PROBLEMI NACIZMA U ISTORIOGRAFIJI NJEMAČKE DEMOKRATSKE REPUBLIKE
THE PROBLEM OF NAZISM IN THE HISTORIOGRAPHY OF THE GERMAN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC

Summary/Abstract: An attempt was made in the work to describe some of the most important results of the historical science in the German Democratic Republic in the area of more recent German history, more precisely, the history of the period between the two wars in Germany, including the Nazi dictatorship and the events leading up to it. The author particularly wished to point out those scholarly works which are not yet available to Yugoslav scholarship, being still unpublished doctoral dissertations. On the basis of the books, studies, and articles on the problem of Nazism published so far in the German Democratic Republic, the author came to the conclusion that the scholarly interest of the historians of the German Democratic Republic was directed toward the investigation of all those components that had contributed to the establishment of the Nazi dictatorship in Germany. In a number of works there is present a criticism of German bourgeois historiography, especially of those works concerning the role of the militaristic Prussia in the realization of the unification of Germany in 1871 and the role and general significance of militaristic circles of the German society in the German politics at the turn of the century. The historians of the German Democratic Republic concentrated their attention on investigating the roots of German imperialism and militarism as well as on exposing the illusions of the invincibility of German arms, which was especially true during the First and Second World Wars. The author tried in his work to systematize according to certain problem s the more important scholarly achievements of the historiography of the German Democratic Republic in the investigation of the Nazi movement. In the first place he pointed out those works dealing with the analysis of the main components of the Nazi ideology — race theory which in the political reality of Nazism assumed the forms of anti-semitism , pseudo-socialist demagogy, role and function of the so-called Fiihre-Prinzip, and some other questions —, also the works dealing with various aspects of the history of the Weimar Republic, in which time Nazism constituted itself ideologically and organizationally as a movement; further, those works dealing with foreign and internal policies of the Weimar Republic, especially in the realm of economics and development of economic relations. The author analyzed fairly exhaustively the works dealing with the history of the workers' movement before and after the establishment of the Nazi dictatorship, In this respect and in this time an especially significant and interesting question represents the relationship between the communist and the social-democratic movements in Germany. The author also pointed out some weaknesses in the historiography of the German Democratic Republic in dealing with that question, weaknesses reflected in the uncritical acceptance of former appraisals by the participants in the German communist movement which were often used by historians as a starting¬ -point in their analyses and conclusions. Stating that in the German Democratic Republic there did not yet exist a synthetical work on the Nazi movement, and especially on the Nazi regime, the author in the conclusion of his article says that the monographs, studies, and articles published so far, in which certain aspects of the 'Nazi regime are dealt with rether exhaustively, at any event represent the best foundation for the final composition of a complete work on the most recent history in which the period of Nazi dictatorship would certainly have a prominent place.

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