The Office of Racial Policy was a department of the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...

(NSDAP) that was founded for "unifying and supervising all indoctrination and propaganda work in the field of population and racial politics". It began in 1933 as the Nazi Party Office for Enlightenment on Population Policy and Racial Welfare (german: Aufklärungsamt für Bevölkerungspolitik und Rassenpflege der NSDAP). By 1935, it had been renamed to the Nazi Party Office of Racial Policy (german: Rassenpolitisches Amt der NSDAP or ''RPA''). Dr. Walter Gross was tasked with creating the office, and remained its leader until his death at the end of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

in April 1945.

Purpose

The main role of the RPA was to oversee the production and maintenance of propaganda regarding the ethnic consciousness of the Nordic Aryan

master race The master race (german: Herrenrasse) is a pseudoscientific concept in Nazi ideology in which the putative " Aryan race" is deemed the pinnacle of human racial hierarchy. Members were referred to as "''Herrenmenschen''" ("master humans"). T ...

. This was termed "enlightenment" rather than "propaganda" by the Nazi authorities, because it was "not a call for immediate action but a long-term change in attitude".Koonz, p. 110. Dr. Gross did not want people thinking of themselves as

individuals An individual is that which exists as a distinct entity. Individuality (or self-hood) is the state or quality of being an individual; particularly (in the case of humans) of being a person unique from other people and possessing one's own need ...

but rather as "single links in the great chain of life".

Methods

All Nazi Party racial information required the approval of Gross' office before publication. The department dealt with all measures concerning the field of

population Population typically refers to the number of people in a single area, whether it be a city or town, region, country, continent, or the world. Governments typically quantify the size of the resident population within their jurisdiction using a ...

and racial policies in cooperation with other Nazi and SS agencies, such as the

RKFDV The Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Nationhood (german: Reichskommissar für die Festigung deutschen Volkstums, RKF, RKFDV) was an office in Nazi Germany, which was held by ''Reichsführer-SS'' Heinrich Himmler. Adolf Hitler in ...

. The RPA checked and passed all Nazi Party press releases on issues of

race Race, RACE or "The Race" may refer to: * Race (biology), an informal taxonomic classification within a species, generally within a sub-species * Race (human categorization), classification of humans into groups based on physical traits, and/or s ...

. It also provided input for drafting Nazi

legislation Legislation is the process or result of enrolling, enacting, or promulgating laws by a legislature, parliament, or analogous governing body. Before an item of legislation becomes law it may be known as a bill, and may be broadly referred to ...

regarding racial issue. The RPA produced '' Neues Volk'', a monthly magazine aimed at a general readership rather than towards a specialist audience.Koonz, p. 117. But while containing articles on topics such as travel tips, its central theme was the promotion of

eugenics Eugenics ( ; ) is a fringe set of beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic quality of a human population. Historically, eugenicists have attempted to alter human gene pools by excluding people and groups judged to be inferior o ...

and ethnic consciousness. Other publications created by the office included a ten-point plan to marriage. The guidelines, rather than focusing on love, stressed the ideal criteria for marriage in the Nazi state was the consideration of race and health. The pamphlet urged investigation of the ancestry of potential mates, and that the hereditarily fit should not remain single, concluding with the injunction to hope for many children. Other works included "''Can You Think Racially?''" and "''Peasantry between Yesterday and Today''". The RPA also created traveling exhibitions that presented the ideal Aryan type as unchanging in contrast to

subhuman ''SubHuman'' is the sixth studio album by Recoil. Alan Wilder stated in a YouTube greeting that there would be a new album coming in spring or early summer 2007. On 23 April 2007, he released information regarding the album via Myspace and hi ...

types. In its first year, the office had published 14 pamphlets for racial education.

Claudia Koonz Claudia Ann Koonz is an American historian of Nazi Germany. Koonz's critique of the role of women during the Nazi era, from a feminist perspective, has become a subject of much debate and research in itself. She is a recipient of the PEN New Engl ...

, ''The Nazi Conscience'', p. 116. . This led to the establishment of intensive training courses to create ethnic educators. More than a thousand Sturmabteilung personnel and recent medical school graduates were indoctrinated each year on Nazi racial topics until 1945.Claudia, p. 123.

References

External links

NSDAP
on cine-holocaust {{Authority control Organizations established in 1933 Organizations disestablished in 1945 Nazi Party organizations

Purpose

Methods

See also

References

External links