University Government in Nazi Germany: The Example of Hamburg. Yale Higher Education Program Working Paper.

Many apologies have been made for the part the German universities played in the Third Reich. The general stigma of having failed the people as intellectual leaders clung to the German academics for a long time. Their contention of helplessness before the forces of National Socialism gave rise to fears of similar weakness in the future. Although Hamburg is not altogether typical of the German universities at the time, a study of it as an example has some validity. Some important general and particular intra-state configurations of power between 1933 and 1945 can be demonstrated, and it can be seen that the professors were able to prevent much outside intrusion by the creation of new institutional forms through which they appeared to conform to the demands of the time but which they cleverly used to shift influence back to themselves. Of absolutely central importance were personalities who through their varying political abilities controlled the ups and downs of their institution. (Author/MSE)