Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- 1 A Social and Historical Typology of the German Opposition to Hitler
- 2 Working-Class Resistance: Problems and Options
- 3 Choice and Courage
- 4 Resistance and Opposition: The Example of the German Jews
- 5 From Reform to Resistance: Carl Goerdeler's 1938 Memorandum
- 6 The Conservative Resistance
- 7 The Kreisau Circle and the Twentieth of July
- 8 The Second World War, German Society, and Internal Resistance to Hitler
- 9 The Solitary Witness: No Mere Footnote to Resistance Studies
- 10 The German Resistance in Comparative Perspective
- 11 The Political Legacy of the German Resistance: A Historiographical Critique
- 12 Uses of the Past: The Anti-Nazi Resistance Legacy in the Federal Republic of Germany
- Bibliography
- Index
6 - The Conservative Resistance
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 January 2013
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- 1 A Social and Historical Typology of the German Opposition to Hitler
- 2 Working-Class Resistance: Problems and Options
- 3 Choice and Courage
- 4 Resistance and Opposition: The Example of the German Jews
- 5 From Reform to Resistance: Carl Goerdeler's 1938 Memorandum
- 6 The Conservative Resistance
- 7 The Kreisau Circle and the Twentieth of July
- 8 The Second World War, German Society, and Internal Resistance to Hitler
- 9 The Solitary Witness: No Mere Footnote to Resistance Studies
- 10 The German Resistance in Comparative Perspective
- 11 The Political Legacy of the German Resistance: A Historiographical Critique
- 12 Uses of the Past: The Anti-Nazi Resistance Legacy in the Federal Republic of Germany
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
If one wishes to discuss the resistance of the German conservatives to National Socialism, one must first consider the central terms “resistance” and “conservatism.” Neither term has a fixed meaning, because both reflect the development of German history since the 1920s.
Historically, resistance must be understood as a phenomenon that varied according to the time of its occurrence and the intensity of the political pressures to which it responded. In this essay, resistance to Nazism is defined as any form of opposition to a regime that attempted to control every aspect of political, cultural, religious, and social life. The Nazi government sought to construct an order that made far-reaching demands on every German citizen and thereby conflicted with other comprehensive visions of social organization - for example, the ideals of the churches.
The extensive demands of the Nazis not only evoked the opposition of their traditional and most outspoken adversaries - the working-class movement - but also challenged a number of conservative parties, interest groups, and institutions that initially had accepted parts of the Nazi program. This held especially true for the groups that were the declared enemies of the Social Democrats, the Communists, and the free trade unions. The Catholic church, for example, which had strongly opposed political and cultural liberalism, did not hesitate to cooperate with the Nazis in the summer of 1933, the critical period when the party consolidated its power.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Contending with HitlerVarieties of German Resistance in the Third Reich, pp. 89 - 98Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1992