The main exhibition on the first floor of the former cowshed is dedicated to the failure of the first German democracy under the title "Friends - Helpers - Street Fighters". The focus is on the development of the police as a state institution, which was repressive during the German Empire and had to find its new role as protector of the population and the young democracy in the Weimar Republic. The police were also challenged and ultimately overwhelmed by internal power struggles and external violence from right-wing and left-wing attacks. In 1933, the National Socialists instrumentalized the police for their own purposes.
The exhibition reflects on the failure of the first democracy and thus raises awareness of the subsequent developments up to the present day in order to document the high value of liberal democracy, which the police must protect and defend.
Nine themes, 25 exhibits and accompanying texts document the history of the police in the Weimar Republic with a focus on the regions of present-day Lower Saxony in a vivid and varied way. A new section created by museum director Arne Homann with a selection of high-quality exhibits also sheds light on conditions in what is now the city of Salzgitter, which at the time belonged partly to Braunschweig and partly to Prussia.
The second exhibition "Role models - memories of work" on the second floor of the former cowshed deals with the changing understanding of roles. The exhibition shows works by artists from the years 1950 to 1980 and documents the extent to which traditional role models changed during this period. How were roles distributed back then, how were behaviors seen and what is the difference to today? The exhibits from the Municipal Art Collections provide a variety of answers to these questions.
Incidentally, "Role models" also picks up on a theme from "Friends - Helpers - Street fighters": For the tasks of the police in the Weimar Republic changed from control in the German Empire to protecting the population. The reputation of the police also increased because "policeman" became a skilled profession and the institution was no longer a supply point for retired military personnel as it had been in the Empire. At the same time, the image of the police as an exclusively male profession slowly changed. After a few forerunners in the German Empire, the path of women in the police force began in the Weimar Republic with the founding of the female criminal investigation department.