ABSTRACT
The Nazis Germany paid particular attention to the strengthening and extension of the welfare state in wartime Germany was due in part to Adolf Hitler’s constant fear that the home front might collapse as it had done in 1918. To the disappointment of many Nazis, primary responsibility for social policy remained in the hands of the Ministry of Labour under the Stahlhelm leader, Franz Seldte, who remained in office for all twelve years of the Third Reich. In early 1941 Hitler ordered the creation of a number of new National Political Educational Institutions (NPEAs) on the frontiers of the Reich and in those areas that had been annexed since 1938. Robert Ley as housing commissar was responsible for building the NPEAs, a task which he undertook with great enthusiasm. Ley insisted that ‘public’ housing meant all housing, whereas his opponents, particularly in the Ministry of Labour, argued that he was only responsible for housing for the socially disadvantaged.
