IGCSE History Nazi policies 🇩🇪

Youth, Women, Jews, Church, Education, Workers and Economic policies:)

Organisations under Hitler Youth Policies

1. Hitler Youth (Boys)

2. League of German Maidens (Girls)

What did Hitler Youth involve?

Lectures on Nazi ideals: lebensraum- conquering other countries to increase living space and racial purity of the Aryan race.

Stories about great German heroes, Jews and opposition parties were villains.

Practical activities which evolved into military style training to prepare boys for war.

Effects of Hitler Youth

Indoctrination: Led to youth informing on parents if they expressed anti Nazi ideas.

Membership stats on hitler youth

1932: 100,000 members

1936: 6 mil members

1939: membership was compulsory so membership increased to 8.2 mil.

What did the League of German Maidens involve?

Indoctrination of Nazi ideals

Emphasis on health and women roles.

Rallies and political marches

Outdoor activities and domestic tasks

Effects of League of German Maidens

Despite lectures on health, diseases like scarlet fever increased.

What were the Nazi education policies towards teachers?

Teachers had to swear an oath of loyalty to hitler

Teachers had to join the Nazi Teachers League and undergo courses that aligned with Nazi ideology.

How was education carried out?

Textbooks rewritten to emphasise Nazi ideology (race, militarism)

distorted history: Stab in the back myth, weak weimar government etc.

Students to study “Mein kampf”

What subject took up 15% of school timetable?

Physical Education

Effects of education and youth policies

Hitler Youth members enjoyed the activities but tended to switch off when lectured about Nazi ideals.

By 1938: Anti-nazi spies report that youth members found it boring.

Academic standard dropped but it cultivated a generation that was heavily indoctrinated.

What happened to the number of juvenile crimes?

Juvenile crime rose (crimes committed by minors)

In 1939: 175,000 convicted of crimes

Slogan used for expectations of women

“Kinder, Küche, Kirche” - Children, Kitchen and Church

Why did Hitler encourage women to give birth

Germany’s declining birth rate

Hitler wanted a growing population for future military ambitions and to maximise birth rate of Aryan children.

Provided newlyweds with a loan of 1000 marks.

For each child born, 25% of loan was forgiven.

Law for the encouragement of marriage 1933

Women in workforce 1933

Banned from professional jobs

How many women were forced out of the workforce by 1934

350,000

Percentage of women attending university.

Only 10% of women.

When were Grammar schools for girls preparing for uni closed?

1937

Why did germans agree with Nazi policies on women

Many unemployed men didnt want women taking their jobs

Traditional values in small towns and rural areas

Churches generally supported women as housewives.

What happened to couples who had no children

Taxes were increased for them.

Motherhood crosses top ranking

Gold: Given to women who had 8 children

What did Nazis do to prevent women from not being pregnant?

They restricted access to information on contraception

Abortion was made illegal and was severely punished.

Organisations that helped women in childcare

1. Mother and Child relief agency

2. Reich Mothers Service

Effects of women policies

By 1939: Around 1.7 mil German women had been on a childcare and pregnancy education course

Birth rate increased by around 33% by 6 years

Purpose of Jewish policies

Discriminate against jews

Dehumanise them

Ethnic cleansing

Jewish policies in 1933

Boycott Jewish shops and businesses

SA stood outside shops to intimidate people and placed star of david on windows for identification

Groups targetted in the sterilisation law

People with physical or mental disabilities, chronic alcoholism, and hereditary diseases (like blindness or epilepsy).

How many people affected by the sterilisation law

400,000

Jewish policies in 1935

Nuremberg Laws

1. Reich citizenship law took away Jewish citizenship

2. Law for protection of blood and honour banned sex and marriage between german and jew

Besides the Nuremberg laws, what were Jews restricted from?

inherit land, join army and be in public spaces.

Jewish policies in 1938

Kristallnacht

Stats:

SS troops smashed over 7500 shops

91 Jews killed and many fled Germany

100 synagogues burned

20,000 Jews sent to concentration camps

Jews were fined 1 bil marks

Jews in 1939

Ghettos were formed (Warsaw was the biggest)

Jews were forced to wear the Star of David arm bands

Start of Euthanasia programme

Reich office for Jewish Emigration set up

How many people died from ghettos? Why?

Around 600,000 Jews died from ghettos due to the poor living conditions, overcrowding, disease specifically typhus and malnutrition.

Warsaw: 55,000

Euthanasia programme 1939 statistics

5000 babies and children, along with 72,000 mentally ill patients were killed by injection or starvation.

Einsatsgruppen (death squads) 1941

SS shot Jews and later killed them in mobile gas chambers.

Babi Yar Massacre: 33,000 killed

Stats:

By 1942: 1.3 mil killed by death squads

Wannsee Conference 1942

Discussed the “Final Solution”

The Nazis built extermination camps in occupied Poland (Auschwitz-Birkenau, Treblinka, and Belzec.)

Final Solution 1942 and death toll

Jews from ghettos all over Europe were packed into cattle trains and deported to camps.

Stats:

1.1 mil jews killed at Birkenau.

6 mil jews killed in Holocaust

Warsaw Ghetto uprising 1943

Stats:

13,000 Jews killed, rest sent to CC

Death toll of undesirables in 1945

3-4 million non jewish opposition

Why did Hitler implement worker policies to reduce unemployment?

They had promised to do so since it was what made Germans vote for them.

How many Germans were unemployed in 1933

5 million germans

Amount spent on worker policies

18.4 billion marks in 1933

37 billion marks in 1938

aimed to control workers and motivate them to cooperate, boosting productivity

German Labour Front

Positives of German labour front

• Encouraged and motivated workers

• Implemented fairer wages

• Improve working and living standards

• More jobs created

Negatives of German labour front

• Banned trade unions: could not strike for better pay and conditions

• Strict control of workers

• Wages were low

• Long working hours

How much did the average working hour increase by

around 6 hrs per week.

How much was an avg skilled worker earning per week by 1936

35 marks a week

Aimed to expand car ownership and develop a new “people’s car”

Volkswagen

Limitation of the volkswagen

All car production was halted by the war in 1939.

No workers ever received a car.

Stat:

Workers paid 5 marks a week towards buying the car but were not refunded in the end.

Aimed to improve working conditions in factories

Beauty of Labour

Positives of BOL

Reduced machine noise level

Implemented better lighting and ventilation

Building of low cost canteens, washing and sport facilities.

How many companies made improvements from BOL

30,000 companies had made improvements.

Negatives of BOL

Workers were expected to build improvements in their spare time, making the scheme unpopular.

Aimed to provide workers with activities during leisure time and motivate them to work harder

Strength through Joy

What did STJ involve?

Provided workers with cheap theatre and cinema tickets, sports events and trips.

Provided libraries and educational courses.

Cut price on luxury liners.

How many germans were involved in strength through joy

1936: Over 10 million germans had been on a strength through joy organised holiday.

Around 35 mil workers involved in some activity.

What did hitler do with the catholic church in 1933

The Nazis and Catholic Church signed a concordat.

This meant that Hitler was to leave the church alone and allow it to keep control over its schools and youth associations.

Problem with the concordat

Hitler disliked the fact that the church regarded the pope as their leader and not him.

He also disliked Catholic children attending not nazi controlled schools and hitler youth.

What did Hitler do to intimidate the church

Marches were organised to intimidate churchgoers.

Catholic organisations closed down.

How many priests were harassed or arrested by the police?

1/3

What did certain priests do to counter Nazi intimidation? What happened to them?

Some still criticised Nazi and used their sermons to speak out against them.

Stats:

400 priests end up in the clergy block in Dachau concentration camp.

Notable Catholic figure who opposed Nazi party and key thing he did

Bishop Galen of Munster.

He regularly criticised Nazi racial ideas and helped write and promote a letter from the pope “With Burning Concern”

What did Hitler try to do with protestant churches?

Since they were more fragmented and locally run, they tried to get the churches to come together in one official “Reich Church” in 1936.

What did the Reich Church do?

Promoted Nazi ideologies and allowed Nazi symbols such as the swastika.

Effects of the Reich Church

Many Germans still felt true loyalty to their original churches.

1933: A number of Protestant pastors set up the Pastors’ Emergency League to resist Hitler’s attempts to establish the Reich Church.

The leader also set up a rival confessional church.

Statistics of the rival confessional church to the Reich Church

Around 6000 joined the confessional church

This was x3 as many as the Reich Church.

Effect: Nazis responded violently and sent 800 pastors to concentration camps.

Statistics for other races suffering under Nazi Racial policies

• Sterilisation Law 1939: 300,000

• Law against dangerous habitual criminals 1935: 500,000 suffered

• 50,000 gay men were sent to prison. 10,000 to CCs

• Roma and Sinti people sent to CCs

What was under the new plan economic policies

• Job creation schemes such as the National Labour Service.

• Building of autobahns: network of motorways. improving transport and efficiency.

• Building of 1936 Olympics stadium in Berlin

• Subsidise private firms to stimulate economy and provide jobs (construction and car industry)

Distance covered from autobahns

7000km

National Labour Service

Men aged between 18-25 had to serve six months.

Labour projects included: autobahns, draining marshes, coastal walls.

Negatives of National Labour Service (RAD)

• Unpopular

• Workers paid very low wages

• Uncomfortable tents

• Long working hours

• Boring jobs

Term used to regard the number of groups losing their jobs or on labour service without proper jobs.

Invisible unemployed

Who were the invisible unemployed

• Jews: forced out of jobs esp professional

• Women: forced out of jobs esp professional

• Unmarried men: Forced to serve national labour service

• Opponents: arrested and sent to CCs

Result of the New Plan

Successful

• Managed to limit German imports

• Trade agreements with individual countries (supplied G with essentials in return for German goods)

• Germany had a small trade surplus

How much did production increase by 1933 due to the New Plan?

50%

Unemployment in 1939

Unemployment reduced to less than half a million

Autarky and why did Hitler want this.

Self sufficiency.

• He did not want to repeat the mistakes from WWI where Germany was starved off resources from a naval blockade.

• He wanted Germany to be independent and able to sustain itself long term

• Achieve “lebensraum”

Who carried out the 4 year plan?

Hermann Göring

What did the 4 year plan target

• Autarky: self sufficiency to prepare for war

• Rearmament: Produced military supplies

What was the 4 year plan

Military production

Businesses were persuaded to produce synthetic raw materials.

(rubber, fuel and textiles)

What were the replacement materials used for textiles, rubber, coffee and petrol

Pulped wood, coal, acorns and coal respectively.

Negatives of 4 year plan

• Germany was still dependent on foreign imports for raw materials and oil.

• Forced labour from concentration camps

• Arms production given priority over consumer and agriculture

• Food shortages, butter still being rationed in 1939.

Positives of 4 year plan

Stats:

Coal and chemical production x2

Iron and steel production x3

Iron ore extraction x5

Expansion of armed forces provided more jobs

How many men in army from 1933 compared to 1938

1933: 100,000 men (from TOV)

1938: 900,000 men

Industrial plants- huge mining and metal works

Hermann Göring Works

How did Nazis target farming community and limitation

Slogan: Blood and Soil

Some farm debts were written off

All farmers benefitted from rise of food prices

Limitation of agriculture

Shortage of labour due to workers leaving for better jobs in towns

How did Nazis target small businesses

Promised to curb influence of large department stores

Passed laws that banned growth of existing stores

How did Nazis target big businesses

No longer worry about trade unions and strikes

Rearmament resulted in growth and larger profits

Example: IG Farben company gained huge govt. contracts to make explosives and artificial oil from coal.

How much did manager’s salaries increase by 1938?

1934-38: Avg salary of managers increased by 70%

Limitation of big businesses

Some resentment of Nazi control of wages, profits, imports and raw materials.