Current dissertations

Institute of History, Ethics and Philosophy of Medicine

Doctoral candidate

Henriette Meyer

Working title of the dissertation

The intraprofessional discussion about the position of military physicians in the new German (Federal Republic of Germany) military

Abstract

The focus of the research project presented here is the discussion about the position of military physicians in the new German (Federal Republic of Germany) military, which has so far only been examined in research using the Ärztliche Mitteilungen as an example. The discussion will now be examined in greater depth in this and other selected medical journals of the post-war period. The aim is to analyze the attitude of the medical profession towards rearmament on the basis of the medical press and at the same time to shed light on the prevailing culture of debate and to close existing research gaps in the history of medicine in the post-war period. An examination of this topic cannot avoid making visible "the complex, often contradictory relationship between the destructiveness of war and the humanitarian aspirations of medicine".

Five different medical journals were selected as the source material for the dissertation project. This is a homogeneous corpus of sources, as it is assumed that the medium of the weekly offers a comprehensive overall insight into the discussion. The year 1955 is set as the beginning of the period under investigation, as preliminary examinations of the Ärztliche Mitteilungen of the years 1952-1955 revealed that the discussion about the position of military physicians arose at this time. The year 1957 is initially planned as the end point of the investigation. Further research in the Ärztliche Mitteilungen revealed that subsequent volumes did not focus on the discussion, but published general descriptions of the structure of the medical service of the new Bundeswehr. However, the exact end point of the period under investigation can only be clarified in the further course of the research.

In addition to the Ärztliche Mitteilungen (before 1945 and after 1962 until today known as the Deutsches Ärzteblatt), the basis for research is the Wehrmedizinische Mitteilungen. However, these were not published until 1957, which is why the question of whether the discussion had already ended or whether this weekly journal was still involved in the discussion must be investigated here. The source corpus also includes the Münchner Medizinische Wochenschrift, which is published by the right-wing conservative Julius Friedrich Lehmanns Verlag. In contrast, the Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift, also the subject of the research, can be assigned to a liberal publishing house. The last source is Das deutsche Gesundheitswesen, the organ of the Society for Clinical Medicine of the GDR, which was published from 1946 onwards. Although the presented corpus of sources is homogeneous in nature, the selected weeklies are extremely heterogeneous in their (political) orientation, which allows for a comparative analysis and promises a comprehensive picture of the discussion about the position of military physicians.