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The Most Famous

SOCIAL ACTIVISTS from Germany

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This page contains a list of the greatest German Social Activists. The pantheon dataset contains 538 Social Activists, 30 of which were born in Germany. This makes Germany the birth place of the 5th most number of Social Activists behind United Kingdom and Russia.

Top 10

The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the top 10 most legendary German Social Activists of all time. This list of famous German Social Activists is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity. Visit the rankings page to view the entire list of German Social Activists.

Photo of Claus von Stauffenberg

1. Claus von Stauffenberg (1907 - 1944)

With an HPI of 75.89, Claus von Stauffenberg is the most famous German Social Activist.  His biography has been translated into 67 different languages on wikipedia.

Claus von Stauffenberg (German: [ˈklaʊ̯s ˈfɔn ˈʃtaʊ̯fn̩bɛʁk] ; 15 November 1907 – 21 July 1944) was a German army officer who is best known for his failed attempt on 20 July 1944 to assassinate Adolf Hitler at the Wolf's Lair. Alongside Major Generals Henning von Tresckow and Hans Oster, Stauffenberg was a central figure in the conspiracy against Hitler within the Wehrmacht. Shortly following the failed Operation Valkyrie plot, he was executed by firing squad. As a military officer from a noble background, Stauffenberg took part in the Invasion of Poland, the 1941–42 invasion of the Soviet Union in Operation Barbarossa and the Tunisian campaign during the Second World War.

Photo of Thomas Müntzer

2. Thomas Müntzer (1489 - 1525)

With an HPI of 70.52, Thomas Müntzer is the 2nd most famous German Social Activist.  His biography has been translated into 48 different languages.

Thomas Müntzer (c. 1489 – 27 May 1525) was a German preacher and theologian of the early Reformation whose opposition to both Martin Luther and the Roman Catholic Church led to his open defiance of late-feudal authority in central Germany. Müntzer was foremost amongst those reformers who took issue with Luther's compromises with feudal authority. He was a leader of the German peasant and plebeian uprising of 1525 commonly known as the German Peasants' War. In 1514, Müntzer became a priest in Braunschweig, where he began to question the teachings and practices of the Roman Catholic Church. He then became a follower and acquaintance of Martin Luther, who recommended him for a post in Zwickau. His beliefs became increasingly spiritual and apocalyptic; by his arrival at Allstedt in 1523 he had completely broken with Luther. Amidst the peasant uprisings in 1525, Müntzer organized an armed militia in Mühlhausen. He was captured after the Battle of Frankenhausen, tortured and finally executed. Few other figures of the German Reformation raised as much controversy as Müntzer, which continues to this day. A complex and unusual character, he is now regarded as a significant personality in the early years of the German Reformation and the history of European revolutionaries. Almost all modern studies stress the necessity of understanding his revolutionary actions as a consequence of his theology: Müntzer believed that the end of the world was imminent and that it was the task of the true believers to aid God in ushering in a new era of history. Within the history of the Reformation, his contribution, especially in liturgy and biblical exegesis, was of substance, but remains undervalued.

Photo of Martin Niemöller

3. Martin Niemöller (1892 - 1984)

With an HPI of 70.18, Martin Niemöller is the 3rd most famous German Social Activist.  His biography has been translated into 49 different languages.

Friedrich Gustav Emil Martin Niemöller (14 January 1892 – 6 March 1984) was a German theologian and Lutheran pastor. He is best known for his opposition to the Nazi regime during the late 1930s and for his widely quoted 1946 poem "First they came ...". The poem exists in many versions; the one featured on the United States Holocaust Memorial reads: "First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out – because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me – and there was no one left to speak for me." Niemöller was a national conservative and initially a supporter of Adolf Hitler and a self-identified antisemite. He became one of the founders of the Confessing Church, which opposed the Nazification of German Protestant churches. He opposed the Nazis' Aryan Paragraph. For his opposition to the Nazis' state control of the churches, Niemöller was imprisoned in Sachsenhausen and Dachau concentration camps from 1938 to 1945. He narrowly escaped execution. After his imprisonment, he expressed his deep regret about not having done enough to help victims of the Nazis. He turned away from his earlier nationalistic beliefs and was one of the initiators of the Stuttgart Declaration of Guilt. From the 1950s on, he was a vocal pacifist and anti-war activist, and vice-chair of War Resisters' International from 1966 to 1972. He met with Ho Chi Minh during the Vietnam War and was a committed campaigner for nuclear disarmament.

Photo of Sophie Scholl

4. Sophie Scholl (1921 - 1943)

With an HPI of 68.75, Sophie Scholl is the 4th most famous German Social Activist.  Her biography has been translated into 56 different languages.

Sophia Magdalena Scholl (9 May 1921 – 22 February 1943) was a German student and anti-Nazi political activist, active within the White Rose non-violent resistance group in Nazi Germany. She was convicted of high treason after having been found distributing anti-war leaflets at the University of Munich (LMU) with her brother, Hans. For her actions, she was executed by guillotine. Since the 1960s, Scholl has been extensively commemorated for her anti-Nazi resistance work.

Photo of Carl von Ossietzky

5. Carl von Ossietzky (1889 - 1938)

With an HPI of 67.79, Carl von Ossietzky is the 5th most famous German Social Activist.  His biography has been translated into 62 different languages.

Carl von Ossietzky (German pronunciation: [ˈkaʁl fɔn ʔɔˈsi̯ɛtskiː] ; 3 October 1889 – 4 May 1938) was a German journalist and pacifist. He was the recipient of the 1935 Nobel Peace Prize for his work in exposing the clandestine German rearmament. As editor-in-chief of the magazine Die Weltbühne, Ossietzky published a series of exposés in the late 1920s, detailing Germany's violation of the Treaty of Versailles by rebuilding an air force (the predecessor of the Luftwaffe) and training pilots in the Soviet Union. He was convicted of treason and espionage in 1931 and sentenced to eighteen months in prison but was granted amnesty in December 1932. Ossietzky continued to be a vocal critic against German militarism after the Nazis' rise to power. Following the 1933 Reichstag fire, Ossietzky was again arrested and sent to the Esterwegen concentration camp near Oldenburg. His brutal torture after his arrest was attested by International Red Cross. In 1936, he was awarded the 1935 Nobel Peace Prize but was forbidden from travelling to Norway and accepting the prize. After enduring years of mistreatment in various Nazi concentration camps, Ossietzky died of tuberculosis in 1938 in a Berlin hospital, completing more than 5 years in police custody.

Photo of Anneliese Michel

6. Anneliese Michel (1952 - 1976)

With an HPI of 65.68, Anneliese Michel is the 6th most famous German Social Activist.  Her biography has been translated into 35 different languages.

Anna Elisabeth "Anneliese" Michel (21 September 1952 – 1 July 1976) was a German woman who underwent 67 Catholic exorcism rites during the year before her death. She died of malnutrition, for which her parents and priest were convicted of negligent homicide. She was diagnosed with epileptic psychosis (temporal lobe epilepsy) and had a history of psychiatric treatment that proved ineffective. When Michel was 16, she experienced a seizure and was diagnosed with psychosis caused by temporal lobe epilepsy. Shortly thereafter, she was diagnosed with depression and was treated by a psychiatric hospital. By the time that she was 20, she had become intolerant of various religious objects and began to hear voices. Her condition worsened despite medication, and she became suicidal, also displaying other symptoms, for which she took medication as well. After taking psychiatric medications for five years failed to improve her symptoms, Michel and her family became convinced she was possessed by a demon. As a result, her family appealed to the Catholic Church for an exorcism. While rejected at first, two priests got permission from the local bishop in 1975. The priests began conducting exorcism sessions and the parents stopped consulting doctors. Anneliese Michel stopped eating food and died of malnourishment and dehydration after 67 exorcism sessions. Michel's parents and the two Roman Catholic priests were found guilty of negligent homicide and were sentenced to six months in jail (reduced to three years of probation), as well as a fine. In a conference several years later, German bishops retracted the claim that she was possessed. Several films are based on her story, including the 2005 film The Exorcism of Emily Rose, the award-winning 2006 film Requiem and the 2011 film Anneliese: The Exorcist Tapes.

Photo of Horst Wessel

7. Horst Wessel (1907 - 1930)

With an HPI of 65.48, Horst Wessel is the 7th most famous German Social Activist.  His biography has been translated into 37 different languages.

Horst Ludwig Georg Erich Wessel (9 October 1907 – 23 February 1930) was a member of the Sturmabteilung (SA), the paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party, who became a propaganda symbol in Nazi Germany following his murder in 1930 by two members of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD). After his death Joseph Goebbels turned him into a martyr for the Nazi Party. Wessel first joined a number of youth groups and extreme right-wing paramilitary groups, but later resigned from them and joined the SA, the brownshirted street-fighting stormtroopers of the Nazi Party. He rose to command several SA squads and districts. On 14 January 1930, he was shot in the head by two members of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD). Albrecht "Ali" Höhler was arrested and charged with his murder. Höhler was initially sentenced to six years in prison but was forcibly taken out of jail and killed by the SA after the Nazis came to power. Wessel's funeral was given wide attention in Berlin, with many of the Nazi elite in attendance. After his death, he became a propaganda symbol in Nazi Germany. A march for which he had written the lyrics was renamed the "Horst-Wessel-Lied" ("Horst Wessel Song"), and became the official anthem of the Nazi Party. After Adolf Hitler came to national power in 1933, the song became the co-national anthem of Germany, along with the first verse of the previous "Deutschlandlied", also known as "Deutschland über alles".

Photo of Jenny von Westphalen

8. Jenny von Westphalen (1814 - 1881)

With an HPI of 62.57, Jenny von Westphalen is the 8th most famous German Social Activist.  Her biography has been translated into 30 different languages.

Johanna Bertha Julie Jenny Edle von Westphalen (12 February 1814 – 2 December 1881) was a German theatre critic and political activist. She married the philosopher and political economist Karl Marx in 1843.

Photo of Paul Schäfer

9. Paul Schäfer (1921 - 2010)

With an HPI of 61.90, Paul Schäfer is the 9th most famous German Social Activist.  His biography has been translated into 16 different languages.

Paul Schäfer Schneider (4 December 1921 – 24 April 2010) was a German-Chilean Christian minister, and the founder and leader of a sect and agricultural commune of 300 German immigrants called Colonia Dignidad (Dignity Colony) (later renamed Villa Baviera) located in Parral in southern Chile, about 340 km (210 miles) south of Santiago from 1961 to 2005. Schäfer led his followers in the teachings of William Branham. Aside from human rights abuses against members of Colonia Dignidad, including rape and sexual and physical abuse (including torture) of young children, Schäfer maintained a relationship with Pinochet's military dictatorship (1973–1990) and was involved in weapons smuggling and the torture and extrajudicial killings of political dissidents. After the end of Pinochet's government, increased public awareness of the activities of Colonia Dignidad following testimony by former victims led to the issuing of a warrant for Schäfer's arrest. Living underground for eight years, he spent the last five years of his life in prison in Chile.

Photo of Hans Scholl

10. Hans Scholl (1918 - 1943)

With an HPI of 61.26, Hans Scholl is the 10th most famous German Social Activist.  His biography has been translated into 31 different languages.

Hans Fritz Scholl (German: [hans ʃɔl] ; 22 September 1918 – 22 February 1943) was, along with Alexander Schmorell, one of the two founding members of the White Rose resistance movement in Nazi Germany. The principal author of the resistance movement's literature, he was found guilty of high treason for distributing anti-Nazi material and was executed by the Nazi regime in 1943 during World War II.

People

Pantheon has 30 people classified as social activists born between 1343 and 1996. Of these 30, 1 (3.33%) of them are still alive today. The most famous living social activists include Luisa Neubauer. The most famous deceased social activists include Claus von Stauffenberg, Thomas Müntzer, and Martin Niemöller. As of April 2022, 7 new social activists have been added to Pantheon including Gretl Braun, Juliana of Stolberg, and Harro Schulze-Boysen.

Living Social Activists

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Deceased Social Activists

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Newly Added Social Activists (2022)

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Overlapping Lives

Which Social Activists were alive at the same time? This visualization shows the lifespans of the 25 most globally memorable Social Activists since 1700.

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