Talk:Werner Conze

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Was he a member of NSDAP? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 20:38, 8 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Yes he was, according to German Wikipedia, with party # 5,089,796.radek (talk) 20:57, 8 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Indeed. It seems a referenced section regarding his Nazi activity was blanked by anon IP, I restored it.--MyMoloboaccount (talk) 02:14, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

NPOV
It is important to render justice to this eminent German historian. His involvement in discussion during the 1930s about ethnic cleansing in Eastern Central Europe never went beyond scattered writings in obscure places, and ended around 1940 when he was still under 30 years old.

While it is legitimate to mention these well documented early statements, they should be put into perspective. Conze's outstanding achievements after 1945 are far more important than his youthful errors. MyMoloboaccount has displayed an unfair attitude by attributing to some of Conze's early statements a degree of importance totally out of proportion. I would like to request both Molobo and Marek to refrain from polemics and leave this article in a shape which corresponds to Wikipedia's standards.

Aravono — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aravono (talk • contribs) 22:28, 6 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Also see Talk:Schieder commission. Skäpperöd (talk) 09:30, 17 March 2012 (UTC)
 * In addition to what I said there, I agree with the assessment by Aravono that this article has an undue focus on Conze's youth and its most critical assessments and almost completely lacks information on his post-1945 career which made him famous. There are biographies available, and the article should follow the lines of those. Recent biographies include
 * Etzemüller, Thomas: Sozialgeschichte als politische Geschichte. Werner Conze und die Neuorientierung der westdeutschen Geschichtswissenschaft nach 1945, Munich 2001.
 * Dunkhase, Jan Eike: Werner Conze. Ein deutscher Historiker im 20. Jahrhundert. Göttingen 2010.
 * Skäpperöd (talk) 19:07, 18 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Then add that information. Don't tag the article because you didn't write it yourself. And come on, Aravono is an obvious SPA, if not an outright sock of some banned user. Until you actually do some work on the article or get more specific there's no point for the tag. Volunteer Marek 19:11, 18 March 2012 (UTC)


 * One quick note, it looks like the Dunkhase biography actually gives the info that Conze joined not just the Nazi party but actually the SA, i.e. "The Brownshirts". I don't have the book itself but I'm basing it on this review, quote:
 * His (Conze's - VM) early career took him to the University of Königsberg in 1931, following a short period in Leipzig. It is here, during the “crystallisation point of the völkisch academic medium” (p. 27), that Conze enters the SA in 1933, absorbing the key influences that would continue to have an effect on his scientific work even after 1945, namely, the interdisciplinarity arising from völkisch sociology and orientation towards German history in Eastern Europe.
 * Volunteer Marek 18:45, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

Die Geschichte der 291. Infanterie-Division 1940-1945. H. H. Podzun, Bad Nauheim1953
Does anyone know Conze's book Die Geschichte der 291. Infanterie-Division 1940-1945. H. H. Podzun, Bad Nauheim published in 1953? Its content would be very interesting. --MyMoloboaccount (talk) 14:49, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

Comment by Omudicagna

I am glad that Skäpperöd has taken up Aravono's thoughts about rendering justice to Werner Conze. While I don't know what Volunteer Marek means by SPA (I am not a Wikipedia hack, but just a user who is not ready to accept unfair judgments), there is nothing wrong with Aravono's version, in particular with regard to Dunkhase's recent well documented biography. Aravono should have done better with footnotes, but I am sure this can be remedied.

Conze's year as a junior researcher at the "Publikationsstelle" of the Geheimes Preussisches Staatsarchiv (April 1936 to March 1937) did not lead to anything substantial. He worked for 3.000 Reichsmark, which is 250 per month (Burleigh, p.78) - it was a stipend for remaining hungry, and Dunkhase (p. 41) has documented that Conze's main objective remained his academic work in Königsberg to which he wanted to return as soon as possible.

To put the title of "Jomsburg" on the Wikipedia biography as the only visual testimony of Conze's life is simply obnoxious. This was an obscure journal edited by the "Publikationsstelle" in which Conze wrote three short (and minor) pieces during his year at Berlin.

The small book on the 291st Infanterie-Division was a tribute to the fallen soldiers with whom Conze had spent most of the war. The few survivors had asked him to write an account of the division's history. It is a sad story about death and misery, as so many others. The book can certainly be found at relevant university libraries.

Could it be that Molobo and Volunteer Marek don't read German? They would otherwise most certainly have taken into account the recent scholarly works mentioned by Skäpperöd.

I would hope that this discussion will now attract more users, in the interest of improving the quality of this important article.

Omudicagna (talk) 20:52, 18 March 2012 (UTC)


 * So, um, you're saying you're not "Aravono"? Volunteer Marek 21:23, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

We are discussing about the quality of an article, not about identities. I have not asked you about yours, and I only have time for a debate on substance. Omudicagna Omudicagna (talk) 21:50, 18 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Aravono was/is a single purpose account who's only "contribution" was to remove well sourced text from the article. You are calling that "his version". Volunteer Marek  23:07, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Confirmed sockpuppet.--MyMoloboaccount (talk) 14:08, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

Who is Jan Eike Dunkhase?
Does he deserve to be quoted in the lead? According to Google Scholar his book about Conze has been quoted 35 times (I have not verified if the book has been prised or criticised) but his other works are not referenced. Xx236 (talk) 07:42, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
 * This review says that Götz Aly and Ingo Haar are critical regarding Conze.


 * Götz Aly is mentioned at the end in Legacy and his inreview is listed but not referenced.
 * Ingo Haar has written his dissertation 'Historians in Nazi Germany'.
 * The book by Haar&Fahlbusch is quoted selectively - three times the Foreword (by Iggers) and once the chapter 1 (by Haar). Xx236 (talk) 07:52, 10 January 2022 (UTC)


 * this is Dunkhase. More here in German. I don’t believe anyone disagrees that Conze is one of the most important German historians of the 20th century, you’ll find similar statements in Haar and others. The information that he was one of the most important advocates of social history is from another scholar, for instance, Moeller. I don’t think Aly even, the most zealous left wing critic of older scholarship, disputes this. He’s an extremely important scholar. We need to attribute such statements however. Dunkhase is also “critical” that doesn’t diminish Conze’s influence or importance.
 * If you have full access to those books then feel free to add from them. However they do not discuss Conze on every page obviously. I’m relying on where Google books finds the name Conze.—Ermenrich (talk) 13:12, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
 * The link is still red.Xx236 (talk) 13:20, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
 * I am not a fan of any type of 'cancel culture' but many people are damned because of less important accusations than Nazism. So the prize in the second sentence of the lead and Nazism in the last one may be regarded as biased. Xx236 (talk) 13:26, 10 January 2022 (UTC)


 * Not sure what you mean? No one has “cancelled” Conze. Scholars now discuss his involvement with the Nazis and whether it affects his postwar work. Haar says Conze moved away from his völkisch positions, Iggers thinks he still maintained his world view, etc. He’s still a very significant historian, whom I’m sure you can find recent citations for.
 * Do you have some suggested changes based on the sources?—Ermenrich (talk) 13:30, 10 January 2022 (UTC)


 * I’ve moved the Nazis controversy sentence to the end of the first paragraph.—Ermenrich (talk) 13:40, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
 * , I've replaced the paraphrased quote by Dunkhase by one in English by Georg Iggers - I hope these two changes satisfy some of your objections? By the way, if you happen to have a full citation for Iggers' foreword we should probably use it rather than citing the book by Haar and Fahlbusch. That was an oversight on my part due to relying on Google books. Fixed.--Ermenrich (talk) 14:01, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
 * We have to be careful even with figures who are burdened by a Nazi past. Objectivity becomes problematic. Scholars will conjecture that some of these figures, Conze among them, never turned away fully from their "Nazi" views, but this is a disingenuous retrospective take, since people can change. Now, when those German scholars actually contributed to justifying racial determinism and inferiority to the degree of a Hans Friedrich Karl Günther, wherein they share intellectual responsibility for the Holocaust, then forgiveness is not the right answer. For those historians that legitimized imperial conquest, that becomes much more debatable, because this does not imply racial extermination and the like...just nationalist idealism. Let's be sure that we balance scholarly opinions, which is what I think Ermenrich is rightfully getting at here. --Obenritter (talk) 15:44, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
 * Conze certainly wrote some pretty vile stuff in his Nazi years - calling for "Entjudung" in Eastern Europe, however vaguely, is not excusable. I'm certainly not in favor of "rehabilitating" him or minimizing these statements. There's several debates that can be had here, and are had in scholarship: does this make partially him responsible for the Holocaust? Or does it simply show the degree to which the Nazi worldview permeated German academia at the time? Is Conze's postwar work tainted by these earlier ideas? What is beyond dispute, however, is that Conze was a very important historian after the war and his influence continues to be felt. We are fortunate that the Nazi past is no longer being hushed up, certainly, but this does not invalidate everything Conze ever wrote.--Ermenrich (talk) 15:56, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
 * Well, recall that Entjudung originally meant expulsion as far as most people understood vice outright murder. And yes, even "expulsion" was brutal in concept. It's not ideal either way. Also recall that most of Europe exercised a similar "Entdeutschung" by expelling ethnic Germans by the millions in return at the end of the war. Yes, I agree the Nazi Weltanschauung was everywhere and encouraged in everything, to the degree that if you wanted to keep your job (especially for educators) you had to "tow" the party line. Now that said, I am with you about not excusing Conze, but I cannot assent to "canceling" him altogether, having personal familial connections to ancestors and those of many friends who "towed" that same line out of fear, sometimes out of genuine nationalist and racialist conviction. Differentiating between those two things is not easy to do. Balance is what we need for important academics. When "balance" is unwarranted, then we should remain critical.--Obenritter (talk) 16:13, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

A few more quotes on Conze's significance: Philipp Stolzel One of the West German history professions key figures between the 1950s and 1970s; Christoph Brüll Der Ruf nach Heidelberg 1957 markiert deren Ende und zugleich den Beginn einer Schaffenszeit, die Conze zu einem der führenden Historiker der jungen Republik machte. My point is, this is almost a common fact. If I didn't know someone would object to it, I wouldn't bother attributing it all (like saying "According to Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Einstein was one of the most important physicists of the 20th century"). I've also found one hostile mention, Werner Lausecker, Handbuch der völkischen Wissenschaften, p. 139, which still proves the point: Ihm [Conze] wird weiterhin "innovative" Bedeutung für die Entwicklung der Sozialgeschichte in Deutschland zugeschrieben.. Also page 138: Von circa 1955 bis 1970 war Conze der wichtigste öffentliche Repräsentant der deutschen Sozialgeschichte. Lausecker thinks Conze's work was racist baloney, which appears to be a minority position (he's so far the first and only scholar I've seen to claim that Conze's postwar work was explicitly anti-Semitic, which contradicts e.g. Iggers, but maybe agrees with Götz Aly), but he still acknowledges that others disagree.--Ermenrich (talk) 14:23, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
 * Your point is well-made here Herr Doktor . There seems to be sufficient cause to not paint him (Conze) exclusively under the stain of his Nazi past, even if he has detractors. His significance as a historian must be acknowledged given this evidence. --Obenritter (talk) 19:52, 11 January 2022 (UTC)