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AeCBODvy
would
have been regarded as foreign. This foreign element was for him indicative of a spiritual
i m i n r t l n n
that had reached the point of destroying the
spirit .
ConcludingAat thepoliticalcollapse of 1918 was
ariMnOy
amicipated in this degeneration, Hitlerdelivered a
harangue
against nrademist art as art Bolshevism.
Sbatf
years
ago, he commented, such aculturalcollapse, as it manifested itself
in
futurist,cubist, and dadaistic works,
^ o i i dhaveseemedsimplyimpossible and its organizers
would
haveended up in a madhouse . AsHitlersaid, he saw
ftoe
diseases
*Hn
nearly every
field
of art and culture in Germany between 1900 and 192S. The Bolshevist
pRScaf
was for
him
embodied in a cubist monstrosity, and he questioned whether it was permissible to dish up
haBodnations of lunatics or
criminals
to the healthy
world .
Whatmakesthis tediousharangueso important for
*e
ioieationalist
interpretation is the fact thati tprovides the complemento ftermslater used to
designate
modernist art
as a
apedal
idndofcultural
degeneration .
T f i t k r attributed the ultimate
reason
for the decline ofImperialGermany... to its failure to recognize the racial
pwMcuiin Germany. For
hinu
history was determined by thesurvivalof thefittest. a popularized version of
Social
Darwinism.In Hider'sterminology,this
reads
as the self-preservation and propagation of thespeciesand therace...
sobject to the lawso fNature . Consequently, Hider also sought to provide aracialjustificationof hiscultural politicsin
MeinXampf.Forhim,the Aryan was the founder and custodian of culture,whereasthe Jewish people were
declared to he a people
'Svithout
any true culture, especiallywithouta culture of
its
own .Hitlermaintained that
there has never
been
a Jewish art and accordingly there is none today eiUier . This pohidous demagoguery
reveals the racist
basis
of
Hitler's
concept of
cultural
degeneration and the
claim
for amandateto exercise this
diseaseo f
degeneration
from
the German national body .
The Nads' definitionof what was German wasbasedon a biomedicalworldview that posited a fictitious
Goman norm and resulted hi the argument that anything deviating
from
this norm was to be removed likea
cancer from
the
fictitious
body of a German people, or
Votk.
Nineteenth-century
pseudo-sdence
provided the
Naziswitha term for this norm and thedeviationtherefrom: the German wordsArT,or
genus,
and
Entartung,
or
degeneration.
While
the Nazi
usage
of both the terms rac^ and
Aryan
was
totaify
unscientific and
derived
from
pseudosdentific publications of the nineteenth century, the terms l iad the aura of sdentific
respectability not only among the masses but also among the educated middle dass. The l ink between
degeneration and the Jew was oneo fthe standard associations ofNazipropaganda.AlthoughJewsImdsettled hi
Germany for over 1,000 years, they were now considered as not
fitting
the fictitiousGerman norm, and they
were designated asdegenerate-
deviating
fromand harmful to thenorm.Therefore, according to Nad
ideology,
they had to be removed
from
the body of the German people, and this body had to be protected
from
or
immunizedagainst the influence
o f
degeneration .
I M P L E M E K T A T I O N
OFN A Z I
C U L T U R A L
POLICIES
In 1930, threeyearsbeforeHitlerbecameChancellor, there occurred the firstinstance of implementation ofNazi
culturalpolides : as a resulto fstateelectionsi nThuringiainJanuary 1930, the NaddqnityWilhelmRickentered the
stategovernment as minister of the interior
with
responsibility forstatepolice and education. One of Prick's
first
political
actions was to introduce a
regulation
called Ordinance againstNegit)
Culture,
whichwas to rid
Thuringia
o f
all
immoral
and
foreign
racialelements
in
the arts. Thisordinance resulted
in
the
blacklistingo f
books, the censorship
of
theatre, cinema, and concert
stage
as
well
as a purge of modernist aftfirom he Wdmar DucdMuseum...
he
eariy
actions
made
Thuringiathe rehearsal
stage
ofNazi culturalpolicies.Even though I^ck had to resign
in April
of
1931,
his actions were praised throughout the Partypress.They were a prelude to thecultural
policies
tobe implemented after
1933 . -
After Hitler had been appointed chancellor in January 1933, the various
stages
of his cultural p
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POLYCRACY,R A DI C A L I S A TI ONOFC U L T U R A LPOLICYAN DHITLER'S
LEADERSHIP
Nazirule was a polycratic system and itsculturalpolicies were no exception... [T]he interagency rivalry was
perhaps
more evidentherethan in any otherarea.Goebbels'ministryandthe Reich ChamberofCultureunder
his presidencybad a
rival
in the Combat LeagueofGerman Culture{Kamp bundfS r deutschKuUur under the
leadership of
Alfred
Rosenberg... Founded in 1929, this organization gadiered not
only Nazi
writers, artists, and
scholars, but also other nationalists, ultraconservatives. and pan-German racists of various colors. In January 1934,
Hider
created a new department for die
supervision
ofthe
ideological training
of the Party,
known
as the Officefor the
Supervision
of Ideological
Training
and Education of the
Nazi
Party,
with
Rosenberg as its head. This move
mstitutionalized
the rivalry between the two topNazi
officials
hi the
area
of cultural politics.The interoffice
infightii igdidnotneutralize the negative effectsofNazi cultural politicsbut radicalized them. In many uistances,
Rosenberg forced Goebbels' hand in cultural policies . Infighting was typical for the evolvement of many
institutionsandpolicies,and the
cultural
policies were no exception. A
process
of cumulative radicalization ...also
can be obsoved in the realm of
cultural
politics.Thisradicalizationoccurred whenever the various competing
Nazi
agencies
fought for
positions
of
power
withu)the system.
But
the cumulative
radicalizatioi^
ofthe
cultural politics
was
mainly
due to
Hitier
s
hitervention
and not the resultofthefaiteractionofvariousagendes.Thebdanceof
powo-b^ween Goebbels and Rosenberg was controlled by
Hitler's firm
leadership in matters of
cultural politics
between 1933 and 1939 .
Atthebeginningof
his
r^jjme,Hi t i e rwasrelativelyambiguous inhispronouncements on a rt Hisfirstpublic
statement on art in 1933
seemed
to^peaseboth the Goebbels and Rosenberg factions. He condemned modermst art,
but
asserted
that today's
tasks
require new methods. This statement was considoed a rejection of the
position
of the
Combat League for
Culture,
while
the condemnation of mod^dsm was taken as a repudiation of
[Goebbels']
Berlin
faction.
Goebbels* appomtment as president of the Reich Chand}er of
Colbire
wasseenasastepin theright
direction
toward
restraining &e dogmatism of Rosenberg and his Combat League for German Culture. By September 1934,
however,Hi t i e rdefined andsetthecourseofthe
cultural
polides for theyearstocome.
A t
the annud Nad Party
rally in
Nuremberg,
he
identifiedtwo
cdturddangersthreatemng
Nationd
Sodalism. Rrst, the modermsts,
whom
Iw
describedas
ttie
cubists, futurists, and Dadaists. were targeted as the conrupters of art There was noplace in
Germanyformodernist art, he
claimed,
that such charlatans are mistaken that the creators of theThirdRdch are
foolish
orcowardlyenough to 1^ themsdves be ...intimidatedby their cfaatto-. Hewoddnot tolerate any cdturd
assistance
topoUticddestruction, and he demanded that art be integrated as part of theNazi politicdprogram. The
otho'cdturd dang ' hepCTceived was the traditionalists.In thiscase,
IMex
attacked theMstoricist
followers
of
Rosenberg and the Combat League for German
CdUne.
Heridiculedthe representatives ofa
r e v l vd
of
Teutonic
art
and ordered such redvalist actidties to
cease.
These
polides, outlinedhiHitier's
speech
of 1934,
became
the
otBddprogram
of
Nad culturd
politics,and there was to be no
significant deviation
from the
direction
pobited
by
Hi t l e r . ' '
Roseabo^
and the Combat League for German Cdture woe prevented
from
gaimng farther
control
in
cdturd
affiuTL By 1935. the Cooibatk a ^ was
itMrporatedinto
the Nad Labor Front and had lost its sigmficance
within
the NadVj^sHefSi
wiule
Rosedxrg
shified
his actidties to other
areas.
Goebbels. on the other
hand,
was forced to
retrench
his
mote progresdveprogramai dtowithdrawto a more reactionary approachtocdture .
ByAugust 1907, thedefhiltiveNadculturd politicswereinplace and enforced inallareas...Nothingwas
donew itl iont
Hitier
s
i^provaL
The
ap{opruite legislation
was issued in thenameo fthe FQhrer and chancellor of the
Reich...In omtrasttodocuments
relating
to the Holocaust Hider's signature can be
found
on the major documents
relating
to
diecdturd
poUdes . *
Hit le r dalmeda qpedd relationship between German and dassicd Greek art, establishing a newtypeof
dasddsm. Ndtiier medlevd art nor expressionism coddserve as modds, but
only
classed Greekart as an
expressionof an
A r y a i ^
race,of a hedthier and stronger humanype
Hit le r
considered it his task to protect
the Germanraceandits art
from
destruction or,ashe put
i t ,
degeiKracy ...(Dhe cdturd
politics
oftheTh i rd
Rdch...constitutedanfaitegrdpartof[HBflers]ra dd polides .
S OURCE EhiiiardBahr, ^aziCulturalPolitics: Intentionalism vs. Functionalism , in Glenn R.
Cuomo,(cd-).
National
Socialist
Cultural
Policy London, Macmillan,
1995, pp.5-22.
DJM
EhrhaidBAHR