Selected excerpts from a LabourNet Germany dossier. Read the full dossier
“[…] The National Socialist Teachers’ League had organized 97% of educators. One-third of them were members of the NSDAP. Nevertheless, the tendency to downplay the NSLB’s role persists even within the field of educational science. Based on an analysis of the NSLB’s central publication, this study demonstrates that the NSLB was by no means a harmless professional organization, but rather an integral part of the criminal Nazi system from 1933 onward. The association was part of the Nazi regime, which certainly needed the NSLB’s incitement, racism, and anti-Semitism to prepare for and accompany the actual murder programs.” Publisher’s information on the book by Saskia Müller and Benjamin Ortmeyer—see
more information about the book. In response to the book’s publication, there is an open letter from the Federal Committee of GEW Students (BASS) to the GEW Executive Board and members, as well as a broad debate surrounding the GEW:
Open Letter to the GEW: Where Is the Public Justification for Renaming the Max Traeger Foundation? The GEW, the Nazi Era
, and Contemporary Anti-Semitism
For over 10 years, there have been calls to rename the Max Traeger Foundation—which is affiliated with the GEW—because Max Traeger was a Nazi collaborator. Four years ago, in 2022, the decision to rename the foundation was finally made. Then it took yet another few years for the renaming to actually take place. However, this was done in such a way that the reasons for the renaming were not disclosed to the public or on the foundation’s website. Benjamin Ortmeyer’s open letter from October 2026 addresses this issue
Founding Chairman Dethroned: The Education and Science Union (GEW) is renaming its “Max Traeger Foundation.” The foundation was named after a member of the Nazi Teachers’ League.
“At this year’s union convention in Leipzig, the rank-and-file members
of the Education and Science Union (GEW) have dethroned their controversial founding chairman, Max Traeger: The union’s own research foundation had previously been named after him. In the future, however, it will bear the name of a woman—who has not yet been identified—who is “an exemplary figure for her anti-fascist commitment,” according to the resolution passed over the weekend. With this decision, Traeger’s critics have prevailed over prominent voices on the executive board. Max Traeger is “controversial because of his membership in the National Socialist Teachers’ League, particularly among younger union members,” the GEW website states as the rationale.
Until now, the union’s executive board had tended to glorify Max Traeger as a “pioneer.” (…) Twenty-four years ago, Frankfurt-based education scholar Benjamin Ortmeyer first denounced the union’s Nazi roots, particularly the prominent role played by former members of the National Socialist Teachers’ League in Nazi Germany. Ortmeyer argues that these individuals systematically assisted in the selection of “life unworthy of life” in Nazi Germany. In particular, by reviewing church records, they helped identify people who, according to Nazi “racial doctrine,” were considered Jews and were therefore persecuted, deported, and murdered, Ortmeyer has argued ever since in his numerous publications on the subject. (…) Following the decision to change the name—for which he and others fought—does Ortmeyer feel satisfaction or rather outrage because it took so long?
“Both,” he tells the *taz*, including “outrage over the ‘Catholic Church syndrome’ of repression.” To this day, the Executive Board maintains the position that “that’s just how it was back then.” Nevertheless, the effort was worth it. He is happy to congratulate the many young GEW members and the Hessian regional chapter on this belated success, as they never gave up on the cause.” Article by Christoph Schmidt-Lunau from June 28, 2022, in taz online
The Teachers’ Union During the Nazi Era: A Danger
That Was Underestimated
Historian Marcel Bois has researched the history of the GEW’s predecessor, the “Society of Friends of Patriotic Schooling and Education (GdF),” in Hamburg. Interview by Esther Geißlinger from E&W 3/2021 on March 8, 2021, at the GEW , including the following: “… Many actors of the time, from bourgeois forces to the Communists, underestimated the danger. The GdF was not alone in this. In Hamburg, the GdF’s strength was a further factor. The National Socialist Teachers’ League played no role in the city before 1933, and other associations were also weak. The GdF, on the other hand, had members in leading positions within the school administration; it saw itself as the experienced association whose position was secure.
This attitude is evident in texts from that time, in which the Nazis were mocked. Some officials saw a greater threat coming from the left. (…) The situation among teachers mirrored what was happening overall: The economic crisis led to mass poverty and mass unemployment. Young people were not hired, and married women were laid off. The NSDAP received 2.6 percent of the vote in the Reichstag elections in March 1928 and became the strongest party during the Great Depression in the early 1930s. In Hamburg, however, the NSDAP’s influence was less than the national average. This certainly had to do with the role of the GdF, because it supported young teachers and took a very clear stand against the Nazis. (…) From today’s perspective, it is easy to say they should have done things differently, but there were groups that chose other paths.
The Free Teachers’ Union dissolved in April 1933, as did teachers’ associations in Saxony and Bremen, and the Women Teachers’ Association, which transferred its assets to a foundation. The GdF resisted Gleichschaltung longer than other organizations and also attempted to organize resistance through the German Teachers’ Association. Only after the Allies had left, the NSDAP had seized power in Hamburg, and violence had broken out in the streets—only then did they cave in…”
GEW: “Understanding History!” Education Union Presents Study Titled “The Education and Science Union and the Nazi Legacy”
“The Education and Science Union (GEW) is confronting its past. During a video press conference on Friday, it presented the study by Leipzig historian Jörn-Michael Goll titled ‘The Education and Science Union and the Nazi Legacy.’ “This scholarly study lays the groundwork for understanding the history of the GEW’s predecessor organizations during the Weimar Republic and their role during the Nazi era, as well as the reorganization of teachers’ advocacy after World War II, the founding of the GEW in 1948, and its development in the years that followed—and for fostering discourse within the public sphere and the education union. “We are open to this process,” said GEW Chair Marlis Tepe in Frankfurt am Main.
“The study touches on sensitive issues without condescendingly judging those who were active at the time. It captures the structural developments and places them within their historical context. In this way, the (pre)history of the GEW becomes visible as part of German history, as part of the history of the Federal Republic, and as part of education policy.” “The study conveys the insight that the GEW’s Nazi legacy is more complex, multifaceted, and contradictory than has been assumed in everyday perception,” emphasized Jörn-Michael Goll, author of the study and historian at the Department of History at the University of Leipzig. “A central concern after 1945 was the rebuilding of the GEW, which was a founding member of the German Trade Union Federation (DGB) in 1949, with a strongly pronounced ‘pragmatism’ serving as the guiding principle for its actions.
Thus, the GEW stood behind its members almost unreservedly. The GEW’s founders were convinced that without this approach, it would not have been possible to reorganize teachers into a large, influential union. However, this policy also led the organization, in several cases, to advocate for teachers—some of whom faced serious charges—to be reinstated to the teaching profession or to secure their pension entitlements. This corresponded with a general lack of willingness to critically examine the Nazi legacy. On the other hand, however, there are also examples showing that staunch National Socialists had no place in the GEW—and that the GEW thereby demonstrated from the very beginning that it explicitly saw itself as a democratic organization.
It was not until the late 1970s and early 1980s, with a new generation of members, that the GEW began to confront its past.” Goll also made it clear, however, that the GEW did not play a special role in this development within postwar German society…“
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