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| Kampfbund für deutsche Kultur | |
|---|---|
| Name | Kampfbund für deutsche Kultur |
| Native name | Kampfbund für deutsche Kultur |
| Formation | 1928 |
| Founder | Alfred Rosenberg |
| Type | Cultural organization |
| Headquarters | Berlin |
| Region served | Germany |
| Leader title | Chairman |
| Leader name | Alfred Rosenberg |
Kampfbund für deutsche Kultur was a nationalist cultural organization active in the Weimar Republic and early Third Reich that sought to reshape German artistic and intellectual life. Founded in 1928, it brought together figures from politics, art, music, literature, and journalism to promote völkisch aesthetics and to oppose modernist trends. The organization interacted with prominent institutions and personalities across the Weimar Republic, Nazi Party, Reichstag, and the cultural networks of Berlin, Munich, and Dresden.
The Kampfbund emerged in the late 1920s amid conflicts surrounding the Treaty of Versailles, the aftermath of World War I, and debates in the Weimar Republic over national identity, moral renewal, and cultural policy. Its founder, Alfred Rosenberg, had earlier been involved with movements linked to the Deutschvölkischer Schutz und Trutzbund and collaborated with figures from the Thule Society, the German Workers' Party, and early cadres of the Nazi Party such as Adolf Hitler, Joseph Goebbels, and Hermann Göring. The organization drew support from artists and intellectuals tied to Munich and Berlin salons, and it positioned itself against currents associated with Expressionism, Dada, and Bauhaus circles as represented by proponents like Walter Gropius, Paul Klee, and Oskar Schlemmer.
Leadership centered on Alfred Rosenberg, who articulated much of the group's program while interacting with senior members of the Nazi Party leadership including Goebbels, Hans Frank, and cultural intermediaries in the Reichskulturkammer network. Regional branches in Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, and Thuringia coordinated activities with local politicians such as Adolf Wagner and intellectuals from universities including Humboldt University of Berlin and the University of Munich. The Kampfbund partnered informally with associations like the German National People's Party's cultural wings, publishing organs linked to editors such as Alfred Rosenberg (as editor) and contributors like Ernst Jünger, Dietrich Eckart, and lesser-known activists from the völkisch milieu.
The Kampfbund's ideology synthesized völkisch nationalism, racial theorizing, and anti-Semitic polemic influenced by thinkers such as Houston Stewart Chamberlain and writers in the Conservative Revolutionary movement. Its program promoted a return to perceived Germanic traditions against what it labeled "degenerate" influences from figures like Ernst Toller, Bertolt Brecht, Kurt Weill, and artists associated with New Objectivity. Objectives included reshaping curricula at institutions such as the Prussian Academy of Arts, influencing programming at venues like the Bayreuth Festival, and purging perceived foreign or "cosmopolitan" elements from publishing houses, theaters, and concert halls connected to impresarios like Richard Strauss and directors such as Max Reinhardt.
The Kampfbund organized lectures, exhibitions, and public campaigns targeting exhibitions deemed "degenerate" and performances it considered subversive. It staged protests against exhibitions associated with Expressionism and collaborated with municipal authorities in Berlin and Dresden to pressure galleries and museums, engaging journalists from papers such as the Völkischer Beobachter and periodicals linked to Alfred Rosenberg's circle. Campaigns sought to influence institutions like the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, the Berlin State Opera, and conservatories where conductors like Wilhelm Furtwängler and composers like Arnold Schoenberg were contested. The organization also published tracts attacking Jewish intellectuals and artists including Franz Kafka and Lion Feuchtwanger, while endorsing composers and writers aligned with its aesthetics.
Though never the sole arbiter of policy, the Kampfbund contributed to a cultural climate that enabled the later creation of the Reichskulturkammer and measures restricting artistic freedom. Its rhetoric and networks fed into administrative actions under figures such as Joseph Goebbels and institutions like the Ministry of Propaganda and the Prussian Ministry of Culture. Policies affecting theaters, film studios such as UFA, publishing houses like S. Fischer Verlag, and conservatories reflected pressures and lists circulated by Kampfbund affiliates, which intersected with legal instruments and decrees passed during the early years of the Third Reich.
Contemporaneous reception ranged from enthusiastic endorsement among völkisch circles and conservative elites to strenuous opposition from modernist artists, liberal intellectuals, and some clergy. Critics included representatives from the Bauhaus, émigré intellectuals who later joined networks in Paris and London, and leftist cultural organizations associated with the Communist Party of Germany and the Social Democratic Party of Germany. Opposition also surfaced in court challenges, protests by actors and musicians linked to institutions like the Berlin Volksbühne and international denunciations by figures in the International Federation of Artists.
Historians assess the Kampfbund as a formative actor in the radicalization of German cultural life that presaged state-led cultural engineering under the Third Reich. Scholarship links its activities to broader trends involving the politicization of art seen in controversies over the Degenerate Art Exhibition (Entartete Kunst), the coordination of institutions under the Gleichschaltung process, and the exile of artists to cities such as Paris, New York, and London. Modern studies place the Kampfbund within networks connecting conservative revolutionaries, völkisch ideologues, and Nazi administrators, emphasizing its role in legitimizing exclusions enacted by bodies like the Reichskulturkammer and shaping the cultural landscape of mid-20th-century Europe.
Category:Organizations established in 1928 Category:Political organizations in the Weimar Republic Category:Cultural history of Germany