Europapatent. An IG Farben Project for the Reorganization of Europe (1939-1945)

Abstract

The IG Farben concern played a pre-eminent role in Nazi German economic planning for the New Order in Europe. Its internal conception of what Europe was to look like after a German victory has been treated mainly from the perspective of the Nuremberg trials. A source-critical analysis of internal planning documents concerning the creation of a unified European patent law as an instrument of economic hegemony had been lacking.
This article analyzes the IG Farben Europapatent project (1939-1945) as an expression of the war aims of the chemical monopoly, examining the role of the Commercial Committee and the Patent Commission in planning a continental European Großwirtschaftsraum, the IG Farben's advisory activity at the OKW, and the global dimension of these plans (Tripartite Pact, hydrogenation process agreement with Japan).
The study draws on the company archive VEB Filmfabrik Wolfen (Fifa) and the Deutsches Zentralarchiv Potsdam (IG-Farben NW 7), particularly on the minutes of the 32nd to 62nd sessions of the Commercial Committee and the Patent Commission (1940-1943) and on the travel reports of Max Ilgner and Reithinger (1934-1938).
The analysis shows that the Europapatent project went far beyond technical-legal questions. It was a multi-stage plan for economic domination of Europe: first through advisory activity at the OKW in the occupied territories (Schnitzler, Terhaar), then through the creation of European patent law as the foundation for the continental European Großwirtschaftsraum. The Patent Commission pursued the incorporation of all European countries into a German-dominated patent cartel. In the global framework, the hydrogenation process agreement with the Japanese War Ministry reflected the demarcation of economic spheres of influence in the spirit of the Tripartite Pact. The plans failed owing to resistance from other countries and ultimately to the military defeat of German imperialism.