German Federal Chancellary

Democracy and the Nazi Past

Hans Globke, Chief of Staff of the Chancellery 1953-1963, was often criticized for his past as an administrative jurist during the Nazi era.

In the early days of the Federal Republic, the Federal Chancellery was already the control hub from which all areas of government action could be controlled, planned, and coordinated. This applied to personnel policy as well as the flow of information and public relations. In addition, the Chancellery's influence extended to the coalition parties and their parliamentary groups as well as to institutions outside of politics, which had an impact on society and also served as a source of information for the centre of government.

Otto Lenz, Head of the Federal Chancellery 1951-1953. He was arrested after the assassination attempt of July 20, 1944 and was sentenced to four years imprisonment.

Since 2018, the Institute of Contemporary History and the Leibniz Centre for Contemporary History Potsdam have been investigating the role of the Federal Chancellery and the tensions between a democratic rebirth and the Nazi past. The IfZ and ZZF research project was funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (BKM) and essentially consisted of four sub-projects. While the ZZF analysed how the Chancellery and the Federal Press Office dealt with the Nazi era and its aftermath in their policies towards the past, the IfZ conducted two studies on continuities and new beginnings in the personnel policies of the Chancellery (researcher: Gunnar Take) and on the influences, convictions and political styles of its top personnel (researcher: Nadine Freund). Beyond researching the development of the Federal Chancellery, the four interrelated but independent projects attempt to gain insight into the development of democracy and the system of government in the Federal Republic as a whole. The projects span biographical case studies from the late German Empire to the beginning of the Federal Republic and the period of the social-liberal coalition after 1969.

The results of the research project are now available in one volume reference work which brings together all four individual studies. The publication provides answers to the hitherto unanswered question of how the Chancellery navigated the tensions between democracy and the Nazi past. The studies confirm that overcoming authoritarian structures of governance, administration and public communication, as well as finding personnel in the central German governing authority not tainted by attachment to National Socialism was a decades-long process and by no means linear. Judging by the claim that the Federal Republic strived to be a Western democracy, the Federal Chancellery and the Federal Press Office were as much part of the problem as they were part of the solution. Especially during the era of Konrad Adenauer and Hans Globke, the Chancellery was characterized by resistance to change, reform and openness. In light of these conditions, this raises the urgent question as to how a stable, democratic order which has lasted for 75 years was able to emerge a spart of Germany’s second attempt at democracy. On the one hand, the Nazi past and the ambivalent way the Chancellery addressed that past undoubtedly made the new start more difficult. On the other hand, it is still possible that ideas of democracy which are questionable from today’s perspective, communication of those ideas by people with significant Nazi pasts, Adenauer’s authoritarian leadership style, and his virulent anti-communism were precisely the reasons that a population shaped by dictatorship and war embraced Germany’s second democracy.

The IfZ team in front of the Chancellery in Berlin, June 2018

The project was led by Johannes Hürter and Thomas Raithel at the IfZ. In the intensive debate that has been going on for several years about how central federal authorities deal with the Nazi past, the investigation of the Chancellery closes an important desideratum in research into authorities related to the Nazis.

Book release

Jutta Braun, Nadine Freund, Christian Mentel, Gunnar Take

Das Kanzleramt. Bundesdeutsche Demokratie und NS-Vergangenheit

Göttingen 2025

ISBN: 978-3-8353-5598-9

Photo credits:

Title image: Palais Schaumburg, Seat of the Federal Chancellery, 1950 / BArch, B 145 Bild-P001503 / Arntz, Burow
Image 1: KAS-Lenz, Otto-Bild-1860-2, via Wikimedia Commons
Image 2: Federal government / Egon Steiner
Image 3: The IfZ team in front of the Chancellery in Berlin / Christian Mentel

Das Kanzleramt. Bundesdeutsche Demokratie und NS-Vergangenheit

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