Friedrich Meinecke

For the sculptor, see Friedrich Meinecke (sculptor).
Friedrich Meinecke
Born (1862-10-30)October 30, 1862
Salzwedel, Prussia
Died February 6, 1954(1954-02-06) (aged 91)
West Berlin
Nationality German
Occupation Nationalist historian
Archivist (1887–1901) of the German State Archives
Editor (1896–1935) of the Historische Zeitschrift
Chairman (1928–1935) of the Historische Reichskommission
Known for Weltbürgertum und Nationalstaat (Cosmopolitanism and the National State), Die Deutsche Katastrophe (The German Catastrophe), Die Entstehung des Historismus (The Emergence of Historism)

Friedrich Meinecke (October 20, 1862 – February 6, 1954) was a German historian, with Liberal and anti-semitic views, who supported the Nazi invasion of Poland. After World War II, as a representative of an older tradition, he criticized the Nazi regime, but continued to express anti-semitic prejudice.[1][2]

In 1948, he helped to found the Free University of Berlin in West Berlin, and remained an important figure to the end of his life.

Life

Meinecke was born in Salzwedel in the Province of Saxony. He was educated at the University of Bonn and the University of Berlin. In 1887-1901 he worked as an archivist at the German State Archives. A professor at the University of Strasbourg, he served as editor of the journal Historische Zeitschrift between 1896 and 1935, and was the chairman of the Historische Reichskommission from 1928 to 1935. As a nationalist historian Meinecke didn't care very much for the desires of peoples in Eastern Europe,[3] and went as far as writing about "raw bestiality of the south Slavs",[4] while favoring German expansionism into the East.[5] During the First World War he advocated removing Polish landowners from the Prussian provinces of West Prussia and Posen (which were acquired from Poland in the course of the Partitions of Poland) to Congress Poland; in addition he proposed German colonization of Courland after the expulsion of its Latvian population.[6] Some authors have likened his views to support of ethnic cleansing.[7] When the German Empire formulated the so-called Polish Border Strip plan – which called for annexation of a large swathe of land from Congress Poland and removal of millions of Poles and Jews to make room for German settlers – Meinecke welcomed this vision of mass expulsion of Poles with contentment.[8]

Meinecke was best known for his work on 18th-19th century German intellectual and cultural history. The book that made his reputation was his 1908 work Weltbürgertum und Nationalstaat (Cosmopolitanism and the National State), which traced the development of national feelings in the 19th century. Starting with Die Idee der Staatsräson (1924), much of his work concerns the conflict between Kratos (power) and Ethos (morality), and how to achieve a balance between the two.

One of his students was Heinrich Brüning, the future Chancellor. Under the Weimar Republic, Meinecke was a Vernunftsrepublikaner (republican by reason), someone who supported the republic as the least bad alternative. In 1918 he had been one of the founders of the German Democratic Party. Under the Third Reich, he had some sympathy for the regime, especially in regard to its early anti-semitic laws. After 1935, Meinecke fell into a state of semi-disgrace, and was removed as editor of the Historische Zeitschrift. Though Meinecke remained in public a supporter of the Nazi regime, in private he became increasingly bothered by what he regarded as the violence and crudeness of the Nazis. Nevertheless, he openly described himself as "antisemitic",[9] and while he was willing to have Jewish friends and colleagues, the Nazi persecution of Jews never bothered him much.[10]

After the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939 he praised this event in a letter to Siegfred August Kaehler, stating: "You will also have been delighted by this splendid campaign".[11]

One of Meinecke's best-known books, Die Deutsche Katastrophe (The German Catastrophe) of 1946, sees the historian attempting to reconcile his lifelong belief in authoritarian state power with the disastrous events of 1933-45. His explanation for the success of National Socialism points to the legacy of Prussian militarism in Germany, the effects of rapid industrialisation and the weaknesses of the middle classes, though Meinecke also asserts that Hitlerism benefited from a series of unfortunate accidents, which had no connection with the earlier developments in German history. In the book Meinecke interprets National Socialism as an "alien force occupying Germany",[12] while at the same time expressing anti-semitic prejudice towards the Jews.[13] Meinecke claimed that Jews were responsible for their own misfortune and blamed them for the fall of liberalism; the German Catastrophe represented two classic themes of antisemitism; resentment based on Jewish economic activities and their alleged "character".[14]

In 1948, Meinecke helped to found the Free University of Berlin.

British historian E. H. Carr [15] cites him as an example of a historian whose views are heavily influenced by the Zeitgeist: liberal during the German Empire, discouraged during the interwar period, and deeply pessimistic after World War II.

Works

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Germany: The Long Road West: Volume 2: 1933-1990 Heinrich August Winkler "But when it came to the Jews, Meinecke's thoughts reflected the same old anti-Semitic prejudices"
  2. ↑ The anti-enlightenment tradition, Zeev Sternhell Yale University 2010 Press, page 383
  3. ↑ East European Quarterly, Tom 1 page 269 University of Colorado, 1967
  4. ↑ Friedrich Meinecke and German politics in the twentieth century - Page 20 Robert A. Pois
  5. ↑ The Lost German East: Forced Migration and the Politics of Memory, 1945-1970 page 73
  6. ↑ Globalisation and the Nation in Imperial Germany Sebastian Conrad, page 175
  7. ↑ Telos - Issues 94-97 - Page 159 State University of New York at Buffalo. Graduate Philosophy Association - 1994
  8. ↑ The German Empire, 1871-1918 Hans-Ulrich Wehler page 112-113.
  9. ↑ The bourgeois Democrats of Weimar Germany page 12 Robert A. Pois - 1976 "Friedrich Meinecke, in his Erinnerungen, confessed to being a "rugged anti-Semite"
  10. ↑ Militarism, Imperialism, and Racial Accommodation: An Analysis and Interpretation of the Early Writings of Robert E. Park by Stanford M. Lyman page 146 University of Arkansas Press
  11. ↑ The Quest for the Lost Nation: Writing History in Germany and Japan in the American Century (California World History Library) Sebastian Conrad page 48
  12. ↑ Thinking about the Holocaust: After Half a Century Alvin H. Rosenfeld - 1997, page 169
  13. ↑ Germany: The Long Road West: Volume 2: 1933-1990 Heinrich August Winkler "But when it came to the Jews, Meinecke's thoughts reflected the same old anti-Semitic prejudices"
  14. ↑ The anti-enlightenment tradition, Zeev Sternhell Yale University 2010 Press, page 383
  15. ↑ Carr, E. H. (1961). What is History?. Macmillan/Penguin. ISBN 0-14-020652-3.

References

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