The Berlin Football Association is publishing its study on the "History of Berlin Football during the Nazi Era" just in time for its Association Day on November 22. The book entitled "Eine Stütze des Systems? Der Berliner Fußball im Nationalsozialismus" will be published by Arete Verlag, Hildesheim. The publication, conceived and edited by the experienced soccer historians Daniel Küchenmeister and Thomas Schneider, comprises eight individual contributions by specialist academics that have been written over the past two years and shed light on various aspects of the topic.
The study is a milestone in the critical examination of the role of sport, and soccer in particular, under National Socialism in at least two respects. On the one hand, no other national or regional association under the umbrella of the DFB had previously commissioned a work comparable in terms of content and form. In this way, no other federal association of German soccer had previously taken a consistent and critical look at its own past with a view to the future.
Secondly, the book closes a gap in the examination of the role of soccer during the Nazi era and is dedicated to the federal level of the state and regional associations, which were transferred to the structure of the Gaue after their de facto self-dissolution in 1933 in the course of social conformity by the National Socialist dictatorship. At this level, which directly connected the clubs organizationally and influenced sports policy, the political guidelines of the regime were implemented and enforced in the clubs. They played an important role in the consolidation and functioning of the Nazi sports system, a role that has not been sufficiently considered and presented to date.
Two main contributions examine the sporting policy actions of the association and its clubs after January 30, 1933. A special focus in the other main contributions of the book is on the exclusion of Jewish club members and the history of Jewish soccer in Berlin, which came to an abrupt end after November 9, 1938. Two concluding individual studies are devoted to the sports ground of the Jewish community in Grunewald and the eventful history of today's sports school of the Berlin Football Association at Kleiner Wannsee.
The book is not intended solely as an academic treatise, but also as a stimulus and resource for historical and political education in the Berlin Football Association and beyond. The BFV commissioned the study in 2022 as part of its activities to mark its 125th anniversary. The Sport:Kultur e.V. association was entrusted with the implementation, while Daniel Küchenmeister and Dr. Thomas Schneider were responsible for the content and conceptual project management.
The work on the BFV study on the "History of Berlin Football in the Nazi Era" was made possible by a grant from the Stiftung Deutsche Klassenlotterie Berlin (DKLB). The publication was supported by the Cultural Foundation of the German Football Association and the Center for Research on Anti-Semitism at the Technical University.
