Mythe et action sociale en Allemagne

Abstract

Certain episodes in the history of the German workers' movement illustrate the part that mythical type of thought still plays in it. The same is true for the « Movement for Popular Broadcasting » through which the author of this article shows the internalization of the mythical aspect of technology by the progressist and revolutionary movements at the time of the Weimar republic. In the face of left-wing Messianic optimism which was caught up in controversy over Marxist orthodoxy, the National-Socialist movement was able to present itself as the most important political expounder of the social demands likely to restore the nation's spiritual unity jeopardized by Modernism and the parliamentary government system of industrial society. The stand that National-Soci alism had taken, was that of the opponents of « Zivilisation », who by their Naturistic and Theosophical view of society, had since the 19th century deeply influenced wide areas of German society.