoing debate among historians as to whether a Volksgemeinschaft was or was not successfully established between 1933 and 1945. This is a notably controversial topic of debate for ethical and political reasons, and is made difficult by the ambiguous language employed by Hitler and the Nazis when talking about the Volksgemeinschaft.

In the aftermath of the November Revolution of 1918 that marked the end of the German Empire and the beginning of the Weimar Republic, there was strong animosity amongst many Germans towards the Weimar Republic and the social democrats who sponsored its creation. This was combined with anxiety in the 1930s and with the severe economic crisis in Germany and abroad, in which many Germans faced unemployment. This situation resulted in increasing popularity for the Nazi Party, including amongst workers, small business owners, and others who desired a government that would resolve the economic crisis. While ascending to power, Hitler promised to restore faith in the Volk and to bring wholeness while accusing other politicians of tearing at German unity.