The slogan was used in a political context to suggest that due to the Treaty of Versailles depriving Germany of her colonial empire, the Germans had become a people without living space (Lebensraum), struggling with poverty, misery, hunger and overpopulation.[2] Closely linked to this idea was the claim that the earth was divided unfairly among the Great Powers, leaving the Germans possessing little land compared to the less populous European nations.[2]