This contribution is an abridged version of an essay in the second issue of Historia Prima, published in May 2025 under the title “‘What we are experiencing here is 1933 on a global level, that is, total seizure of power.’ The Functionalization of History as Political Argument Using the Example of Corona Protests from 2020 to 2022.” The academic magazine, published annually under the direction of the Institute of History at the University of Hildesheim, aims to make outstanding student work accessible to the interested public following a peer-review process and close editorial revision. Historia Prima is published via open access and is available free of charge at this link. Submissions for the third issue of the magazine will be accepted between August and October 2025. Even after the expiration of the last Corona protective measures and the associated official end of the pandemic at the beginning of 2023, public discussions about the proper handling of the virus continue to this day.¹ Political reappraisal has, in the meantime, made little progress despite repeatedly expressed declarations of interest: some federal states are still at the beginning of their endeavors, while others have at least announced first, preliminary results. In Thuringia, for example, there is currently discussion about which experts should testify in the hearings before the investigative committee scheduled for August.² Berlin and Saxony-Anhalt, meanwhile, presented commission reports that criticize, among other things, the treatment of the dying, poor forms of communication, or inadequate preparation by the respective state governments.³
Corona Reappraisal as Service to Democracy
At the federal level, the reappraisal of the pandemic is in even worse condition, even though the parties of the Merz government stipulate in their coalition agreement that they want to “comprehensively reappraise the Corona pandemic within the framework of an inquiry commission,” “particularly to derive lessons for future pandemic events.”⁴ Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier recently emphasized how important it is to initiate a reappraisal of the pandemic and the social-political handling of it not only at the state level, but also at the federal level. According to him, the Corona pandemic was “an enormous burden for a democracy. To discuss, to engage, to criticize, to protest, all of that was not or hardly possible during this time. And therefore our democracy lacked something quite essential: the permanent conversation of society with itself. A conversation that it so urgently needs, on which democracy depends.”⁵ In his speech, Steinmeier emphasized that it is “indispensable that transparency is established so that we can win back as many people as possible who doubted democracy during the pandemic, and that reappraisal is also an opportunity to regain trust.”⁶ With regard to the strengthening of the political fringes in the most recent state and federal elections, the Federal President warned urgently: “If we do not reappraise, too much remains that has been repressed. And what we do not openly address nourishes new conspiracy theories and new mistrust. Both are poison for democracy. Both play into the hands of populists, and we must not allow that.”⁷
Unlike the Merz government, Steinmeier sees in Corona reappraisal not merely the potential for improved preparation for similarly situated crisis situations in the future, but also a service to democracy itself. How important this second dimension of reappraisal is can be clearly explained by the activities of declared opponents of the protective measures taken during the pandemic. The so-called ‘Corona deniers’ gathered for the first time for larger protest actions in Berlin in the face of the first lockdown in March 2020. Similar protest groups quickly emerged in other German cities, which over time were able to rally more and more people behind them. Among them, the group ‘Querdenken’ stood out in particular, which rapidly formed into a collection movement in which supporters of different interests came together.⁸ This politically highly heterogeneous group is united primarily by “the perceived unjustified restriction of fundamental rights, as well as alienation from representative democracy, deep mistrust of political institutions, and openness to conspiracy theories.”⁹ The Constance political scientist Sebastian Kroos recognizes in the group’s activities a new form of populism that unites left- and right-wing extremist positions to achieve a rejection of established orientation patterns.¹⁰
Through changed organizational forms – larger demonstration marches like the one on August 29, 2020, with about 40,000 supporters were no longer possible due to the protective regulations in force during the first Corona year, so the movement switched to decentralized spontaneous rallies, so-called ‘walks’ – (new) right-wing populist actors became increasingly decisive in shaping the protests. Consequently, the demonstrations increasingly exhibited democracy-contemptuous and state-subversive tendencies in both content and rhetoric.¹¹ The COMPACT magazine, as “mouthpiece and high-reach platform of the so-called New Right,”¹² played a central role in spreading these ideologies. The online magazine, classified by the domestic intelligence service as definitively right-wing extremist and temporarily banned, sympathized with the Corona deniers from the beginning of the pandemic and even dedicated its own issue to them in September 2020, in which they are romanticized as a freedom movement.¹³
Analysis of several issues of the magazine from 2020 to 2022 shows that Corona deniers repeatedly used historical analogies to argumentatively secure their criticism. Through the targeted use of such references to the past, they question seemingly socially secure patterns of interpretation and orientation and openly attack individual scientists as well as political institutions. Historical memory, as historical research has repeatedly pointed out, plays a decisive role in the functionalization of history as political argument. The historian of historical theory Jörn Rüsen speaks in this context of a “political legitimation function.”¹⁴ The contribution expands the circle of actors examined in previous research to include journalists and activists of the Corona protests. In doing so, it follows a methodologically secure approach derived from current contributions to research on the politics of history and demonstrates the use of three central narratives.
I. Delegitimization of State Institutions
With regard to increased use of the term ‘Corona dictatorship’ and the associated attempts to discredit protective measures taken, the language-critical jury chose the term as the non-word of the year 2020. Indeed, a rapid spread of the term among Corona deniers can be observed since its first mention in the April issue of the COMPACT magazine of the same year.¹⁵ The term also appears in contributions by various speakers at Corona protests. Markus Haintz, former lecturer at Biberach University and Querdenken activist, recalled in his speech of August 1, 2020, how “[o]n June 17, 1953, […] the population of the GDR rose up against state arbitrariness, against tyranny and oppression,” only to subsequently declare that “[e]ven though no tanks are rolling today, […] we in Germany and in many other countries of the world have nevertheless reached a point where the state, without any sustainable justification, arbitrarily and disproportionately and with the aid of massive media fear and panic propaganda by the state-loyal mass media, enforces an agenda that massively endangers democracy and the rule of law, has factually suspended freedom rights and tramples on human rights and human dignity.”¹⁶
By equating the pandemic situation prevailing at that time, characterized by uncertainties, with the months before the uprisings of June 17, 1953, Haintz creates a historical orientation service in the sense of Jörn Rüsen,¹⁷ which serves as a response to the contingency experience provoked by the Corona protective measures taken. Haintz stylizes the federal government as a form of rule similar in its oppressive manner to the GDR leadership, whereas the demonstrators present are propagated by him as rebellious popular heroes. Haintz’s argumentation can be understood as a critical-exemplary narrative in which “general laws of human life order” are generated via the historical facts of the 1953 uprisings, which are “applied to concrete cases of current contemporary events”¹⁸ and contradict the established interpretation of those events.
At the time of the speech, assemblies and demonstrations were not fundamentally prohibited, but rather could continue to take place under certain conditions, so Haintz’s orientation service is not empirically sound. Accordingly, we must speak here of a counterfactual critical-exemplary meaning-formation that serves to establish alternative interpretation patterns and lend them legitimation. Similar argumentation patterns can also be found in the later course of the protests. In particular, the third amendment to the Infection Protection Act in November 2020 can be understood as a catalyst for further linguistic boundary transgression. In addition to analogies to GDR history, references to NS rule can also be observed.¹⁹ Thus, the Infection Protection Act is often equated linguistically and pictorially with the so-called ‘Law for Remedying the Distress of People and Reich’ of March 24, 1933.
This narrative can also be evaluated according to Rüsen as critical-exemplary meaning-formation, since the individual event, here the National Socialist establishment of power in 1933 through the introduction of the Decree for the Protection of People and State, is assigned an exemplary general validity.²⁰ It is suggested that the newly formulated Infection Protection Act and the associated legal basis for determining an epidemic situation of national scope would break up the democratic separation of powers and pave the way into a dictatorship. Like Haintz’s argumentation, however, this analogy lacks empirical plausibility, since the reformulation of the Infection Protection Act by no means meant a disempowerment of the Bundestag, which retained the sole right to determine and lift the epidemic situation as such.²¹ Thus, one cannot speak of a concentration of power on the then federal government, so that the deconstruction again results in a counterfactual critical-exemplary meaning-formation.
These examples reveal a strategic use of historical memory by activists and participants in Corona protests: Through blanket analogies to the NS or GDR regime, the current federal and state governments are propagated as ideologically succeeding dictatorships. Corona deniers thus use their counterfactual critical-exemplary argumentations to delegitimize state institutions.
II. Victimization as Community-Building Element
Building on the narrative of an alleged dictatorship, Corona deniers create, using history as political argument, in a second step the image of an oppressed population, whose representatives they declare themselves to be.²² For this, they take up the historically charged slogan ‘We are the people,’ which was coined by demonstrators of the Monday demonstrations in 1989 and has since been interpreted in Germany as an epitome of civil resistance activities against authoritarian systems. By using this slogan, the associated historical facts are remembered, creating an orientation offer that directly builds on the dictatorship narrative, but now focuses more on the demonstrators themselves, who fancy themselves as victims of an oppressive regime. The meaning-formation occurs in the mode of critical-traditional narration by presenting the federal government as the spiritual-ideological successor institution of the GDR leadership.
Here too, however, we must speak of a counterfactual critical-traditional narrative, since the number of those participating in the Corona protests, while steadily increasing, never reached the extent that one could speak of a majority representing the people.²³ The victimization achieved with such meaning-formations represents the second central narrative of Corona deniers and is a popular argumentation strategy at demonstrations. The speech contribution of a young woman in mid-November 2020 at a Querdenken demonstration in Hanover caused great media attention. Because she, according to her narrative, had been actively resisting for months by giving speeches, demonstrating, distributing flyers, and organizing rallies, she felt like Sophie Scholl.²⁴ Through the comparison with Sophie Scholl, the woman staged herself as a victim of an allegedly dictatorial regime.
The meaning-formation also proceeds here in the mode of critical-exemplary narration, but must be evaluated as an inappropriate argument due to its generalizing tendency. With her non-sound statement, the speaker undermined the resistance efforts made by Sophie Scholl and ultimately relativized the danger of the National Socialist dictatorship. Thus, the victim narrative reveals another form of functionalization of history by Corona deniers, which serves victimization and, through the juxtaposition with the dictatorship narrative, prepares the ground for motivation-generating narratives. With their argumentation, they pursue the goal of opposing the allegedly degenerate – or in the sense of Corona deniers, dictatorial – elite with a morally superior entity.²⁵ Yildirim speaks in this context of populists who stage themselves as “mouthpiece of an imagined culturally and ethnically homogeneous people.”²⁶
III. Mobilization of ‘Resistance’
While the historical narratives anchored in the dictatorship and victim narratives provide orientation offers through the populist juxtaposition of ‘They’ – in the sense of a state delegitimized as dictatorship – and a ‘We’ – staged as a victim oppressed by Corona protective measures – the resistance narrative serves primarily to mobilize supporters within the group of Corona deniers against what is perceived as unjustified action by federal and state governments. This can be observed, for example, in an interview with Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben, who compared the introduction of the first lockdown in March 2020 with the establishment of power by National Socialists in 1933, before stating that “new forms of resistance are necessary for those who do not give up thinking toward a future politics that has neither the form of bourgeois democracies nor the form of bio-hygienic arbitrary rule that currently takes their place.”²⁷
While Agamben remained comparatively vague in his appeal, former WDR journalist and conspiracy theorist Gerhard Wisnewski spoke of “1933 on a global level”²⁸ and prophesied: “In view of this, there is only one choice: uprising or gulag.”²⁹ This clearly shows how strongly the three narratives used by Corona deniers are interconnected, as Agamben and Wisnewski only generate a motivational action recommendation by activating the dictatorship narrative and the associated orientation service. Since emotions play a decisive role in converting historical orientation into practical actions, such a constructed threat scenario is indispensable for the functioning of the resistance narrative.³⁰
That the generated motivation among Corona deniers develops effectiveness despite or precisely because of its counterfactual basis was shown not only by the steadily rising participant numbers at demonstrations in 2020 or the increase in anti-Semitic incidents outside the events,³¹ but can also be established through increased aggressive behavior toward journalists and protesting in front of politicians’ houses and apartments.³² However, the movement achieved the peak of its ‘resistance’ in August 2020 when several hundred people equipped with Reich flags occupied the steps of the Reichstag following the American model.³³ This incident illustrates the democracy-endangering potential of the Corona protests, as they contributed significantly to “blurring boundaries between legitimate democratic political protest and far-right populist positions.”³⁴
The functionalization of the resistance narrative can be repeatedly recognized in the speech contributions of individual participants at previously held rallies, in which various historical personalities are heroized as resistance fighters and declared role models of the movement. In addition to the previously cited comparison of the speaker with Sophie Scholl, this can be seen, for example, in Samuel Eckert’s speech, which is oriented toward Martin Luther as a leading figure: “He went to the Reichstag at Worms back then and stood before the whole nation and said: Here I stand. I can do no other. […] 500 years later we are in the same situation, where we must ask ourselves how far we want to go for the truth.”³⁵
What is particularly striking about Eckert’s critical-exemplary meaning-formation is his appropriation of an alleged truth, because “[i]n this way right-wing populists stage themselves as owners of absolute truths and as the only ones willing to share them with the people.”³⁶ The comparison lacks any empirical plausibility, as the demonstrators, unlike Luther, have not been declared outlawed and thus without rights, making the appropriation of absolute truth seem all the more ironic. Through the invocation of a sole, absolute truth, Eckert’s argumentation reaches a new quality level compared to the previously analyzed argumentation patterns: Unlike before, one can no longer assume merely counterfactuality; rather, alleged knowledge is elevated to universally valid truth and any significance is denied to possible counterarguments.
Overall, Corona deniers succeed in justifying a resistance narrative in their interpretive handling of history with reference to the dictatorship and victim narratives, in which they are heroized as champions of democratic fundamental values. As in the narratives before, the historical thinking performances rendered for functionalization are not plausible. Nevertheless, this counterfactual “counter-history […] is seen in emotionalized perception as critical historical interpretation”³⁷ and thus as truth.
Politics of History for Destabilizing Democratic Systems
The described narratives, considered individually, pursue different motives – namely those of delegitimizing state institutions, victimizing one’s own supporters, and mobilizing the same – but unfold their full effective power only in interaction. In the dictatorship narrative, comparisons between the Federal Republic and the NS dictatorship or GDR leadership are repeatedly constructed to delegitimize the former as an unlawful state. Simultaneously, this regime perceived as illegitimate is juxtaposed through the victim narrative with a völkisch-nationalist construct of ‘We’ that unites racist and anti-Semitic attributions of belonging and non-belonging. With the help of the resistance narrative, action motivation is finally to be evoked among supporters that is directed against the ‘They’ perceived as oppressive.
By staging themselves as victims of an alleged morally degenerate Corona dictatorship, they thus court support for their subversive intentions. Through this sweeping-polarizing logic of thought that propagates a “they-against-us” or “evil-against-good” worldview, one’s own group identity is legitimized, so that a self-reinforcing demarcation to the outside occurs. The social movement of Corona deniers thus becomes increasingly a socio-spatial echo chamber.³⁸
The actors use numerous orientation offers, with motivational guidance particularly sought in the resistance narrative. Historical meaning-formation proceeds exclusively in the form of critical-traditional or critical-exemplary narratives. However, these meaning-formations build on untruths and imprecise analogies as well as conspiracy theories, which is why they run counter to empirical, theoretical, and normative plausibility and must thus be described as counterfactual in deconstruction. Through populist argumentation strategies, they are elevated to sole truth and opposed to established interpretation patterns. Social consensus in memory culture is thus openly attacked.
Even in expanding the circle of actors, (right-wing) populist argumentation patterns thus remain recognizable. Corona deniers represent both a phenomenon closely intertwined with the pandemic events and an exemplum attributable to the circle of (right-wing) populism that deserves corresponding scientific attention. It remains open to what extent the argumentation patterns used can also be found in other discourses after the declared end of the pandemic. The deconstruction of such narratives will therefore continue to be a central task of historical-theoretical research in the future.
¹Cf. Bader, Nadine: Corona measures expire. This is how the pandemic ends, in: tagesschau, 07.04.2023, URL: https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/innenpolitik/corona-massnahmen-ende-101.html (accessed: 27.07.2025).
²Cf. Vogel, Elena: Streeck, Drosten and Co. These virologists are to testify at the Thuringian Corona committee, in: Thüringer Allgemeine, 28.05.2025, URL: https://www.thueringer-allgemeine.de/politik/article409128542/streeck-drosten-und-co-diese-virologen-sollen-beim-thueringer-corona-ausschuss-aussagen.html (accessed: 27.07.2025).
³Cf. Salpius, Daniel: Pandemic Commission. Rights of the dying disregarded, in: mdr, 21.05.2025, URL: https://www.mdr.de/nachrichten/sachsen-anhalt/corona-pandemie-kommission-bericht-104.html (accessed: 27.07.2025); Schwager, Christian: Corona reappraisal for Berlin. Black book reveals discrepancy to facts, in: Berliner Morgenpost, 30.05.2025, URL: https://www.berliner-zeitung.de/mensch-metropole/corona-aufarbeitung-fuer-berlin-was-waren-die-fakten-und-was-wurde-erzaehlt-li.2328869 (accessed: 27.07.2025).
⁴Christian Democratic Union of Germany/Christian Social Union in Bavaria e.V./Social Democratic Party of Germany: Responsibility for Germany. Coalition Agreement between CDU, CSU and SPD, in: koalitionsvertrag2025, 2025, p. 112, URL: https://www.koalitionsvertrag2025.de/ (accessed: 27.07.2025).
⁵Steinmeier, Frank-Walter: “We must reappraise the time of the pandemic,” in: Der Bundespräsident, 14.03.2025, URL: https://www.bundespraesident.de/SharedDocs/Reden/DE/Frank-Walter-Steinmeier/Reden/2025/03/250314-Corona-Aufarbeitung.html (accessed: 27.07.2025).
⁶Ibid.
⁷Ibid.
⁸Cf. Federal Association of Research and Information Centers on Anti-Semitism (RIAS): Anti-Semitism in the Context of the Covid-19 Pandemic, Berlin: 2020, p. 10, 24; Holzer, Boris et al.: Introduction. Protest in the Pandemic, in: Sven Reichhardt (ed.): The Community of Distrust of the ‘Querdenker’. The Corona Protests from Cultural and Social Science Perspective, Frankfurt am Main/New York: Routledge 2021, pp. 7–26, here p. 8. The formation of system-critical movements during the pandemic is a phenomenon that was not limited to Germany but could be observed worldwide. A first analysis of these internationally occurring processes is provided by Ringe, Nils/Rennó, Lucio (eds.): Populists and the Pandemic. How Populists around the World Responded to COVID-19 (Routledge Studies in Extremism and Democracy), London/New York: Routledge 2023.
⁹Kroos, Sebastian: Contours of a heterogeneous ‘community of distrust’. The social composition of Corona protests and the motives of their participants, in: Sven Reichardt (ed.): The Community of Distrust of the ‘Querdenker’. The Corona Protests from Cultural and Social Science Perspective, Frankfurt am Main/New York: Routledge 2021, pp. 67–89, here p. 84.
¹⁰Cf. ibid., p. 85; Zajak, Sabrina: COVID-19 and the Reconfiguration of the Social Movement Landscape, in: Breno Bringel/Geoffrey Pleyers (eds.): Social Movements and Politics during COVID-19. Crisis, Solidarity and Change in a Global Pandemic, Bristol: Bristol University Press 2022, pp. 134–140, here p. 138. Zajak sees a parallel to the US-American QAnon movement and emphasizes: “[t]he broadness of the alliance structures is particularly dangerous as it facilitates the diffusion of racist and right-wing beliefs.”
¹¹Cf. Holzer et al., Introduction 2021, p. 13; Federal Association of Research and Information Centers on Anti-Semitism (RIAS): Anti-Semitic Incidents and Manifestations in the Context of Current Protests against Corona Measures in Germany, Berlin: 2022, p. 2.
¹²Götschenberg, Michael: Constitutional Protection on ‘Compact’. “Definitely extremist,” in: tagesschau, 10.12.2021, URL: https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/innenpolitik/compact-magazin-101.html, (accessed: 27.07.2025).
¹³Cf. Schilk, Felix: The Anger Entrepreneur. The COMPACT Magazine as Hinge Component in the Right Mosaic, in: kultuRRevolution. Journal for Applied Discourse Theory, 77. 2019, H. 2, pp. 32–44, here p. 40.
¹⁴Rüsen, Jörn: Historical Culture, Education and Identity. On Foundations of History Didactics (History Didactics Discursive, Vol. 8), Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang 2020, p. 20. Under the concept of politics of history, historical science has been researching since the 1970s the functionalization of history as political argument, which can be understood as “a political argumentation structure within which a historical fact, a historical context or a historical interpretation is used to win approval for a concrete political project and to solicit legitimacy for the same” (Becker, Manuel: History as Argument. A Stepchild of Recent Historical-Political Research, in: Claudia Fröhlich/Harald Schmid/Birgit Schwelling (eds.): 25 Years European Turn (Yearbook for Politics and History, Vol. 5), Stuttgart: Steiner 2014, pp. 173–187, here p. 174).
¹⁵Janich, Nina: Press Release. Election of the 30th “Non-word of the Year” and a new jury, in: Unwort des Jahres, 12.01.2021, URL: https://unwortdesjahres.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/pressemitteilung_unwort2020.pdf (accessed: 27.07.2025), pp. 1–2; Elsässer, Jürgen: The Corona Dictatorship, in: COMPACT. Magazine for Sovereignty, 4. 2020, p. 3.
¹⁶Haintz, Markus: “I didn’t understand the word fascism before.” Speech by Markus Haintz on August 1 (Straße des 17. Juni), in: COMPACT Edition. Magazine for Sovereignty, 8. 2020, pp. 35–39, here p. 35.
¹⁷Cf. Rüsen, Jörn: Historics. Theory of Historical Science, Cologne: Böhlau 2013, p. 210.
¹⁸Ibid., p. 211.
¹⁹Cf. Kolhoff, Werner: Comparison “Decree for the Protection of People and State” – “Population Protection Act,” in: tageblatt, 24.11.2020, URL: https://www.tageblatt.lu/premium/jana-aus-kassel-hat-sich-nicht-vertan-warnung-vor-abdriften-der-corona-proteste/ (accessed: 27.07.2025).
²⁰Cf. Rüsen, Historics 2013, pp. 210–211.
²¹Originally enacted as the Epidemic Law Reorganization Act in 2000, the law has been adjusted over the years repeatedly. With the renewed amendment in November 2020, the original text is tightened to the extent that the federal government must henceforth regularly give account to the Bundestag about epidemiological developments. At the same time, the law clearly states that the Bundestag (and not the federal government) decides on the basis of defined criteria about determining an epidemiological emergency. Cf. Federal Ministry of Justice: Law for the Reorganization of Epidemic Legal Provisions (Epidemic Law Reorganization Act – SeuchRNeuG), in: Federal Law Gazette, 33. 2000, pp. 1045–1077; Cf. Federal Ministry of Justice: Third Law for the Protection of the Population in an Epidemic Situation of National Scope of November 18, 2020, in: Federal Law Gazette, 52. 2020, pp. 2397–2413, here pp. 2397–2398.
²²Similar argumentation patterns have already been identified by Müller, Jan-Werner: What Is Populism?, Philadelphia: University of Philadelphia Press 2016, pp. 19–20 and Yildirim, Lale: (Un-)Honest History? Alternative-factual critical-traditional narration as instrument of right-wing populist re-interpretation, in: Journal for History Didactics, 17. 2018, H. 1, pp. 57–71, here p. 60 as central components of right-wing populism.
²³Cf. Fense, Marco/Quadbeck, Eva: Corona protests. Number of demonstrators increases – also much counter-protest, in: rnd, 27.01.2022, URL: https://www.rnd.de/politik/corona-und-proteste-zahl-der-demonstrierenden-steigt-viel-gegenprotest-VIH4SW4VTZTUDA2KCIFENDQX24.html (accessed: 27.07.2025).
²⁴Cf. WELT News Channel: “Such nonsense.” “QUERDENKEN” speaker compares herself to Sophie Scholl, in: YouTube, 2020, URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Y7pNU03i-o (accessed: 27.07.2025).
²⁵Müller, Populism 2016, pp. 19–20.
²⁶Yildirim, History 2018, p. 60.
²⁷Lenz, Anselm/Sodenkamp, Hendrik: “Most totalitarian apparatus in history.” Giorgio Agamben in interview with Anselm Lenz and Hendrik Sodenkamp, in: COMPACT Current. Magazine for Sovereignty, 4. 2020, pp. 22–23, here p. 23.
²⁸Meissner, Karl: “This is a global 1933.” Gerhard Wisnewski in conversation with Karl Meissner, in: COMPACT. Magazine for Sovereignty, 1. 2022, pp. 14–16, here p. 14.
²⁹Ibid., p. 16.
³⁰Cf. Rüsen, Historics 2013, pp. 42–43. The symbiosis of the three narratives can also be clearly seen in Ralph Niemeyer’s speech. Thus he stated with regard to 1989: “We stand thirty years later […] again at the same point and have in truth not progressed a step. […] We must now complete what got stuck in 1989” (Niemeyer, Ralph T.: “Finally negotiate the peace treaty.” Speech by Ralph T. Niemeyer on August 29 (Victory Column), in: COMPACT Edition. Magazine for Sovereignty, 8. 2020, pp. 103–104, here p. 103). In the mode of critical-traditional meaning-formation, Niemeyer offers the listeners an orientation offer according to which the population would be oppressed by the Corona protective measures taken by federal and state governments, thus encouraging mobilization.
³¹Cf. Federal Association RIAS, Anti-Semitism 2020, p. 8.
³²Cf. Rafael, Simone: Violence and Corona deniers. With shooting ballpoint pen, knife and small child to the demonstration, in: belltower, 19.01.2022, URL: https://www.belltower.news/gewalt-und-coronaleugnerinnen-mit-schiesskugelschreiber-messer-und-kleinkind-auf-die-demonstration-127101/ (accessed: 27.07.2025); Kormeier, Claudia: Ban on demos in front of politicians’ houses legal?, in: tagesschau, 21.02.2022, URL: https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/proteste-privathauser-versammlungsrecht-101.html (accessed: 27.07.2025).
³³Cf. Philippsen, Kai T.: Incident at Berlin demo. Corona skeptics storm through barrier to Reichstag steps, in: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 29.08.2020, URL: https://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/inland/corona-skeptiker-stuermen-durch-absperrung-zum-reichstag-16928759.html (accessed: 27.07.2025).
³⁴Cf. Vieten, Ulrike M.: The “New Normal” and “Pandemic Populism”. The COVID-19 Crisis and Anti-Hygienic Mobilisation of the Far-Right, in: Social Sciences, 9. 2020, URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/9/9/165 (accessed: 27.07.2025).
³⁵Eckert, Samuel: “Here I stand. I can do no other.” Speech by Samuel Eckert on August 2 (Brandenburg Gate), in: COMPACT Edition. Magazine for Sovereignty, 8. 2020, pp. 48–49, here p. 48.
³⁶Yildirim, History 2018, p. 60.
³⁷Ibid., p. 59.
³⁸Cf. Rau, Jan P./Stier, Sebastian: The Echo Chamber Hypothesis. Fragmentation of the Public and Political Polarization through Digital Media?, in: Journal of Comparative Political Science, 13. 2019, H. 3, pp. 399–417.
This article is an English translation of the original German post: Rechtspopulistische Geschichtspolitik zur Destabilisierung demokratischer Systeme | Kurzfassung des Aufsatzes von Valentin Loos in Historia Prima, 2. 2025