Publications

With the MEMO study series, the Institute for Interdisciplinary Research on Conflict and Violence (IKG) from the University Bielefeld, in cooperation with the Foundation EVZ, is researching the current state of critical historical awareness in Germany. The aim is to empirically document the culture of remembrance in the form of a representative opinion poll.
The participants of the Gedenkanstoß [Call to remember]-MEMO study (2025), which was published as part of the Gedenkanstoß [Call to remember] project of the Education Agenda NS-Injustice, were asked about their knowledge, attitudes and previous points of contact with regard to Nazi history.

This flyer summarizes the commitment of the EVZ Foundation in Ukraine: Ukraine has been fighting for its freedom for more than 1,000 days. Russia’s war of
aggression has inflicted immense suffering on the population and poses a fundamental threat to Europe as a whole. In this existential crisis, the EVZ Foundation continues to stand by Ukraine’s side: having approved 4.4 million euros in funding from 2024 to today (as of March 2025), it supports projects for Ukrainians across a range of different funding programs. The Foundation has also launched initiatives of its own to ensure that Ukraine’s civil society is not forgotten.

Social media, apps, games, virtual and augmented reality - digital media have also found its way into the culture of remembrance and historical education. However, these technological possibilities are not just new formats, they are also changing remembrance practices. The EVZ Foundation has been accompanying this process for several years and is committed to making history tangible in the digital space with innovative projects, tools and techniques.

Discover our experiences, learnings and approaches in our thematic dossier! 
 

How can we make sense of the present and stand up for peace, dialog and democracy across borders? In 2023, the Franco-German Youth Office (FGYO) and the EVZ Foundation launched the joint pilot project "War(s) in Europe. Shared experience, collective memory? – Germany, France, Bosnia and Herzegovina". During a trilateral exchange of educational professionals, methods were developed and then tried out by young people. The participants embarked on a journey through Europe's military history from Paris to Sarajevo.

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The Education Agenda NS-Injustice started in autumn 2021 with two certainties: Firstly, the survivors are passing away; there are few chances today to meet eyewitnesses who can tell us first-hand about the atrocities committed by the National Socialists. Secondly, we are increasingly entering contexts in which boundaries between fiction and fact are blurred. Under these conditions, we are dependent on new ways of learning and innovative forms of conveyance in our critical examination of National Socialist injustice and in historical-political educational work. In the magazine we present the funding program, projects and current debates.

Decades after the Shoah, the Central Welfare Organisation of Jews in Germany (ZWST) continues to provide psychosocial work for survivors and their descendants. The publication "Generations after the Shoah" provides initial insights into topics that came up during an encounter weekend in summer 2022 and in subsequent interviews with participants. Hear stories about loss, grief, anger and painful experiences of everyday anti-Semitism.

The graphic book, a Ukrainian-German project, is about the strength and escape stories of young people from Ukraine, Syria, Iran, Iraq, and Afghanistan. It shows what unbelievable things the main characters have been through and how they have managed to stay alive. One such example is a story ("Home Sweet Home") of a granddaughter and her grandma, how they became close and went back home with hope for a better future, even though their house had been destroyed. The stories and experiences that revolve around refugee and displacement issues, the first-hand knowledge of the challenges and needs have so much in common regardless of their ethnic backgrounds, and require world-wide support and solidarity.
Project of Gustav Stresemann Institute, Germany / Charitable Foundation Vostok SOS, Ukraine / Libereco Partnership for Human Rights e.V., Germany

Flight and displacement, racism and poverty have been existential threats for many Roma from Ukraine since the beginning of the war, which they are confronted with on a daily basis. The report examines their situation in Ukraine's neighboring countries and documents severe human rights violations that affect Roma.

With the war of aggression against Ukraine, the Russian Federation has finally and explicitly terminated the founding consensus of the EVZ Foundation, which is to work permanently for a peaceful Europe in the face of the violent history of the 20th century. As a promoter of Russia's democratically oriented civil society, the EVZ Foundation was faced with the question of what attitudes and views characterize the Russian population. With this in mind, we commissioned the internationally renowned, independent opinion research institute Levada in Moscow to conduct a study on the culture of remembrance in Russia.

The project seeks to uncover forgotten historical places, explore memories that have not yet been told about the National Socialist regime’s injustices and atrocities and its impact on today. It will focus on Antisemitism, racism, discrimination of and hatred towards the LGBTIQ community in Europe in order to advance an inclusive and diverse culture of remembrance.

Germans' memories of World War II are centered on events and places in Western Europe. This is a result of MEMO - the Multidimensional Remembrance Monitor. The fifth study on German culture of remembrance shows that 58.5% of the 1,000 representative respondents have never visited a place of remembrance of World War II and its victims located outside of Germany intentionally. Those who visited a memorial site outside Germa-ny most often refer to France, and there to the warfare and the war graves in Normandy.

How, what and in what ways do young people in Germany remember National Socialism? How do they perceive discrimination and remembrance culture today? The MEMO Youth Study 2023, conducted by Bielefeld University and funded by the EVZ Foundation, extends the previous five MEMO surveys (2018-2022) by the focus group young adults. National Socialism and World War II are central reference points in Germany's culture of remembrance for adolescents and young adults. All results of the study as well as accompanying material are available here.

For more than two decades, the Foundation EVZ has supported projects for survivors of National Socialist persecution in many countries. The dossier "Responsibility and Care: The Foundation EVZ's Commitment to Survivors of Nazi Injustice" outlines the challenges of this work and presents the results to date. The very elderly need psychological, physical and social assistance in order to age stably and with dignity. In addition, the pandemic and the war against Ukraine required acute emergency aid, which the EVZ Foundation provided quickly and unbureaucratically.

Since 2004, the EVZ Foundation has been promoting and developing international projects together with young people. The thematic dossier "EVZ meets GenZ: Preserving Memory and Shaping the Future Together with Young People" shows milestones such as funding programs, cooperations and operational projects for and with young people - the future bearers of remembrance culture. 

The study examines the experiences and qualifications of Sinti:ze and Rom:nja in the German education system. The results show that the educational situation of Roma and Sinti has improved significantly in the school sector, but only slightly in the field of training. The differences with the total population remain significant. The survey results also show the long-term effects of National Socialist persecution. 
An expanded version of the study has been available from Springer Verlag since September 2023 (softcover, eBook): https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-658-40896-1

The final report, published in April 2018, presents the findings and conclusions of an extensive research project conducted in 2016/2017 in five European countries - Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. It examined whether immigration from the Middle East and North Africa has an impact on anti-Semitic attitudes and behaviors in Western Europe. The report summarizes the findings of the five national reports, which provide a comprehensive overview per country of existing quantitative and qualitative evidence on this topic since 2011.

The EVZ Foundation invited partners to develop secondary ideas and concepts for an international workshop in 2017 on “Video-taped interviews”. The team from _erinnern.at_ undertook to hold a workshop on the subject, to explore and to develop quality criteria for such interviews and afterwards to prepare a publication in our “Education with Testimonies” online series. This is the result.

The brochure contains interdisciplinary teaching material on the subject of Sinti and Roma. In addition to background information on history and the Sinti and Roma and a "disambiguation", task sheets on the topics of history, art, culture and social policy are provided as copy templates. The task sheets are deliberately designed in such a way that they can be used both interdisciplinary and in different age groups and school forms.

This publication describes the practical implementation of the Foundation EVZ's payment program for Nazi forced laborers and examines the various stages and steps necessary to carry out such a comprehensive program. The authors were directly involved in the implementation of the program and thus offer an "insider's" perspective of the implementation. By illustrating why certain decisions were made at each stage of the program and what the consequences were in each case, the authors aim to offer knowledge and inspiration for those involved in establishing or implementing compensation programs in other countries.

This publication reflects the interdisciplinary debates currently taking place on the various digital techniques of preserving eyewitness interviews. The focus is how the changes in media technology are affecting the various fields of work, which include storage/ archiving, education as well as the reception of the interviews.

These essays document the exchange that took place between education experts from Israel, the Czech Republic, Poland and Germany as part of the series Entdecken und Verstehen. Bildungsarbeit mit Zeugnissen von Opfern des Nationalsozialismus (“Discovering and Understanding: Educational Work with Testimonials from Victims of National Socialism”) that was initiated and organized by the Foundation EVZ in 2010 and 2011.

This volume elucidates the debates surrounding the historical development of human rights after 1945. The authors examine a number of specific human rights, including the prohibition of discrimination, freedom of opinion, the right to asylum and the prohibition of slavery and forced labor, to consider how different historical experiences and legal traditions shaped their formulation. Through the examples of Latin America and the former Soviet Union, they explore the connections between human rights movements and human rights education. Finally, they address current challenges in human rights education to elucidate the role of historical experience in education.

In June 2007, the Foundation EVZ presented a final report on the disbursement programs. This report was presented to Federal President Horst Köhler and Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel at a ceremony on June 12, 2007. An essay by historian Lutz Niethammer reflects on the subject of forced labor under National Socialism. Reports by victims from various countries provide insights into the fates of survivors.

The English version is out of stock, the German version can be ordered in bookstores or by email.

What is the significance of remembering and knowing about the Holocaust in the fight against antiziganism today? With the help of numerous interviews with historical eyewitnesses, the study sheds light on the lack of knowledge about the mass murder committed by Germans.

For more than two decades, the EVZ Foundation has been working to support survivors of the persecution of Sinti and Roma, against current discrimination and to empower this minority. The dossier on the subject of Antigypsyism outlines both the principles as well as the specific challenges faced within this work and introduces projects and their partners.