Commentary: Right-Wing Extremism and Bias Crime in Germany

Abstract

Over the past several years, the number of right-wing extremist groups and violence has been increasing, especially since the reunification of Germany in 1990. Most of their members belong to a youth culture centered on racism, neo-Nazism, anti-Semitism, and xenophobia. Using official data, this article discusses the nature and extent of right-wing extremism and bias crime in Germany. It also examines the response by the German government to prevent and control these groups. These include punitive and preventive measures.

KEYTERMS:

• Germany
• right-wing extremist groups
• prevention

Notes

1. The term hate crime is translated literally into German (Hassverbrechen and Hasskriminalität). Because the motivation of the offender does not have to be exclusively hate related, the term could also be translated into German as bias crime and follows on from the term bias crimes that exists in the United States (cf. Bufkin, 1996).

2. Dworek (2000) emphasizes that it was the civil rights movement that first discussed the problem and did so before each legal initiative and brought it into public awareness.

3. In the Hate Crime Statistics Act, hate crime is described as “crimes that manifest evidence of prejudice based on race, religion, sexual orientation, or ethnicity, including where appropriate the crimes of murder, non-negligent manslaughter; forcible rape; aggravated assault, simple assault, intimidation; arson; and destruction, damage or vandalism of property” [Hate Crime Statistics Act of 1990, Public Law Nr. 101–275 (1990)].

4. The countless regulations and laws to be mentioned were adopted by the National Socialists regarding the exclusion and persecution of certain social groups, all before the “Nuremberg Laws” of September 15, 1935, which contained the “law for the protection of German blood and German honour.”

5. The details of the post-war period relate to the developments in the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany). To this day little is known about developments in East Germany (German Democratic Republic). The State attempted to repress the problem of right-wing extremism as widely as possible. It was only in the 1980s that we can start to talk about the building of a youth culture and the “beginning of a politically-motivated extreme right wing movement” (Korfes, 1992, p. 51).

6. cf. The basic rights of articles 1 to 19 in the Basic Constitutional Law for the Federal Republic of Germany.

7. cf. Article 18, Basic Constitutional Law for the Federal Republic of Germany.

8. See Article 21 (2), Basic Constitutional Law for the Federal Republic of Germany.

9. It is worth considering the case of the United States with the details in the First Amendment (freedom of speech).

10. Federal Constitutional Court, Judgment from October 23, 1952: BVerfGE 2, 1 (p12). It must be noted, that just two parties have been banned in Germany up to this day: In 1952 the Sozialistische Reichspartei (SRP) and in 1956 the Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands (Communist Party of Germany [KPD]). Lastly, the Government filed a request for the banning of the Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands (National-Democratic Party of Germany [NPD]) in 2001 that was rejected by the Federal Constitutional Court. Today the NPD is the largest extreme right-wing party in Germany with over 6,000 members, a monthly journal, with a circulation of 10,000 copies, and a youth organization (Junge Nationaldemokraten/Young National Democrats [JN]), which appeals to young neo-Nazis and skinheads in particular.

11. The Rote Armee Fraktion (Red Army Fraction) grew from the student revolts of the late 1960s and with it extreme left-wing terrorism in the 1970s to the extent that the extreme right-wing problem remained broadly unnoticed.

12. The work of Theodor W. Adorno on the authoritarian personality should obviously not be forgotten, and it focused even earlier on this theme (cf. Adorno, 1973).

13. The terms right and left in a political context originated in the French National Assembly in 1789, when the politicians in the young Parliament were first split according to political orientation rather than social standing. While the liberal, revolutionary members of parliament sat on the left, the conservative monarchists were on the right side (cf. Goodwin, 1964).

14. Penal Code § 130 (3).

15. On March 25, 2005 an amendment to § 130 (4) came into use, which categorizes endorsement, glorification, or justification of National Socialist heritage as punishable offenses. The Government reacted to planned deployment of extreme right-wing gatherings in the vicinity of newly erected memorials in Berlin to the Jews of Europe who were murdered. Critique on this instant policy (cf. Bertram, 2005; Leist, 2005).

16. §§ 223 (bodily injury) and 224 (dangerous bodily injury) Penal Code.

17. On the problem of a Gesinnungsstrafrecht (a term that has no direct equivalent in English but that basically means a kind of penal law oriented primordially to punish attitudes or belief systems of offenders instead of the act itself, respectively, the traditional elements of mens rea) and its significance for Germany (cf. Preuß, 1989).

18. §§ 111 (public incitement to crime), 126 (disturbance of the public peace by threatening to commit crimes), 130a (instructions for crime), 140 (rewarding and approving crimes), 241 (threat) Penal Code.

19. § 131 (representation of violence) Penal Code.

20. §§ 125 (breach of the peace), 127 (formation of armed groups), 129 (formation of criminal groups) Penal Code.

21. §§ 86 (dissemination of means of propaganda of unconstitutional organizations), 86a (use of symbols of unconstitutional organizations), 130 (agitation of the people), 185 (insult) Penal Code.

22. The antiracism directive (2000/43/EG on June 29, 2000), directive framework (2000/78/EG on November 27, 2000), revised equal-treatment directive (2002/73/EG on September 23, 2002), and the fourth directive for equal treatment (2004/113/EG on December 13, 2004).

23. On the factors of bias in both statistics (cf. Coester & Gossner, 2002).

24. It is essential to show the extreme right-wing attitudes alongside the degree of right-wing extremism in Germany. The interesting dimension regarding social exposure to extreme right-wing–oriented people is that it is always considered in conjunction with actions and attitudes. For example, in a simple case of shoplifting, the attitude of the offender for the overall appreciation of the crime does not play a critical role; however, with extreme right-wing hate crimes, the beliefs and attitudes are directly placed in the context of the crime. But also before an alleged crime, social scientists are interested in the broad field of extreme right-wing opinion and attitudes mainly among youths. Comparatively, a large number of empirical (youth) studies exist in Germany on this theme (cf. Coester & Gossner, 2002; Schroeder, 2004). In this place only a few findings from a new analysis should be included: Since 2004 research from Marburg and Bielefeld University Graduate College on “group-related misanthropy: causes, phenomenology, consequences” has been analyzing to what extent equality and integrity of specific groups in Germany can be called into question. The common core of the syndrome of group-related misanthropy is the construction of inequality and contains elements of racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, heterophobia, islamophobia, privileges for the established, and classical sexism. The researchers developed questions for each of the seven elements, which in June 2004 they used to sample 2,656 representatively chosen people of the German-speaking population. (The response categories “completely disagree” and “if anything it's a no” both come under “no” in this table and “completely agree” and “yes I suppose so” are treated as “yes”). From the results the researchers deduce widely reaching implications on theoretical, political, and preventive levels. “Overall the results are a confirmation of the syndrome of group-related misanthropy in many respects. It becomes apparent that it revolves around a construct of overriding importance, in which the individual elements are therefore not independent from each other” (Heitmeyer, 2002, p. 22).

25. The figures relate to West Germany up until 1990 and the whole of Germany from 1991.

26. The figures relate to West Germany up until 1992 and from 1993 to the whole of Germany. The system of recording politically motivated crime was always being further developed and improved. A new system of recording has existed since 2001 intended to capture the broad spectrum of politically motivated crime (cf. Federal Ministry of the Interior/Federal Ministry of Justice, 2001).

27. “Crimes are attributed to extreme right-wing politically motivated crime if the conditions of the offence/attitude of the offender give clues that they are attributed to an extreme right-wing orientation, without the crime having to aim at the repeal or abolition of an element of the free democratic basic order (extremism). In particular crimes are attributable if the benefits of popular nationalism, racism, Social Darwinism, or National Socialism were fully or partly a cause for the committal of the crime. These politically-motivated crimes can be qualified as right extremist” (Federal Criminal Police Office, 2001, p. 10).

28. Includes murder, bodily injury, arson, sexual attack, crimes of antagonism, breach of the peace, deprivation of personal freedom, robbery, and extortion according to the Penal Code.

29. This total number of politically motivated extreme right-wing violent crimes in 2001 contains completed as well as attempted crimes. Each crime is only counted once: for example, if bodily injury has been committed at the same time during a riot, then only bodily injury appears as the offense in the statistics, with a higher treat of punishment (Coester, 2008).

30. Andreas Marneros, psychological court expert for extreme right-wing crimes in Germany, confirms this randomness (cf. Marneros, 2005).

31. Unemployment rate in Germany 2001 was around 9%.

32. Even though the victim might be born in Germany and/or holding German citizenship.

33. cf. the Federal Ministry for Families, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth at www.bmfsfj.de/Politikbereiche/kinder-und-jugend,did=4732.html.

34. Prominent examples for such measures are opt-out schemes (help for dropouts from the extreme right-wing scene, who are often open to attack from former fellow members, cf. www.exit-deutschland.de); education in memory (work with extreme right-wing youths on the historical place of the Holocaust, cf. www.fuer-die-zukunft-lernen.de); accepting, integrating, dialogue-oriented or real-life experience youth work with youths, girls, pupils, fans, offenders, or propagators (e.g., competence training for prospective teachers [www.difference-troubles.de]; or provision of information to schools on the theme of homosexuality [www.kombi-berlin.de]).

35. I was a member of that group.

36. cf. www.kriminalpraevention.de.

37. Prepared by Prof. Dr. Britta Bannenberg (Bielefeld University) with the title “Hate Crime: An Overview for Criminological Purposes.”

38. Prepared by Prof. Dr. Ulrich Wagner (Marburg University) with the title “Measures for Crime Prevention in the Field of Hate Crime With Primary Preventive Measures Especially Taken Into Account.

39. Several publications on the named activities as well as further works are available (cf. Coester, 2003; Rössner & Coester, 2003a, 2003b, 2003c; Bannenberg, B. Rössner, D., & Coester, M. 2005).

40. Examples: contact in segregated neighborhoods (cf. Pettigrew & Tropp, 2000), contact in the workplace (cf. Pettigrew & Tropp, 2000), integrated schooling (cf. Dollase, 2001), cooperative group teaching (cf. Slavin & Cooper, 1999).

41. Examples: procurement of information in class (cf. Stephan & Stephan, 1984), presentations on “multi-cultural school” (cf. Banks, 1988), and the prior mentioned Olweus Programme (cf. Knaack & Hanewinkel, 1999). Also the National Center for Hate Crime Prevention has developed a teaching program for the prevention of hate violence and delinquency (cf. McLaughlin & Brilliant, 1997).

42. cf. Sherman et al., 1997; Rössner, Bannenberg, & Coester, 2002.

43. Examples: Parent upbringing training (cf. Kazdin, 1994), social competence training for children (cf. Wasserman & Miller, 1998), teacher class contingency training (cf. Howell & Hawkins, 1998), parent–children interaction training in preschool education (cf. Zigler, Taussig, & Black, 1992), and cultural awareness training (cf. Wallace, 1998).

44. Alongside the recommendations that are briefly outlined here, the work group further produced a concluding report that can be ordered at the German Forum for Crime Prevention: http://www.kriminalpraevention.de.