ABSTRACT
An examination of the different varieties of liberal activities in the various agrarian regions of Germany, however, reveals the special nature of south Germany. The special character of popular liberalism in Greater Swabia is all the more remarkable in view of the environment in which it operated. This chapter discusses the idea with popular liberalism and National Socialism. In the early 1930s the Nazi movement in Germany contained many different propagandist and ideological elements. The year 1932 may perhaps have reminded elderly radical liberals and their families and children in south Germany of another, similar period: the 1860s and 1870s. The atmosphere of that period had been perceived at the time as posing a threat to their existence. The struggle against the Bolshevists and communists and the popular claims against the German élites was seen by quite a number of former radical liberals in 1932 as resembling the struggle against ultramontanism in the period of the Kulturkampf.
