Verräter, Zufallshelden oder Gewissen der Nation?

Since there have been two dictatorships in Germany, resistance to public authority is a subject which is linked to diverse experiences and emotions. It is offered regularly by minorities who invoke fundamental values and human rights. The majority of the population usually keeps its distance or rejects it openly. As proof of this, Germany has provided a great deal of illustrative material between 1938 and 2008. Bernd Rüthers studies this, using a selection of various people from military, private and church resistance as examples. He focuses on the Nazi period and the behavior of almost unknown »little people,« who kept silent afterwards and about whom no information was revealed. He also analyzes the behavior of German intellectuals and Hitler's military elite as well as the new understanding of »resistance« and those who took an active part in the demonstrations and student revolts of 1968.