Old Nazis, new networks
After the founding of the Federal Republic of Germany in 1949, new extreme right-wing parties such as the Socialist Reich Party (SRP) and the German Reich Party (DRP), or associations such as the Stahlhelm and the Hilfsgemeinschaft auf Gegenseitigkeit der Waffen-SS (HIAG) emerged. They denied the crimes committed by the Nazi regime and agitated against denazification. They despised the new federal government as "henchmen" of the Allies. They regularly held public and well-attended meetings in Hamburg in the 1950s. Some of these parties or associations were banned by the Hamburg State Parliament. There were frequent protests and counter-demonstrations against these groups, mainly supported by organisations of those persecuted by the Nazis, the SPD, the KPD, and trade unions.

After initial electoral success, the extreme right-wing parties lost ground in the mid-1950s. Many of their voters migrated to the CDU. At the same time, mainstream parties began to address the issues of interest to the extreme right, particularly their advocacy of national sovereignty and their lamentation of Germany as the real victim of the Second World War, but also their denial and trivialisation of National Socialist crimes.