Memorial Site Seminar with Evonik

In February 2023, sixteen works council members from Evonik locations all over Germany joined an educational trip to the Mittelbau-Dora memorial site near the town of Nordhausen. This was the last concentration camp opened by the Nazi regime. Some sixty thousand prisoners were transported to Mittelbau-Dora from August 1943 to March 1945. Here, they were forced to dig a system of tunnels in the nearby hills, where the underground production of V-2 rockets was then set up during the last phase of the war. At least twenty thousand prisoners died at the camp. Together with the sixteen participants, we explored the history of this unique camp and talked about the dimensions of forced labor under National Socialism. In the hotel’s seminar room and at the Mittelbau-Dora memorial site, we discussed with this highly engaged group what the history of Evonik’s predecessor companies means for today’s works councils, and how we can engage with our own society against the devaluation of human beings.