The amount of change with respect to the rights of women that occurred
between the fall of Nazism in 1945 and the fall of socialism in East Germany
in 1989 cannot be overstated. During this transitional time women received
equality in every aspect of life -- at least in theory. It was only after
the end of WWII in 1945 that women were able to participate equally in
sectors of society such as the workplace and politics, thanks largely
to the Soviet system of socialism. The harm caused by the repressive policies
of the Nazi regime towards many groups including women was only fully
evident after its demise and fall. The ideology that Hitler and his government
embedded in the minds of women was so deeply rooted that many of the women
who later lived in East Germany could not believe the freedom and rights
that they were granted. Socialism seemed to give women a freedom that
they had never known under any other German government. However, an analysis
of primary documents shows that socialism offered equality in theory but
not always in practice. [thesis statement]
It is often hard for people, especially women, to understand
a time when women did not have the same basic rights as their male counterparts.
However, the attitude that females were inferior ran rampant in Germany
under Nazism. Women were hardly ever allowed to partake in political offices
unless it was for a strictly female organization such as the League of
German Women. Such restrictions extended to the field of education as
well, where women were restricted to learning how to keep an orderly house,
instead of the professions of school teaching and engineering. Although
it is extremely hard for citizens of the western world, especially those
of this generation, to imagine a time where women were virtually confined
to their homes, it is vital to understand the improvements made under
the Soviets and the impact their policies had on the status of German
women.
One of the few outlets that women under Nazism had outside
of the house were women's organizations such as the League of German Women
and the League for German Girls. Under such organizations women were able
to take some sort of leadership role in society, as small as it may have
been. Nazi leaders such as Adolf Hitler and Joseph Goebbels realized what
an extremely important factor such women's organizations played in securing
the implementation of their propaganda in actual society. One of the very
first speeches that Joseph Goebbels made as Minister of Propaganda under
Hitler was given to the League of German women, aptly titled German
Women, on 18 March 1933, just six days into his term. Adolf
Hitler himself made another crucial policy speech at a rally of the German
Women's League on 14 September 1936.
Such speeches were given to women's organizations in order
to convince women that although they were not allowed to have the same
social rights as men, they were still crucial to the success of the government.
Many women's organizations were started in order to provide service to
male army officers, thus making their contribution to Hitler and the government
indispensable. A service and connection to the army was their main objective
in these organizations, in fact, as historian Jill Stephenson writes:[1]
These groups provided soup kitchens for needy party
members and SA men, collected money and goods, made and mended uniforms,
circulated propaganda material, and provided first-aid for injured SA
men. These activities were suitably 'womanly;' the 'political struggle'
was left strictly to the men.
The Nazis also published propaganda aimed towards women in such women's
journals as Frauenwarte, a biweekly magazine for women that had
1.9 million subscribers, and Das Deutsche Madel, a monthly girls
magazine that promoted doing quiet individual things like hiking and
caring for wounded soldiers.
High-ranking Nazis argued that women were not allowed
to participate in political affairs because they were too valuable and
pure to be exposed to such a harsh reality. In his March 1933 German
Women speech, Goebbels clearly explained the government's reasoning
for banning women from politics outside of their women's organizations.
He said, "We have kept women out of the parliamentary-democratic
intrigues of the past fourteen years in Germany not because we do not
respect them, but because we respect them too much."[2]
Because women in East Germany did not face the same level
of repression, there was not a need to make many distinctly women-oriented
organizations, although they did exist. Perhaps the largest women's
organization was the Women's Democratic Federation of Germany (DFD),
which was founded on 8 March 1947. Unlike the Nazi women's organizations,
the DFD had different objectives for its female members; "The main
purpose of the DFD since it was founded had been to get women to actively
participate in the fight for peace and socialism, for the happiness
of women and their families."[3] The DFD was so popular that its membership reached 1.3
million members, and was linked to a larger international group, Women's
International Democratic Federation (IDFF), that had significantly larger
numbers of members. As part of the Women's International Democratic
Federation, "the organization considers it important to take part
in the international women's struggle for peace, peaceful coexistence,
national independence and rights of women and the happiness of children."[4] And indeed the DFD did its part to spread socialism around
the globe by making connections with 111 women's organizations in eighty
countries.
Women's involvement in politics reached much further than
just being a member of the DFD or other organizations in East Germany.
Due to the equality that socialism offered them, women were able to
hold very prestigious offices in government. Statistics show that every
third deputy elected, every fifth mayor, and every third judge in East
Germany was a woman.[5]
Outside of their women's organizations, women under Nazism
had no other escape from their home life. Marriage was considered extremely
important by the Nazi regime because of the tradition of reproduction
that marriage holds. First and foremost the fascists were concerned
with massive reproduction to expand their Aryan race. During the start
of Hitler's regime there was a stark increase in the number of marriages
between the years 1934- 1940. The pressure for women to reproduce was
pushed to the extreme, and motherhood soon came to be their identity.
Gisela Bock offers an insight into just how extreme the sexism towards
women of the time was in the bookWhen Biology Became Destiny:[6]
… most historians seem to agree that … women counted merely as
mothers who should bear and rear as many children as possible, and that
Nazi antifeminism tended to promote, protect and even finance women
as childbearers, housewives, and mothers. It seems necessary to challenge
various aspects of this…. [T]he Nazis were by no means simply interested
in raising the number of childbearing women. They were just as bent
on excluding many women from bearing and rearing children- and men from
begetting them- with sterilization as their principle deterrent.
In return for some marriages, couples received marriage incentives
like tax breaks and deference of loans owed to the government.
There were obvious reasons why some marriages were rewarded
more than others, and those decisions were based on race. The government
clearly preferred Aryans to marry among themselves, so that they would
produce purely Aryan offspring. Those Aryans who married within their
race were considered "hereditarily valuable."[7]
Despite the Nazis' view of marrying within exclusive races, the Nuremberg
Laws of 15 September 1935 made interracial marriage legal as long as
there was no reproduction, although the government still clearly gave
financial rewards to those Aryans who decided to remain married within
their own race. Regardless of the race a woman married, the system of
marriage under Nazism was no different than any other governmental policy
when it came to the traditional gender roles and expectations, and women
assumed their normal role as the subservient wife.
Under socialism the rights of women were radically different
because of the Family Code of 1965, which set equality as the goal in
each relationship. As cited in Eva Kolinsky's Women in Contemporary
Germany, the family code clearly states that in a marriage, "the
husband and wife were equal and bound together by love and affection."[8]
The Family Code of 1965 encouraged marriage and wanted each family to
produce children to ensure the healthy survival of the socialist state,
and it was the parents' explicit duty to raise the children in a healthy
atmosphere where growth could easily take place. This responsibility
of both parents is clearly expressed in the section three of the Family
Code, as cited by Kolinsky:[9]
The citizens determine their family relations in such
a way as to assist the development of each member of the family. It
is the noblest task of the parents to bring up their children in assured
cooperation with the institutions of the state and society to become
healthy and sunny, hard working and broadly educated human beings and
active builders of socialism.
Similar to the marriage laws under Nazism, the socialist
government also offered material rewards for those who decided to get
married. An agricultural technician described the financial benefits
of marriage especially when pregnant to historian Ingrid Sandole-Staroste
as follows:[10]
I was pregnant with [my daughter] and we decided to get married
because we wanted the credit [of 7,000 Marks which the state provided].
We could not just let it go… We had to pay it back, but the conditions
were very favorable. I paid 53 Marks per month. It's incredible, really
[how low it was].
Marriage also was one of the few ways that people were able to leave
their families, move out on their own and find housing on their own.
This proved to be a large incentive considering that the average age
for men was 25.3 years and women 23.2 years (Federal Ministry for Women
and Youth, 1992, p.72), as cited in Sandole-Staroste.[11]
Like many other aspects of life under socialism, marriage
was not as perfect in East Germany as the statistics would lead one
to believe. With the young age that most people married in East Germany
divorce rates were extremely high. The rates were so incredibly high
that East Germany ranked one of the highest in the world in regards
to divorce rates.[12] Divorce rates climbed steadily throughout socialist
rule in East Germany. Kolinsky writes, "In 1989, 40% of East German
marriages ended in divorce; more than half broke down within three years."[13]
Unlike the situation under Nazism, women exerted much power within a
marriage, and even represented an overwhelming percent of those who
filed for divorce.
Divorce was also allowed in Nazism, although it was as
easily attainable and socially acceptable as in East Germany. In 1938,
the Nazi government took a small step in making divorce a little bit
easier to receive by introducing new grounds for divorce, "irretrievable
breakdown." It was because of this adaptation to the divorce law
that a divorce was possible without placing blame on one spouse or the
other. In accordance with the Nazis' preoccupation with population growth,
it is no surprise that "divorce was obtainable on grounds of premature
infertility, unless the couple already had 'hereditarily healthy' children."[14] Reproduction for the sake of extending the power of
a government was present under both governments, but Nazism placed more
importance on having a large family. As badly as the Nazis wanted more
National Socialists, they were not willing to allow the hereditarily
"unfit" to reproduce. As a means of "social hygiene,"
only the "socially fit" can reproduce under Nazi law.[15]
While marriage was encouraged, children who were created out of wedlock
were also socially acceptable, as long as the parents were both of the
Aryan race. The state offered "repressive protection,"[16] which included supervision of "valuable
pregnancies through providing midwives and social workers. To ensure
that non-Aryans were not reproducing illegally, the Nazis enforced sterilization
and mass murders. The Nazi government saw non-Aryans as "worthless
families,"[17] and would
take any means necessary to keep them from polluting the German race.
Being at home and taking care of a large family was exactly where the
National Socialists imagined women at their finest. They believed that
mothers raised their sons to be the men who would come to rule the nation
in the future and that there was no more important task than that of
mother who would ensure that her son was raised correctly and followed
the National Socialists' plan. Joseph Goebbels demonstrated exactly
how important the Nazis saw women in society as homemakers in his 1933
speech:
The first, best, and most suitable place for the women is in
the family, and her most glorious duty is to give children to her people
and nation, children who continue the line of generations and who guarantee
the immortality of the nation. The woman is the teacher of the youth,
and therefore the builder of the foundation of the future. If the family
is the nation's source of strength, the woman is its core and center.
The best place for the woman to serve her people is in her marriage,
in the family, in motherhood. This is her highest mission.
Families having children was also a major concern for Socialists,
so they offered many programs and incentives to make motherhood appealing
and as easy on the mother as possible. The state provided excellent
inexpensive and reliable childcare for working mothers. Working mothers
with multiple children received an extra bonus in 1972 with the introduction
of a law that reduced their work hours a week from 43.75 hours a week
to 40 hours a week without a pay cut. They also received an additional
three to nine day increase in vacation days.[18]
The state truly bent backwards to promote multiple child families by
also offering maternity leave that lasted fourteen to eighteen weeks
and a raise in allowance per child to 1,000 Marks.[19] And while a woman was actually pregnant
the law ensured her of her job security since it was illegal to dismiss
a pregnant woman from her job. In terms of actual birthing, almost ninety-nine
percent of all births were free at the hospitals. And as a measure of
equality, single mothers received the same rights as those who were
married.
While evaluating the statistics it is hard to find a fault
with the socialists' plan towards women's rights during and after pregnancy,
but in order to receive most of these benefits a woman had to be active
in the workforce. Due to the type of system that East Germany had during
socialist rule, it was not socially acceptable not to work and not be
part of the public that served the nation, which was much the opposite
during Nazism. Many women in East Germany complained that after they
had worked a full day, they had to come home to even more household
work because of the still present deep embedded idea that women were
to take care of matter at home. Women had to juggle both responsibilities
and often times missed out on the enjoyment of having a child. a white-collar worker described to Sandole-Staroste
the agony of this juggling act:[20]
When I think about it all, in some ways I spent too
little time with my children, too little time. I hardly remember the
time when they were little and when they went to kindergarten. I would
have liked to start later; I really would have liked that much better.
I would have seen them in the morning, and I would have come home a
little earlier at night. I would have preferred that. I was totally
exhausted. In those days, I slept so well and I only had six hours of
sleep on average.
Although many women like this white-collar worker were devastated
by the fact that they were not able to spend an adequate amount of time
with their children, many others knew that as part of a socialist nation
working was the first priority. There are numerous examples of people
in socialist East Germany who were scorned and ridiculed for not taking
an active part in furthering the economy and producing goods for the
sake of the nation. This socialist ideal was a major part of everyday
decision making, even when it came to raising one's children. As a nurse
put it:[21]
My children were very, very important in
my life. I don't want to say they were the most important, but one of
the most important things in my life… It was not accepted that a mother
stayed at home. [But when she did], it caused surprise. Few women stayed
home because it meant a decrease in their standard of living. Many thought
it was a good thing, but [they] also said they would not do it. We had
child care. We could bring our children there. And to stay home the
entire day and wash diapers, many women did not want that. But [those
of us who stayed home for a while] did not have to concern ourselves
with losing our jobs, that was secure.
Due to Nazi beliefs many women were not able
be an active part of the workforce, that is until the end of World War
II when more manpower was needed to keep up production for the Nazi
regime. The need for women in the workforce came as an influx of German
men were called into war service. Stephenson describes the number of
women that entered the workforce during this time period, and the reasoning
she sees behind it:[22]
The wartime withdrawal of men from civilian life and
work continues for five and a half years, leaving women to many jobs
traditionally performed by men, in increasingly difficult circumstances.
Yet women's recorded numbers in employment remained around the 14 million
mark--the 1939 level in Greater Germany--and even in 1944 reached only
14.9 million.
The need for increased participation from women came from years of
war losses suffered by the Nazis--losses that continued to grow with
time. Stephenson says that, "Germany's problem was that its resources--both
human and material--were being stretched even in the war's early, victorious
stages."[23] The need for
an increased workforce force, even if it meant taking more women out
of the home, was so strong that there was a consideration for women
to be drafted or to enroll in compulsory registration for employment
as the war progressed. However there was a fault in the system the Nazis
had with having women join a compulsory was the money needed to start
and organize such a project. In fact Stephenson argues that "compulsory
registration by women at employment offices probably yielded more paperwork
than additional workers."[24]
And with the war going on, was the effectiveness that such a draft would
have was limited because of the number of women who tried to avoid being
called into work, a sign that not all women wanted to join men in the
workplace. Stephenson says that:[25]
There undoubtedly were women who avoided being drafted,
cajoled, or shamed into work in wartime. Some had young children, others
were evacuated to areas remote from war industry, and, in the increasingly
chaotic circumstances of 1944-45, still others were able to abscond.
Researchers like Stephenson have found that most women who did
take advantage of the opening of workplace opportunities were not those
who did not have a desire to work before the beginning of Nazism. Stephenson
found that "the largest group of women able to avoid going into war
work were women--with or without young children--who had not previously
needed or wanted to work."[26]
This would add argument to those who argue that women did not want to
join the workforce; therefore the Nazis were helping and protecting them
from the harsh workplace. However, facts such as this do not speak of
the whole female population in Nazi Germany and should therefore be taken
with a grain of salt. There were in fact women who previously wanted work
and were denied it. Evidence such as this only furthers the argument that
in an extremely prejudiced and sexist society, such as Germany under the
Nazis, many women were discriminated against if not for their race then
for their gender.
In East Germany, the situation was so different that the
community scorned those women who decided not to work. Through looking
at the statistics for the number of women who were actively participating
in the workforce, East Germany seems to live up to its claim that it
upheld the principles of equality. However, we will see that although
there was an almost equal number of women and men in the workforce,
access to some jobs appears to have been more difficult for women. But
in employment as a whole, women in the workplace represented their equal
share of the population. In East Germany during the mid-1970s, almost
eighty-six percent of capable women decided to work, just about every
second person employed sas a woman, and women represented forty-nine
percent of the nation's workforce.[27] Women continued to represented roughly forty-nine percent
of the workforce until 1989, totaling 4.2 million out of the 8.5 million
workers in East Germany.[28]
Kolinsky notes just how high the female percentage in the workplace
was in East Germany before the fall of the Berlin Wall: "On the
eve of reunification, East Germany recorded the highest participation
of women in the labour market in Europe."[29]
The Socialist ideal present in East Germany expected everyone
in society to actively participate in elevating in standards of their
community, the nation as a whole and international socialism. Work in
fact became an obligation for most East German women, like the nurse
quoted above who stated that she had to give up many things including
time with her children. Kolinsky, like other historians, notes what
an obligation working was for East German women: "[For] women in
the GDR, working in paid employment was not a matter of personal preference,
inclination or opportunity, as it has remained for their sisters in
the West; working was obligatory."[30] Unlike in West Germany and in many other Western countries
such as the United States, the obligation of women to work did not diminish
with age. As Kolinsky put it, "working had become the norm, even
after retirement."[31] East
Germany took the right to work to another level by placing such high
pressure on being employed that "the right to work and the duty
to work merged into one while non-working was stigmatized as 'anti-social
(asozial) and refusal to work treated as a criminal offense."[32]
The transition from Nazism to socialism was a particularly
difficult one, when the differences between the two are re-examined.
The two governments appear to be polar opposites in
their views towards women and equality in society. While Nazism promoted
the superiority of one coming from the inferiority of another, it is
easy to see how a transition to the alleged equality under Socialism
would be hard to comprehend.
The level of oppression under the Nazis is easy to condemn
in today's society. But through the analysis of East German women's
testimonies it becomes evident that some women preferred the lifestyle
they lived under the Nazis to the amount of work expected of them under
Socialism. This is not to say that the oppression under Nazism was justified,
although it shows that there is difference in perspective between women.
Like all sects of society, each person has their own idea of what is
right or wrong, and this is seen through the transition from Nazism
to socialism.
The Nazi government proved to be a terribly oppressive
to women, which is evident in numerous areas of society including lack
organizations offered for women, and the harsh marriage and divorce
laws which were obviously discriminatory towards non-Aryans. The idea
of motherhood under Nazism is particularly disturbing because of the
hidden implications and expectations of women as a whole that it represents:
women as trophy and housewives, not as equals in society or the workplace.
Socialism appeared to offer women the equality they did
not have under Hitler. For some women, this so-called equality was experienced,
while others had their hearts broken when they realized that not everything
that works in theory works in practice. Other women lived through this
equality and discovered that it was not all it was cracked up to be.
They found themselves wanting to be back at home with their children
on a full time basis. These women felt as though they were missing out
of their children's childhoods, even despite the extra benefits the
government enacted in 1972. It is these women who discovered that the
grass is not always greener on the other side and perhaps the Nazis'
ideas towards women were perhaps not so bad, at least from their own
personal perspective.
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