Official Statistics and Demography in the Third Reich

Abstract

The production and utilization of population data during the Third Reich are themes which have attracted increasing attention from historians, social scientists and demographers, whether in the context of understanding how population science was rapidly transformed into race hygiene or the specific use of population data systems in planning and implementing the final solution¹. The Nazi seizure of power led to a rehabilitation of the work of the statistical offices, both at Reich and Länder level, particularly in comparison with the negative impact of enforced savings programmes in the pre-1933 era, while the noticeable expansion in the collation of statistical data served as a basis for greater state control over the individual and a more effective regulation of both economic and social activities. Although the role of the statistical offices between 1933 and 1945 undoubtedly raises important questions concerning the dividing line between science and ideology, as well as the social construction, interpretation and application of knowledge, the extent to which official statisticians were directly implicated in the racial and population policies of the Nazi regime remains unclear. According to Michel, the censuses of 1933 and 1939 represented a,misuse of population statistics’, whereas the most recent study of population statistics during the Third Reich has concluded that official statisticians, although serving as accomplices of the Nazi regime, were not directly responsible for the ultimate realization of its ethnic and racial policies.