The Perils of Professionalism: Lawyers, Teachers, and Engineers in Nazi Germany

In academic circles, the notion of professionalism has a nicely progressive ring.* Unlike athletics, where it smacks of greed, it suggests competent, disinterested service of well-trained experts. What client would not rather consult a "professional" lawyer than a legal amateur, go to a university-educated teacher than to a selfproclaimed pedagogue, or employ a certified engineer rather than someone merely good at fixing machines? It should not be surprising that professionals themselves have been interested in promoting such a positive image, since it guarantees them wealth, social status and better yet, a good conscience. But it is somewhat unexpected that many historians or social scientists have accepted this ideology at face value and touted professionalization as unquestioned progress. The sociologist Talcott Parsons affirmed authoritatively: "The massive emergence of the professional complex, not the special status of capitalistic or socialistic modes of organization, is the crucial structural development of twentiethcentury society."' Since academics are themselves professionals, they tend to view professionalization not only as beneficial, but also as inevitable.