Editing Gleichschaltung (section)

==Terminology==
{{lang|de|Gleichschaltung}} is a compound word that comes from the German words {{lang|de|gleich}} (same) and {{lang|de|schaltung}} (circuit) and was derived from an electrical engineering term meaning that all switches are put on the same circuit allowing them all to be simultaneously activated by throwing a single master switch.{{sfn|Childers|2017|p=248}} Its first use is credited to [[Reich Ministry of Justice|Reich Justice Minister]] [[Franz Gürtner]].{{sfn|Zentner|Bedürftig|1997|p=940}} It has been variously translated as "coordination",{{sfn|Evans|2003|p=381}}{{sfn|Kershaw|1999|p=479}}{{sfn|Burleigh|2000|p=272}} "Nazification of state and society",{{sfn|Hirschfeld|2014|pp=101, 164}} "synchronization",{{sfn|Zentner|Bedürftig|1997|p=940}} and "bringing into line".{{sfn|Hirschfeld|2014|pp=101, 164}} English texts often use the untranslated German word to convey its unique historical meaning.  In their seminal work on National Socialist vernacular, ''Nazi-Deutsch/Nazi-German: An English Lexicon of the Language of the Third Reich'', historians Robert Michael and Karin Doerr define {{lang|de|Gleichschaltung}} as: "Consolidation. All of the German [[Volk#German national identity|Volk's]] social, political, and cultural organizations to be controlled and run according to Nazi ideology and policy. All opposition to be eliminated."{{sfn|Michael|Doerr|2002|p=192}} This accords with the general description provided by historian Jane Caplan, who characterized the term as "the coordination of German institutions into a cohesive, Nazified whole."{{sfn|Caplan|2019|p=60}}{{efn|Caplan remains critical of the term ''Gleichschaltung'' as an equalizing ideological structure within Nazi Germany; she claims the notion represents a "fraudulent edifice", since the extant social power structures and economic stratification more or less remained intact, despite Nazi propaganda suggesting otherwise.{{sfn|Caplan|2019|p=60}} }}