Activism and negativism

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Activism and negativism are terms used to describe the politics of the Sudeten Germans during the First Czechoslovak Republic .

After the break-up of Austria-Hungary and the founding of Czechoslovakia in October 1918, around 3.5 million citizens of German descent lived within its borders, most of them in Bohemia and Moravia ("Sudeten Germans"). The majority of them rejected the new state, especially since the attempt to separate the predominantly German-settled border areas and to annex them to the German Reich or German-Austria was forcibly stopped by armed Czech associations in December 1918.

After the German parties represented in the Prague parliament first tried from 1920 to confront the Czech and Slovak majority uniformly and formed a “Parliamentary Association”, differences of opinion soon arose about how to proceed, so that the Parliamentary Association dissolved in 1922.

During this time the term activism came up, which represented the intention to improve the situation of the Sudeten Germans through cooperation with the Czech and Slovak parties and by assuming responsibility in the government. The motivation for this approach was complex; at first the simple acceptance of the political realities was superficial. Later - after Hitler came to power in Germany - the goal of strengthening Czechoslovak democracy and the rejection of the dictatorship in Germany played a role , especially for the Social Democrats (DSAP).

The counter-term negativism was introduced by Rudolf Lodgman von Auen in November 1922. This documented the fundamental rejection of the Czechoslovak state and active participation in it.

A clear assignment of activism and negativism to specific political parties is often not possible. Immediately after the First World War, all German parties - including the Social Democrats - behaved predominantly “negativist”. In 1926 the Federation of Farmers and the German Christian Social People's Party entered government, against which the Social Democrats were still speaking out at that time. In 1929 they finally switched to an activist course and from then until 1938 they took part in the Czechoslovak government. The German National Party (DNP) and the German National Socialist Workers' Party (DNSAP) behaved almost entirely negatively .

The Sudeten German Home Front (later Sudeten German Party), founded in 1933 under Konrad Henlein , was at least programmatically oriented towards activism in the first years of its existence, before it paved the way for the annexation of the Sudeten areas to the German Reich.

Quotes

  • “Anyone who thinks that I would personally shy away from declaring publicly that the highest duty of the German representative in this state is high treason is wrong.” - Rudolf Lodgman von Auen (DNP) in the Czechoslovak House of Representatives, October 27, 1922
  • “I hate and detest this state. I will never feel comfortable in it; the most beautiful day of my life will be the one in which this state falls apart. But - that can of course take a long time, yes you don't know whether it will even come that way. In the meantime it would be good to face the Czechs, who now have power, to some extent. Nothing at all can be achieved with MPs who are hostile to the Czechs; MEPs, on the other hand, who are well-known among the Czechs, bring all sorts of things home for their voters, be it a business license, or a tax break or an import permit or a military exemption, and if we had a few German ministers in the cabinet, then it would be still much more to be achieved. ”- DNP chairman Heinrich Brunar on what he believed to be the prevailing attitude of the Sudeten Germans, March 17, 1926.
  • "Activism is to protect the legitimate vital interests of the German people as well." - Franz Spina (Association of Farmers), April 16, 1927
  • “The German ruling parties are involved in governing - that is, they stand in the dust when Czech chauvinists steal people's rights, the rights of the German people. A fraud against their own people, a fraud against foreign countries, that is this German activism! ”- Eugen de Witte (DSAP) in the Czechoslovak House of Representatives, June 28, 1927
  • “The German National Socialists and the German National Party are trying to ridicule our community of German and Czech Social Democrats and to accuse us of national treason, which has already been widely used. Both of them could be said to be negativists in the struggle for the demands of the German people on the Czechoslovak Republic. The entire German people can only successfully pursue their special economic, political and cultural demands if a part of the Czech people is won over to them. ”- Franz Macoun (DSAP) in the Czechoslovak House of Representatives, November 24, 1930
  • “We want to use all our strength to prevent the threatening political and social catastrophe of the Sudeten Germans. Preventing this catastrophe is also in the interest of the state, is in the interest of further cooperation between the progressive forces of the Sudeten German and the Czech people. ”- Wenzel Jaksch (DSAP) in the Czechoslovak House of Representatives, June 26, 1935
  • “We don't want the house that we share with the Czechs and Slovaks to go up in flames. Rather, we affirm the task of furnishing it in a friendly and comfortable way for all its citizens, regardless of nationality. ”- Wenzel Jaksch in the Czechoslovak House of Representatives, April 5, 1938

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Karl Bosl (ed.): The First Czechoslovak Republic as a multinational party state. Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag 1979, p. 424
  2. ^ Karl Bosl (ed.): The First Czechoslovak Republic as a multinational party state. Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag 1979, p. 423
  3. ^ German legation reports from Prague. Part II. From the Beneš cabinet to the first supra-regional government under Švehla 1921–1926. Publications of the Collegium Carolinum, Vol. 49, 2004, p. 488

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