John Michael Steiner

After the attempt on the life of deputy Reich Protector Reinhard Heydrich in 1942, Steiner was arrested and imprisoned in a series of concentration camps: in Theresienstadt, Auschwitz-Birkenau, Blechhammer, Reichenbach) and finally Dachau, where he was liberated by American troops in 1945.

Steiner therefore left Prague and emigrated to Australia, where he studied German philology and psychology at Melbourne University and worked as an interpreter for, and adviser to, immigrants.

In 1962 he went to Freiburg, Germany, to obtain material for his dissertation on the social structure and interpersonal relationships in National Socialist (Nazi) concentration camps.

A scholarship from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation enabled him to complete his first research project with the dissertation entitled Power Politics and Social Change in National Socialist Germany.

He conducted interviews with imprisoned camp guards and numerous high and lower ranked members of the SS and Waffen-SS regarding their biographies and function in the Nazi state, whereby he only revealed his identity as an Auschwitz survivor if directly asked.

"I was invited as guest of honour to an annual SS-Kameradschaftstreffen (military reunion) of 1,200 former members of the SS and their families in Nassau, Hessen, which lasted for three days.

Ironically, I was asked to give a short address which, under the circumstances, was a somewhat difficult task" (written to Erich Fromm on 10 November 1975, from the Steiner estate).

The interviews provide insights into the typical pattern of personal and familial backgrounds, into their life stories and motives for joining the SS or Waffen-SS, a Death's Head Unit (camp guard) or the Gestapo.

Steiner provided important results and insights for understanding the Nazi worldview and social psychological analysis of authoritarian personality, situational conditions and the manifestation of destructive violence.