Reinhard Brückner (politician)

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Reinhard Brückner (born July 10, 1923 in Steinsdorf , Lower Silesia ; † February 18, 2015 ) was a Hessian Protestant pastor and politician ( Die Grünen ) and a member of the Hessian state parliament .

Life

Reinhard Brückner was born in Lower Silesia in 1923 as the oldest of five children. The father was a teacher, the mother trained house and nurse. In 1958 he married Renate Brückner (used Böhme, née Ottmann). He had a daughter with the physiotherapist, who brought three children into the marriage. In 1986 he took early retirement in order to have more time to reflect on fundamental ideological and theological questions. After his wife suffered a stroke in 1997, he withdrew and cared for her. He died in Berlin in 2015.

education and profession

Reinhard Brückner did military service as a radio operator in North Africa from 1941 to 1943 after graduating from high school . He joined the NSDAP on September 1, 1941 ( membership number 8,604,663). As part of the denazification he was classified as a follower. During his four years in captivity, he studied the Bible and decided to become a pastor and work for peace. After returning from captivity , he studied Protestant theology in Marburg an der Lahn and Tübingen from 1949 to 1953 and completed his studies in 1953. After that he was pastor in Weilburg , Eisemroth and Limburg an der Lahn until 1972 . From 1972 to 1976 he was director of the Evangelical Academy in Johannesburg in South Africa, responsible for Namibia and South Africa. Against the resistance of many church members, he opened all the conferences that were previously only reserved for whites to black Lutherans and soon belonged to the circle of church opponents of apartheid. He worked closely with the church anti-apartheid Dr. Beyers Naudé , Wolfram Kistner as well as representatives of liberation theology, the Black Consciousness Movement , students and political activists beyond racial barriers. He and his secretary, Myrtle Wyngaard, and eight other people were arrested under the Terrorism Act in the 1976 Soweto student riots he helped prepare. While Mrs. Wyngaard remained imprisoned for some time, Mr. Brückner was expelled from the country and was banned from entering the country for life.

Back in Germany, he endeavored inside and outside the church, trade unions and politics to educate the German public about the misanthropic apartheid system as well as the German economic and political entanglements. He took part in conferences in both parts of Germany and in European countries, published and discussed repeatedly on radio and television. He was an activist of the anti-apartheid movement, a West German solidarity movement with the South African liberation struggle.

politics

As a pastor he was involved in church youth work and for ecumenical cooperation. In the early 1980s he campaigned against the construction of a reprocessing plant in Merenberg . In the state elections in Hesse in 1982 , representatives of the Green Party, including Reinhard Brückner, were elected to the state parliament for the first time. In his criticism of democracy, he went so far as to question the majority principle:

"The question arises as to whether an affected, informed and thus qualified minority does not represent the actual majority and is therefore more empowered to decide what is right and what is not."

- Reinhard Brückner quotes from the minutes of the hess. Landtag on Deutschlandfunk from January 9, 1983

Holger Börner's attempt to govern by means of a minority government ("Hessian conditions") failed after a few months. In the early state elections in Hesse in 1983 , Reinhard Brückner, who had run in the constituency of Limburg-Weilburg II , was re-elected from the state list. Due to the rotation principle practiced by the Greens at the time , he had to give up his mandate on February 15, 1984.

NSDAP membership

In the study published by historian Hans-Peter Klausch on behalf of the Die Linke parliamentary group in the Hessian state parliament in 2011 , the well-known fact is presented that he was a member of the NSDAP. According to this study, he was accepted as a member of the NSDAP on September 1, 1941 (at the age of 18) under membership number 8,604,663. According to the study, “[Brückner] was one of those who, in adolescence, had joined the Nazi party after years of indoctrination by the Hitler Youth. Obviously, painful war experiences brought about a change of mind ”. Reinhard Brückner himself never disguised his young membership and clearly opposed the ideology of the Nazi regime in his professional and personal commitment.

Fonts

Reinhard Brückner is the author of a number of books, mainly on the subject of southern Africa. His work "On the Situation of Humanity since World War II" was never published, but can be viewed online .

A selection of his books:

  • South Africa's black future. The youth unrest since 1976 - its causes and consequences . Frankfurt am Main: Verlag Otto Lembeck. 1977
  • South Africa - what an adventure! , 1983

literature

  • Hans-Peter Klausch : Brown Legacy. Nazi past Hessian state parliament member 1st – 11th Electoral term (1946–1987) . The Left Group in the Hessian State Parliament, Wiesbaden 2011, p. 7 ( Download [PDF; 4.2 MB ]).
  • Jochen Lengemann : The Hessen Parliament 1946–1986 . Biographical handbook of the advisory state committee, the state assembly advising the constitution and the Hessian state parliament (1st – 11th electoral period). Ed .: President of the Hessian State Parliament. Insel-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1986, ISBN 3-458-14330-0 , p. 223 ( hessen.de [PDF; 12.4 MB ]).
  • Jochen Lengemann: MdL Hessen. 1808-1996. Biographical index (= political and parliamentary history of the state of Hesse. Vol. 14 = publications of the Historical Commission for Hesse. Vol. 48, 7). Elwert, Marburg 1996, ISBN 3-7708-1071-6 , p. 91.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Plenary Protocol 19/39 of the Hessian State Parliament of March 24, 2015
  2. ↑ Jon: 1967 Terrorism Act, No. 83 of 1967. May 25, 2012, accessed April 1, 2019 .
  3. ↑ FF7 / 05 The German anti-apartheid movement. Retrieved April 1, 2019 .
  4. ↑ Quote in Deutschlandfunk (interview of the week) ( Memento from November 22, 2003 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 183 kB) from January 9, 1983
  5. ↑ Hans-Peter Klausch : Brown legacy. Nazi past Hessian state parliament member 1st – 11th Electoral term (1946–1987) . The Left Group in the Hessian State Parliament, Wiesbaden 2011 ( Download [PDF; 4.2 MB ]).
personal data
SURNAME Brückner, Reinhard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (The Greens), MdL
DATE OF BIRTH July 10, 1923
PLACE OF BIRTH Steinsdorf
DATE OF DEATH February 18, 2015