Is ‘Mein Kampf’ a learning tool or a danger?

Given the current climate of rising anti-Semitism in Europe and elsewhere, is it too offensive and dangerous to reissue Adolph Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” autobiographical manifesto? Critics of the book’s first planned republication in German say yes. But others believe that with the proper annotation and commentary, the book can be an important learning tool.

Next year, a new edition will go on sale in bookstores in Germany for the first time in 75 years. The state of Bavaria has owned the German copyright to the book and has legally blocked attempts to print it. The copyright expires this December, and the Munich-based Institute for Contemporary History (IfZ) plans on reissuing an annotated version filled with criticism and analysis that will stretch its original size from 700 pages to nearly 2,000. 

The copyright of the English translation was sold in the 1930s and the book has been in print ever since. The English version has been constantly available all over the world.”

IfZ is regarded as the world’s leading institute for the research of National Socialism — also known as Nazism. Founded after World War II, the institute has the goals of examining how National Socialism took root in Germany and understanding the reasons behind the pre-Hitler failure of German democracy.

As far as “Mein Kampf” goes, its text is widely available even without IfZ’s new edition, although when “Mein Kampf” (translated in English as “My Struggle”) was first published in 1925, it sold poorly. 

“The book was printed in its German version in more than 12 million copies,” said Magnus Brechtken, deputy director of IfZ. “Many hundred thousands of these copies survived the Third Reich and are available in academic libraries and antiquarian bookshops. The German text is also available through the Internet.