WHO LET IT HAPPEN? ORDINARY GERMANS AND THE COLLAPSE OF THE WEIMAR REPUBLIC

June 22, 2026

4:00 PM ET

Our webinars are designed to increase participants’ knowledge of Holocaust history, explore and access classroom-ready content, and support instructional practice to promote student learning and understanding of this complex history and its lasting effect on the world.

Democracies do not simply collapse overnight; they erode through a combination of political failures, economic crises, social fractures and deliberate manipulation. Join Jesse Tannetta, Director of Holocaust Content and Pedagogy to explore the Weimar Republic's fragile democracy and the cascade of decisions, policies and societal shifts that allowed Nazism to take hold in Germany.

Using primary sources including photographs of anti-Jewish signage and visual history testimony, participants will examine how legislation, antisemitic propaganda and terror worked together to isolate German Jews from society. Participants will also investigate the economic, political, social, and cultural factors that destabilized German democracy and consider how ordinary Germans, not just Nazi leaders, played a role in facilitating its collapse.

This webinar connects to Units 2 and 3 on the Echoes & Reflections website.

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