Jugendwerkstatt

At the Jugendwerkstatt (youth workshop) of the (municipal) Überbetriebliche Ausbildungsgesellschaft (ÜAG), based Am Steinborn in Jena-Nord, the youth welfare office’s department for youth, family, leisure and sport employed unemployed young people, offering them occupational prospects in various trades through work on municipal tasks. In 1991, for instance, two groups helped build the Winzerclub. For about a year, until August 1997, Beate Zschäpe was employed in the painters’ group. That she was already deeply embedded in the far-right scene at that time went largely unnoticed. Before Zschäpe, Andre K. had belonged to the Jugendwerkstatt in 1993 (and again in 1999/2000), and Ralf Wohlleben also did so in 1995. Right-wing youths made up a significant share of participants in the 1990s, with the result that left-leaning young people often dropped out of the training programme at the facility.

(Text and image: Frank Döbert)

External sources

TLZ Jena, 6.4.1991 OTZ Jena, 21.12.2011.