"Urban planning under National Socialism" - book presentation and specialist lecture

To mark the 80th anniversary of the end of the war, the Department of Architecture Urban Planning Landscape Planning at the University of Kassel invites you to a book presentation with a lecture on urban planning under National Socialism on Tuesday, June 3, 2025 at 6:30 pm. The focus will be on Kassel as a central location for armaments production at the time, and interested visitors are cordially invited to attend.

In view of current debates about "drawing a line" under Germany's National Socialist past, the question once again arises as to how architects and planners contributed to the creation and redesign of spaces for large-scale standardization, suppression and destruction of spaces. Urban planning was a central instrument of the Nazi dictatorship - both in the "General Plan East" for the inhuman colonization of Eastern Europe and locally in Kassel.

Kassel played a central role in armaments production during the Second World War: aircraft engines and tanks were manufactured in places that seem unsuspicious today, such as the VW plant in Baunatal or the university. In Bettenhausen, Waldau and Lohfelden, the Fieseler-Werke developed aircraft and the V1. The memorial "The Ramp" on Moritzstraße still commemorates the fate of thousands of forced laborers.

Event and program

The event will begin with a welcome address by Prof. Dr. Uwe Altrock from the Department of Urban Renewal and Planning Theory. Afterwards, authors and editors will present the volume on urban planning under National Socialism published to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of the war. They will speak on the following topics:

• Prof. Dr. Harald Bodenschatz, introduction to the volume

• Dr. Piero Sassi, analysis of sports facilities in Nazi Germany and other dictatorships

• Prof. Dr. Uwe Altrock, lecture on planning for the "occupied East"

• Dr. Christiane Post, Insights into air armament as a field of action in urban planning

In a concluding lecture, Dr. Folckert Lüken-Isberner will focus on local urban planning processes during the Nazi era. The lecture is based on the author's extensive research published in 2016.

The event will conclude with an open discussion.
Admission is free, registration is not required.