[Alfred Grotjahn's (1869-1931) way to "Faustic pact" in his project on social hygiene].
The purpose of this paper in historiographic research is to show the relation of social hygiene to demography. The study focuses on Alfred Grotjahn's merits in the establishment of an independent profile on social hygiene in Germany at the beginning of the 20th century. Grotjahn realised early that demography or, respectively, population statistics is a directing force for a new formation and reorganisation of social hygiene, recognising the meaning of demography for the realm of social hygiene. Grotjahn integrated practical eugenics as a part of reproduction hygiene through the generative aspect within his planning horizon. This resulted in Grotjahn's "Faustic pact" with eugenics. In the history of the reception of Grotjahn's concept of social hygiene it was his pact with eugenics that took him in the dock as an intellectual promoter of national socialist politics. But the problem that Grotjahn left is still being under discussion even 70 years after his death: Is a control and limitation of technocratic social hygiene orientated towards elementary human rights possible or is it at all desirable?
Ferdinand
U
U
Institut für Soziologie der TU Berlin, Berlin, Germany. ferd0759@mailbox.tu-berlin.de
D003710:Demography; D005053:Eugenics / Q000266:history*; D005858:Germany; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006920:Hygiene / Q000266:history*; D028683:National Socialism / Q000266:history*; D012936:Social Medicine / Q000266:history*