IB History Domestic Impact of Hitler's Germany Key Definitions

Hermann Göring's 1936 economic programme to make Germany self-sufficient (autarky) and ready for war within four years. It prioritized rearmament and the development of synthetic substitutes for imported raw materials.

The Nazi secret police (Geheime Staatspolizei), responsible for investigating and suppressing political opposition. It operated outside the legal system and used surveillance, informants, torture, and arbitrary detention.

The Nazi Party's youth organization for boys aged 14-18. Boys aged 10-13 joined the Deutsches Jungvolk first. Membership was made compulsory in 1936 and near-universal by 1939. The organization combined physical training, ideological indoctrination, military preparation, and group activities. By 1939, it had around 8 million members. The Hitler Youth emphasized loyalty to Hitler above family or church, racial ideology, discipline, and preparation for military service. Its counterpart for girls was the League of German Girls (BDM).

German economist and banker who served as President of the Reichsbank (1933-1939) and Reich Minister of Economics (1934-1937). Schacht was not a committed Nazi but served the regime because he believed he could use its political authority to restore German economic power. His "New Plan" of 1934 introduced strict controls on imports and foreign exchange to prevent Germany from running out of foreign currency while rearmament accelerated. He also devised the MEFO bills, a system of promissory notes used to finance rearmament without immediately appearing in the government budget. Schacht resigned as Economics Minister in 1937 when he became concerned that the pace of rearmament was causing dangerous inflation.

The "Night of Broken Glass," a nationwide pogrom against Jews in Germany and Austria on November 9-10, 1938. Organized by the Nazi regime following the assassination of a German diplomat in Paris by a Jewish teenager, the pogrom destroyed around 7,500 Jewish businesses, burned over 1,400 synagogues, killed at least 91 Jews directly, and resulted in the arrest and deportation of around 30,000 Jewish men to concentration camps. The name refers to the broken glass from shop windows that covered the streets. Kristallnacht marked an escalation from legal persecution to open physical violence against Jews and is often cited as a key step toward the Holocaust.

Bund Deutscher Madel, the female counterpart of the Hitler Youth for girls aged 14-18. Girls aged 10-13 joined the Jungmadel first. The BDM emphasized physical fitness, domestic skills, and preparation for motherhood rather than military training. Members were taught Nazi racial ideology, German nationalism, and the importance of bearing healthy Aryan children for the nation. Membership became compulsory alongside the Hitler Youth in 1936. The BDM represented the Nazi vision of womens role: physically healthy, ideologically committed, and primarily oriented toward family and child-rearing.

Two laws passed at the annual Nazi Party rally in Nuremberg in September 1935 that institutionalized racial antisemitism in German law. The Reich Citizenship Law stripped Jews of German citizenship, making them "subjects of the state" without political rights. The Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour banned marriage and sexual relations between Jews and non-Jewish Germans. A supplementary decree defined who counted as Jewish: anyone with three or four Jewish grandparents was fully Jewish; those with one or two Jewish grandparents were classified as "Mischlinge" (mixed-race). The laws affected around 500,000 German Jews directly and created a legal framework for systematic persecution.

The Schutzstaffel, originally founded in 1925 as Hitler's personal bodyguard. Under Heinrich Himmler (appointed head in 1929), it expanded into a vast organization that controlled the entire Nazi terror apparatus. The SS ran the Gestapo (secret police), the SD (Security Service), the concentration camp system, and later the Waffen-SS (military units). By 1945, it had around 800,000 members across its various branches. The SS was ideologically the most committed Nazi organization: members were selected on racial criteria and subjected to intensive ideological training. The SS was the primary instrument of the Holocaust.

The Nazi concept of a racially pure "people's community" that transcended class divisions. It was used to promote national unity and justify the exclusion and persecution of Jews, Roma, and other "non-Aryans."