When I leave my office, I enter a hostile foreign country 2.0

We welcome you

Christiane Kroll, Vice President of the Bochum Regional Court
Dr Benjamin Limbach, Minister of Justice of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia
Christoph Köster, Head of the Documentation and Research Centre Justice and National Socialism at the Justice Academy NRW
Dr Irmtrud Wojak, Managing Director of the BUXUS STIFTUNG and the Fritz Bauer Forum

Fritz Bauer, a German lawyer, social democrat and Holocaust survivor, was the voice of the survivors‘ resistance in the Federal Republic of Germany after 1949.

„When I leave my office, I enter enemy territory“ – with these words, Fritz Bauer characterised his situation in the 1960s when it came to the fight against impunity for Nazi crimes and for the reconstruction of a humane legal system. His legal and political commitment to a new, humane legal system and the legal reappraisal of National Socialist crimes is considered the greatest success of the Federal Republic of Germany after the death of Chancellor Adenauer.

The website documents Fritz Bauer’s almost forgotten fight for a more open approach to history by focussing on individual topics. „We can’t make heaven out of earth, but everyone can do something to prevent it from becoming hell,“ is how he himself summarised his constant and necessary commitment to democracy and human rights in one sentence. In addition to the documentation about Bauer’s life’s work, which will be continued, the project links to the current voices of resistance from victims and survivors worldwide.

The project „When I leave my office, I enter a hostile foreign country 2.0“ was developed as part of the „dive in. Programme for Digital Interactions“ of the German Federal Cultural Foundation, funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (BKM) in the NEUSTART KULTUR programme.

The Fritz Bauer Forum team also received support for the production of the interactive website from the non-profit organisation BUXUS STIFTUNG and Demokratie leben e.V..

We will present this exciting and innovative exhibition project at the Bochum Justice Centre on 11 January 2023. The exhibition will be introduced via the screens in the large conference room of the Justice Centre.