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| {{Short description|German fascist ideology}} | |||
| {{Nazism}} | |||
| {{Redirect-multi|2|National Socialism|Nazi|the party for whom the ideology is named|Nazi Party|other uses|National Socialism (disambiguation)|and|Nazi (disambiguation)}} | |||
| {{redirect|National Socialism}} | |||
| {{for|Nazism after WWII|Neo-Nazism}} | |||
| '''Nazism''' was the ] held by the ] (''Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei'', commonly called the NSDAP or Nazi Party). The word ''Nazism'' is most often used in connection with the ] of ] from 1933 to 1945, also known as the "]". In terms of ideology, Nazism combines ], ], ] and ], and draws from a variety of other sources. Currently, Nazism is outlawed as a political ideology in modern Germany, as are forms of iconography and propaganda from the Nazi era. Still, remnants and revivalists, known as "]", continue to operate in Germany and abroad. | |||
| {{Redirect|Hitlerism|the political positions held by Hitler personally|Political views of Adolf Hitler}} | |||
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| {{very long|date=October 2024}}{{If mobile|] was the main symbol of Nazism, and it was incorporated into the national flag of Nazi Germany after 1935.]]|{{Nazism sidebar}} | |||
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| {{antisemitism sidebar|Manifestations}} | |||
| '''Nazism''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|n|ɑː|t|s|ɪ|z|əm|,_|ˈ|n|æ|t|-|audio=LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-Nazism.wav}}{{respell|NA(H)T|siz|əm}}), formally named '''National Socialism''' ('''NS'''; {{langx|de|Nationalsozialismus}}, {{IPA|de|natsi̯oˈnaːlzotsi̯aˌlɪsmʊs|lang|De-at-Nationalsozialismus.ogg}}), is the ] ] socio-political ] and practices associated with ] and the ] (NSDAP) in Germany.<ref name="Fritzsche_Eatwell_Griffin" /><ref>{{Cite web |title=The political parties in the Weimar Republic |url=https://www.bundestag.de/resource/blob/189776/01b7ea57531a60126da86e2d5c5dbb78/parties_weimar_republic-data.pdf |website=] |access-date=27 March 2023 |archive-date=19 March 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230319203146/https://www.bundestag.de/resource/blob/189776/01b7ea57531a60126da86e2d5c5dbb78/parties_weimar_republic-data.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name=":1">{{Cite web |title=Nazism |url=https://www.britannica.com/event/Nazism |access-date=15 October 2022 |website=] |language=en |quote=Nazism attempted to reconcile conservative, nationalist ideology with a socially radical doctrine. |archive-date=16 May 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230516150339/https://www.britannica.com/event/Nazism |url-status=live }}</ref> During ] in 1930s Europe, it was frequently referred to as '''Hitler Fascism''' ({{langx|de|Hitlerfaschismus|links=no}}) and '''Hitlerism''' ({{Langx|de|Hitlerismus|links=no}}). The later related term "]" is applied to other far-right groups with similar ideas which formed after the ] and therefore after the ] collapsed. | |||
| Originally, the term ''Nazi'' was coined as a quick way of referring to the Party or ideology that would later be - and to this day, remains - in close association with ] (the phrase is derived from the first four letters in the first word of the official name, ], ] for "National Socialist" and often abbreviated with ''NS'' or the word ''Nazi''). ''Nazi'' was also meant to mirror the term ''Sozi'' (a common and slightly derogatory term for the Nazis' main opponents, the ]s in Germany). However, the Nazis from the era of the Third Reich rarely referred to themselves as "Nazis", preferring instead the official term, "National Socialists". ''Nazi'' was most commonly used as a pejorative term, but its use became so widespread that, currently, some ] also use it to describe themselves. | |||
| Nazism is a form of ],<ref>] (2010) ''Hitler and Nazi Germany: A History'' New York: Routledge. p. 1 {{isbn|978-0-13-192469-7}} Quote: "Nazism was only one, although the most important, of a number of similar-looking fascist movements in Europe between World War I and World War II."</ref><ref>Orlow, Dietrick (2009) ''The Lure of Fascism in Western Europe: German Nazis, Dutch and French Fascists, 1933–1939'' London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 6–9. {{isbn|978-0-230-60865-8}}.</ref><ref>] (2013) ''Nazism as Fascism: Violence, Ideology, and the Ground of Consent in Germany 1930–1945''. New York: Routledge. {{isbn|978-0-415-81263-4}}</ref><ref>] and ] (2017). {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230305221654/https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Andreas_Umland/publication/311784498_Why_fascists_took_over_the_Reichstag_but_have_not_captured_the_Kremlin_a_comparison_of_Weimar_Germany_and_post-Soviet_Russia/links/5b5a2f62aca272a2d66cc57b/Why-fascists-took-over-the-Reichstag-but-have-not-captured-the-Kremlin-a-comparison-of-Weimar-Germany-and-post-Soviet-Russia.pdf |date=5 March 2023 }}. '']''. '''45''' (2): 206–221.</ref> with disdain for ] and the ]. Its beliefs include support for ],<ref name=":1" /> fervent ], ], ],<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Kiernan |first1=Ben |last2=Lower |first2=Wendy |last3=Naimark |first3=Norman |last4=Straus |first4=Scott |editor-first1=Ben |editor-first2=Wendy |editor-first3=Norman |editor-first4=Scott |editor-last1=Kiernan |editor-last2=Lower |editor-last3=Naimark |editor-last4=Straus |title=The Cambridge World History of Genocide |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2023 |isbn=978-1-108-48707-8 |volume=3: Genocide in the Contemporary Era, 1914–2020 |location=Cambridge, United Kingdom |pages=358, 359 |chapter=15: The Nazis and the Slavs – Poles and Soviet Prisoners of War |doi=10.1017/9781108767118}}</ref> ], ], ], ], ], ], ], and the use of ]. The ] of the Nazis originated in ] and the ] '']'' movement which had been a prominent aspect of ] since the late 19th century. Nazism was strongly influenced by the {{lang|de|]}} ] groups that emerged after Germany's defeat in ], from which came the party's underlying "cult of violence".{{sfn|Evans|2003|p=229}} It subscribed to ] theories of a ],<ref name="Smithsonian">{{cite web|url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/disturbing-resilience-scientific-racism-180972243/|title=The Disturbing Resilience of Scientific Racism|author=Ramin Skibba|work=Smithsonian.com|date=20 May 2019|access-date=12 December 2019|archive-date=11 October 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221011071349/https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/disturbing-resilience-scientific-racism-180972243/|url-status=live}}</ref> identifying ] as part of what the Nazis regarded as an ] or ] ].<ref name="Baum2006_156"/> Nazism sought to overcome social divisions and create a homogeneous German society based on ] which represented a people's community ({{lang|de|]}}). The Nazis aimed to unite all Germans living in historically German territory, as well as gain additional lands for German expansion under the doctrine of {{lang|de|]}} and exclude those whom they deemed either ] or "inferior" races ({{lang|de|]}}). | |||
| The Nazis of Hitler's time believed in the superiority of an ] race, advocated strong ] through a centralized government and claimed to be defending Germany and the entire ] against ] and ] subversion. Hitler developed the Nazi Party in its more primitive stages and rose to become the movement's undisputable ideographic figurehead. Consequently, much of what is thought to be "Nazism" is in line with ], and the ideology and the man continue to remain largely interchangeable in the public eye. However, scholars often disagree when cataloging Nazism as a "coherent ideology." This is furthered by the inability of various modern Nazi groups to decide what their ideologies are. | |||
| The term "National Socialism" arose out of attempts to create a nationalist redefinition of ''socialism'', as an alternative to both ] international ] and ]. Nazism rejected the Marxist concepts of ] and universal ], opposed ] ], and sought to convince all parts of the new German society to subordinate their personal interests to the "]", accepting political interests as the main priority of economic organisation,{{r|Kobrak2004}} which tended to match the general outlook of ] or ] rather than economic socialism. The Nazi Party's precursor, the pan-German nationalist and antisemitic ] (DAP), was founded on 5 January 1919. By the early 1920s, the party was renamed the National Socialist German Workers' Party in order to appeal to left-wing workers,<ref>] (1996). ''Why Hitler?: The Genesis of the Nazi Reich''. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger. p. 68. {{ISBN|978-0-275-95485-7}}</ref> a renaming that Hitler initially objected to.<ref>], "Les débuts du national-socialisme", Revue d'Allemagne, VII, No. 71 (Sept. 15, 1933), p. 821.</ref> The ], or "25 Points", was adopted in 1920 and called for a united ] that would deny citizenship to ] or those of Jewish descent, while also supporting land reform and the ] of some industries. In {{lang|de|]}} ("My Struggle"), published in 1925–1926, Hitler outlined the antisemitism and anti-communism at the heart of his political philosophy as well as his disdain for ], over which he proposed the {{lang|de|]}} ({{langx|en|leader principle|label=none}}), and his belief in Germany's right to territorial expansion through ''lebensraum''.{{sfn|Kershaw|1999|pp=243–244, 248–249}} Hitler's objectives involved the ] of German territories, German colonization of Eastern Europe, and the promotion of an alliance with ] and ] against the ]. | |||
| In both popular thought and academic scholarship, Nazism is generally considered a form of ] - with "fascism" defined so as to include any of the ], ], ], and right-wing movements that developed in Europe around the same time. However, fascists tended to believe that all elements in society should be unified through ] to form an "Organic State"; this meant that Fascists often had no strong opinion on the question of ], as it was only the State and ] that mattered. Nazism, on the other hand, emphasized the ] race or "Volk" principle to the point where the state simply seemed a means through which the Aryan race could realize its "true destiny". The Nazis themselves, however, claimed to be "German" above all, and less inspired by other ideologies or cultures. | |||
| The Nazi Party won the greatest share of the popular vote in the two {{lang|de|]|italic=no}} general elections of 1932, making them the largest party in the legislature by far, albeit still short of an outright majority (] and ]). Because none of the parties were willing or able to put together a coalition government, Hitler was appointed ] on 30 January 1933 by President ] through the support and connivance of traditional conservative nationalists who believed that they could control him and his party. With the use of emergency presidential decrees by Hindenburg and a change in the ] which allowed the Cabinet to rule by direct decree, bypassing both Hindenburg and the Reichstag, the Nazis soon established a ] and began the ''].'' | |||
| Following ] and ], the term "Nazi" and most other words and symbols associated with Nazism (such as the ]) acquired extremely negative connotations in ] and ]. Calling someone a "Nazi" or even suggesting that one has something in common with Nazism is considered an ]. People of all political persuasions often attempt to draw parallels between their opponents and the Nazis in order to put their opponents in a negative light. This is a ] called ]. See also ] and ]. | |||
| The {{lang|de|]}} (SA) and the {{lang|de|]}} (SS) functioned as the paramilitary organisations of the Nazi Party. Using the SS for the task, Hitler purged the party's more socially and economically radical factions in the mid-1934 ], including the leadership of the SA. After the death of President Hindenburg on 2 August 1934, political power was concentrated in Hitler's hands and he became Germany's head of state as well as the head of the government, with the title of {{lang|de|]}}, meaning "leader and Chancellor of Germany" (see also ]). From that point, Hitler was effectively the ] of Nazi Germany—also known as the Third Reich—under which Jews, political opponents and other "undesirable" elements were ]. During ], many millions of people{{snd}}including around two-thirds of the Jewish population of Europe{{snd}}were eventually exterminated in a genocide which became known as ]. Following Germany's ] and the discovery of the full extent of the Holocaust, Nazi ideology became universally disgraced. It is widely regarded as ], with only a few fringe ] groups, usually referred to as neo-Nazis, describing themselves as followers of National Socialism. The use of Nazi symbols is outlawed in many European countries, including Germany and Austria. | |||
| ==Nazi theory== | |||
| == Etymology == | |||
| According to '']'' (''My Struggle''), Adolf Hitler first began to develop his views through observations he made while living in Austria. He concluded that there was a racial, religious, and cultural hierarchy, and he placed "Aryans" at the top as the superior race while Jews and "Gypsies" (the Roma) were people at the bottom. He closely examined and questioned the policies of the ], where as a citizen by birth, Hitler lived during the Empire's last throes of life. He believed that its ] and ] diversity had weakened the Empire and helped to create dissention. Further, he saw ] as a destabilizing force because it placed power in the hands of ] who, he claimed, "weakened and destabilized" the Empire by dividing it against itself. | |||
| ] | |||
| The full name of the Nazi Party was {{langnf|de|Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei|National Socialist German Workers' Party}} and they officially used the acronym NSDAP. The renaming of the ] (DAP) to the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) was partially driven by a desire to draw upon both left-wing and right-wing ideals, with "Socialist" and "Workers'" appealing to the left, and "National" and "German" appealing to the right.{{sfn|Childers|2001a|loc=26:00–31:04}} The term "nazi" had been in use, before the rise of the NSDAP, as a colloquial and derogatory word for a backwards farmer or ]. It characterised an awkward and clumsy person, a ]. In this sense, the word ''Nazi'' was a ] of the German male name ''Igna(t)z'' (itself a variation of the name ])—Igna(t)z being a common name at the time in ], the area from which the NSDAP emerged.<ref name=GottliebMorgensen2007/><ref name=HarperOED/> | |||
| In the 1920s, political opponents of the NSDAP in the German ] seized on this. Using the earlier abbreviated term {{lang|de|Sozi}} for {{langnf|de|Sozialist|Socialist}} as an example,<ref name=HarperOED /> they shortened the NSDAP's name, {{lang|de|Nationalsozialistische}}, to the dismissive "Nazi", in order to associate them with the derogatory use of the aforementioned term.<ref name=Lepage2009_9/><ref name=HarperOED/><ref name=Sourcebook/><ref name=DailyTelegraph23102011/><ref name=Seebold2002/><ref>''Nazi.'' In: Friedrich Kluge, ]: ''Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache.'' 24. Auflage, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin/New York 2002, {{ISBN|3-11-017473-1}} ( {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141006134952/http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Nazi |date=6 October 2014 }}).</ref> The first use of the term "Nazi" by the National Socialists occurred in 1926 in a publication by ] called {{lang|de|Der Nazi-Sozi}} . In Goebbels' pamphlet, the word "Nazi" only appears when linked with the word "Sozi" as an abbreviation of "National Socialism".<ref>] (1927) {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221002032348/https://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/nazi-sozi.htm |date=2 October 2022 }}, translated and annotated by Randall Bytwerk, ] German Propaganda Archive</ref> | |||
| Nazi thought, an extension of various philosophies, came together at a critical time for Germany; The nation had just lost ] and was in the midst of a period of great ] and instability. The ], or "stab in the back" legend, held that the war effort was sabotaged internally, suggesting that supposed "lack of patriotism" had led to Germany's defeat. In the realm of politics, these charges were directed towards the ] and the ] government, as the latter had been accused of "selling out" the country. Additionally, the Dolchstosslegende encouraged many to look at "non-German" Germans critically, especially those with potential "extra-national loyalties", such as the ]. Such an appeal capitalized on ] sentiments. | |||
| After the NSDAP's rise to power in the 1930s, the use of the term "Nazi" by itself or in terms such as "]", "]", and so on was popularised by German exiles outside the country, but not in Germany. From them, the term spread into other languages and it was eventually brought back into Germany after World War II.<ref name=Sourcebook/> The NSDAP briefly adopted the designation "Nazi" in an attempt to ] the term: an example of this is the serie of articles published by ] on the '']'' under the title '']'' in 1934<ref>{{Cite web |last=Meier |first=Axel |date=2014-11-18 |title=Die Artikelserie "Ein Nazi fährt nach Palästina" |url=https://www.bpb.de/themen/nationalsozialismus-zweiter-weltkrieg/die-wohnung/195248/die-artikelserie-ein-nazi-faehrt-nach-palaestina/ |access-date= |website=] |language=de}}</ref>; but it soon gave up this effort and generally avoided using the term while it was in power.<ref name=Sourcebook/><ref name=DailyTelegraph23102011/> In each case, the authors typically referred to themselves as "National Socialists" and their movement as "National Socialism", but never as "Nazis". A compendium of Hitler's conversations from 1941 through 1944 entitled '']'' does not contain the word "Nazi" either.<ref>], compiler, et al., ''Hitler's Table Talk'', republished 2016</ref> In speeches by ], he never uses the term "Nazi".<ref>See ''Selected Speeches of Field Marshal Hermann Goring''</ref> Hitler Youth leader ] wrote a book about her experience entitled ''Account Rendered''.<ref>], ''Account Rendered: A Dossier On My Former Self'', originally published in 1963, republished in 2016, Plunkett Lake Press</ref> She did not refer to herself as a "Nazi", even though she was writing well after World War II. In 1933, 581 members of the National Socialist Party answered interview questions put to them by Professor ] from ]. They similarly did not refer to themselves as "Nazis".<ref>{{cite book | url=https://searchworks.stanford.edu/view/4087885 | title=Theodore Fred Abel papers}}</ref> | |||
| Nazi rationale also invested heavily in the ] belief that great nations grow from military power and maintained order, which in turn grow "naturally" from "rational, civilized cultures". The Nazi Party appealed to German nationalists and national pride, capitalizing on ] and ] sentiments as well as aversions to various aspects of ] thinking. Many ethnic Germans still had heartfelt ties to the goal of creating a ] and some felt that the use of military force was necessary to achieve it. | |||
| == Position within the political spectrum == | |||
| ]'s racial philosophy wholly embraced the ], which traced Aryan peoples in ancient ] invading the ], and carrying with them great knowledge and science that had been preserved from the ] world. This "antediluvian world" referred to ], the speculative pre-Flood/Ice Age origin of the Aryan race, and is often tied to ideas of ]. Most of the leadership and the founders of the Nazi Party were made up of members of the "Thule Gesellschaft" (the Thule Society), which romanticized the Aryan race through theology and ritual. | |||
| ], ], Minister of Propaganda ], and ]]] | |||
| ] and ] ] (DNVP) during the brief NSDAP–DNVP alliance in the ] from 1931 to 1932]] | |||
| The majority of scholars identify Nazism in both theory and practice as a form of ].<ref name=Fritzsche_Eatwell_Griffin/> Far-right themes in Nazism include the argument that superior people have a right to dominate other people and purge society of supposed inferior elements.<ref name="Oliver H. Woshinsky 2008, p. 156"/> ] and other proponents denied that Nazism was either left-wing or right-wing: instead, they officially portrayed Nazism as a ] movement.<ref name="Adolf Hitler p. 170"/><ref name="Rudy Koshar 1986, p. 190"/> In '']'', Hitler directly attacked both left-wing and right-wing politics in Germany, saying: | |||
| Hitler also claimed that a ] was the highest creation of a ], and great nations (literally ''large'' nations) were the creation of homogeneous populations of great races, working together. These nations developed cultures that naturally grew from races with "natural good health, and aggressive, intelligent, courageous traits". The weakest nations, Hitler said, were those of impure or mongrel races, because they had divided, quarrelling, and therefore weak cultures. Worst of all were seen to be the parasitic ] (''Subhumans''), mainly Jews, but also Gypsies, homosexuals, the disabled and so called anti-socials, all of whom were considered ''lebensunwertes Leben'' ("Life-unworthy life") owing to their perceived deficiency and inferiority, as well as their wandering, nationless invasions ("the International Jew"). The ] as part of ] has seen increasing scholarly attention since the 1990s. | |||
| <blockquote>Today our left-wing politicians in particular are constantly insisting that their craven-hearted and obsequious foreign policy necessarily results from the disarmament of Germany, whereas the truth is that this is the policy of traitors ... But the politicians of the Right deserve exactly the same reproach. It was through their miserable cowardice that those ruffians of Jews who came into power in 1918 were able to rob the nation of its arms.<ref name="Adolf Hitler 2010, p. 287"/></blockquote> | |||
| According to Nazism, it is an obvious mistake to permit or encourage ] within a nation. Fundamental to the Nazi goal was the unification of all ], "unjustly" divided into different ]s. Hitler claimed that nations that could not defend their territory did not deserve it. Slave races he thought of as less worthy to exist than "leader races". In particular, if a master race should require room to live ('']''), he thought such a race should have the right to displace the inferior ]. | |||
| In a speech given in Munich on 12 April 1922, Hitler stated: | |||
| "Races without homelands", Hitler proclaimed, were "parasitic races", and the richer the members of a "parasitic race" were, the more "virulent" the parasitism was thought to be. A "master race" could therefore, according to the Nazi doctrine, easily strengthen itself by eliminating "parasitic races" from its homeland. This was the given rationalization for the Nazis' later oppression and elimination of Jews, ], ], ], the mentally and physically handicapped, homosexuals and others not belonging to these groups or categories that were part of the ]. Hitler and his ''living space'' doctrine found immense popularity among the largely condensed German population of over sixty million. The ], ] and other German soldiers as well as civilian paramilitary groups in occupied territories were responsible for the deaths of an estimated eleven million men, women, and children in concentration camps, prisoner-of-war camps, labor camps, and death camps such as ] and ]. | |||
| <blockquote>There are only two possibilities in Germany; do not imagine that the people will forever go with the middle party, the party of compromises; one day it will turn to those who have most consistently foretold the coming ruin and have sought to dissociate themselves from it. And that party is either the Left: and then God help us! for it will lead us to complete destruction—to Bolshevism, or else it is a party of the Right which at the last, when the people is in utter despair, when it has lost all its spirit and has no longer any faith in anything, is determined for its part ruthlessly to seize the reins of power—that is the beginning of resistance of which I spoke a few minutes ago.<ref name="holocaustreader"/></blockquote> | |||
| Hitler extended his rationalizations into a ] doctrine, underpinned by his criticism of traditional ]. In particular, and closely related to ], Hitler objected to Catholicism's ungrounded and international character - that is, it did not pertain to an exclusive race and national culture. At the same time, and somewhat contradictorily, the Nazis combined elements of Germany's ] community tradition with its Northern European, ] ] past. Elements of militarism found their way into Hitler's own theology, as he preached that his was a "true" or "master" religion, because it would "create mastery" and avoid comforting lies. Those who preached ] and tolerance, "in contravention to the facts", were said to be "slave" or "false" religions. The man who recognized these "truths", Hitler continued, was said to be a "natural leader", and those who denied it were said to be "natural slaves". "Slaves" – especially intelligent ones, he claimed – were always attempting to hinder their masters by promoting false religious and political doctrines. | |||
| Hitler at times redefined socialism. When ] interviewed Hitler in October 1923 for the '']'' and asked him why he referred to his party as 'socialists' he replied: | |||
| The ideological roots that became German "National Socialism" were based on numerous sources in European history, drawing especially from ] 19th Century ], and from a biological reading of ]'s thoughts on "breeding upwards" toward the goal of an ] (''Superhuman''). Hitler was an avid reader and received ideas that were later to influence Nazism from traceable publications, such as those of the ] (''Germanic Order'') or the ]. He also adopted many ] ideas such as limiting profits, abolishing rents and generously increasing social benefits - but only for Germans. | |||
| {{blockquote|Socialism is the science of dealing with the common weal. Communism is not Socialism. Marxism is not Socialism. The Marxians have stolen the term and confused its meaning. I shall take Socialism away from the Socialists. | |||
| Socialism is an ancient Aryan, Germanic institution. Our German ancestors held certain lands in common. They cultivated the idea of the common weal. Marxism has no right to disguise itself as socialism. Socialism, unlike Marxism, does not repudiate private property. Unlike Marxism, it involves no negation of personality, and unlike Marxism, it is patriotic.<ref>{{cite web|title=1923 Interview with Adolf Hitler|url=https://famous-trials.com/hitler/2529-1923-interview-with-adolf-hitler|access-date=14 July 2022|archive-date=5 October 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221005084732/https://famous-trials.com/hitler/2529-1923-interview-with-adolf-hitler|url-status=live}}</ref>}} | |||
| Hitler's theories were not only attractive to Germans: people in positions of wealth and power in other nations are said to have seen them as beneficial. Examples are ], founder of the ], and ], founder of ]. Nevertheless, the support for these theories was highest among the general population of Germany. | |||
| In 1929, Hitler gave a speech to a group of Nazi leaders and simplified 'socialism' to mean, "Socialism! That is an unfortunate word altogether... What does socialism really mean? If people have something to eat and their pleasures, then they have their socialism."<ref>{{cite book|author-last=Turner |author-first=Henry A. |title=German Big Business and the Rise of Hitler |publisher=] |date=1985 |pages=77}}</ref> When asked in an interview on 27 January 1934 whether he supported the "bourgeois right-wing", Hitler claimed that Nazism was not exclusively for any class and he indicated that it favoured neither the left nor the right, but preserved "pure" elements from both "camps" by stating: "From the camp of bourgeois tradition, it takes national resolve, and from the materialism of the Marxist dogma, living, creative Socialism."<ref name="commentary"/> | |||
| It must be noted that Nazism, as a doctrine is far from being ] and can indeed be divided into various sub-ideologies. During the 20s and 30s, there were two dominant NSDAP factions. There were the followers of ], the so-called Strasserites and the followers of ] or what could be termed Hitlerites. | |||
| Historians regard the equation of Nazism as "Hitlerism" as too simplistic since the term was used prior to the rise of Hitler and the Nazis. In addition, the different ideologies incorporated into Nazism were already well established in certain parts of German society long before ].{{sfn|Kershaw|1999|p=135}} The Nazis were strongly influenced by the post–World War I far-right in Germany, which held common beliefs such as anti-Marxism, anti-liberalism and antisemitism, along with ], contempt for the ] and condemnation of the Weimar Republic for signing the armistice in November 1918 which later led it to sign the Treaty of Versailles.<ref name="Peukert, Detlev 1993 pp. 73-74"/> A major inspiration for the Nazis were the far-right nationalist '']'', paramilitary organisations that engaged in political violence after World War I.<ref name="Peukert, Detlev 1993 pp. 73-74" /> Initially, the post–World War I German far-right was dominated by ], but the younger generation, which was associated with ''völkisch'' nationalism, was more radical and it did not express any emphasis on the restoration of the German monarchy.<ref name="Peukert, Detlev 1993 p. 74"/> This younger generation desired to dismantle the Weimar Republic and create a new radical and strong state based upon a martial ruling ethic that could revive the "Spirit of 1914" which was associated with German national unity ('']'').<ref name="Peukert, Detlev 1993 p. 74"/> | |||
| The ] faction eventually fell afoul of Hitler, when Otto Strasser was expelled from the party in 1930, and his attempt to create an oppositional 'left-block' in the form of the ] failed. The remainder of the faction, which was to be found mainly in the ranks of the SA, was purged in the ], which also saw the murder of ], Otto's brother. After this point, the Hitlerite faction became dominant. | |||
| The Nazis, the far-right monarchists, the ] ] (DNVP) and others, such as monarchist officers in the German Army and several prominent industrialists, formed an alliance in opposition to the Weimar Republic on 11 October 1931 in ], officially known as the "National Front", but commonly referred to as the ].<ref name="machtergreifung"/> The Nazis stated that the alliance was purely tactical and they continued to have differences with the DNVP. After the elections of July 1932, the alliance broke down when the DNVP lost many of its seats in the ]. The Nazis denounced them as "an insignificant heap of reactionaries".<ref name="machtergreifung5"/> The DNVP responded by denouncing the Nazis for their "socialism", their street violence and the "economic experiments" that would take place if the Nazis ever rose to power.<ref name="machtergreifung6"/> However, amidst an inconclusive political situation in which conservative politicians ] and ] were unable to form stable governments without the Nazis, Papen proposed to President Hindenburg to appoint Hitler as Chancellor at the head of a government formed primarily of conservatives, with only three Nazi ministers.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|pp=104–106}}<ref>Stephen J. Lee. ''European Dictatorships, 1918–1945.'' Routledge, 1987, p. 169.</ref> Hindenburg did so, and contrary to the expectations of Papen and the DNVP, Hitler was soon able to establish a Nazi one-party dictatorship.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|pp=106–107}} | |||
| In the post war era, Strasserism has enjoyed something of a revival with many neo-Nazi groups openly proclaiming themselves to be 'Strasserite'. Whether they genuinely eschrew Hitlerism in favour of Strasserism, or whether they simply think that by distancing Nazism from Hitler they can somehow make the ideology more acceptable is a matter of intense debate however. | |||
| ] ], who was pressured to abdicate the throne and flee into exile amidst an attempted communist revolution in Germany, initially supported the Nazi Party. His four sons, including Prince ] and Prince ], became members of the Nazi Party in hopes that in exchange for their support, the Nazis would permit the restoration of the monarchy.<ref name="nicholas"/> Hitler dismissed the possibility of a restored monarchy, calling it "idiotic."<ref>{{cite book|title-link=The Second World War (Antony Beevor book)|title=The Second World War |first=Antony|last=Beevor|author-link=Antony Beevor |publisher=Back Bay Books |location=New York |year=2013 |isbn=978-0316023757|pages=92–93}}</ref> Wilhelm grew to distrust Hitler and was appalled at the ] of 9–10 November 1938, stating, "For the first time, I am ashamed to be a German."<ref>{{cite book|first=Michael|last=Balfour|title=The Kaiser and his Times|publisher=Houghton Mifflin|year=1964|page=409}}</ref> The former German emperor also denounced the Nazis as a "bunch of shirted gangsters" and "a mob ... led by a thousand liars or fanatics."<ref name="Ken 1938">{{cite magazine|title=The Kaiser on Hitler|magazine=]|date=15 December 1938|url=http://www.oldmagazinearticles.com/pdf/Kaiser_Wm_and_Hitler.pdf|access-date=6 September 2023|archive-date=11 November 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201111200858/http://www.oldmagazinearticles.com/pdf/Kaiser_Wm_and_Hitler.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| The significance of homosexuals in the Nazi Party is considered minor by most historians. However, some tiny groups like the International Committee for Holocaust Truth, and authors Scott Lively and Kevin E. Abrams in ''The Pink Swastika: Homosexuality in the Nazi Party'', argue that many homosexuals were involved in the inner circles of the Nazi party: ] of the SA (whose execution was thinly rationalized as being based on his homosexuality), ], ], and others. This perspective is denounced as hateful propaganda by most human rights associations and groups, stirring heated debates and accusations of censorship and "hate-speech" from both sides. Most historians and scholars of fascism do not take the work of Lively and Abrams seriously, and dismiss it as part of a ] campaign against gay rights. Conversely, some Nazi supporters argue that such claims are simply more attempts to discredit Nazi ideology. | |||
| There were factions within the Nazi Party, both conservative and radical.<ref name="Michael Mann 2004, p. 183"/> The conservative Nazi ] urged Hitler to conciliate with ] and ].<ref name="Michael Mann 2004, p. 183" /> Other prominent conservative Nazis included ] and ].<ref name="foundations"/> Meanwhile, the radical Nazi Joseph Goebbels opposed capitalism, viewing it as having Jews at its core and he stressed the need for the party to emphasise both a ] and a national character. Those views were shared by ], who later left the Nazi Party and formed the ] in the belief that Hitler had allegedly betrayed the party's socialist goals by endorsing capitalism.<ref name="Michael Mann 2004, p. 183"/> | |||
| Since ], in which Nazi Germany was allied with ], there has been a widely held view among historians and the general population that Nazism and ] are closely related. The term ''Fascism'' is often used in a very broad sense, to refer to a variety of ] ] political movements that exist or existed in many countries. As such, Nazism is usually classified as a particular version of Fascism. | |||
| When the Nazi Party emerged from obscurity to become a major political force after 1929, the conservative faction rapidly gained more influence, as wealthy donors took an interest in the Nazis as a potential bulwark against communism.<ref>Hallgarten, George (1973). "The Collusion of Capitalism". In Snell, John L. (ed.). "The Nazi Revolution: Hitler's Dictatorship and the German Nation". D. C. Heath and Company. p. 132</ref> The Nazi Party had previously been financed almost entirely from membership dues, but after 1929 its leadership began actively seeking donations from German industrialists, and Hitler began holding dozens of fundraising meetings with business leaders.<ref>Hallgarten, George (1973). "The Collusion of Capitalism". In Snell, John L. (ed.). "The Nazi Revolution: Hitler's Dictatorship and the German Nation". D. C. Heath and Company. p. 133</ref> In the midst of the Great Depression, facing the possibility of economic ruin on the one hand and a ] or ] government on the other hand, German business increasingly turned to Nazism as offering a way out of the situation, by promising a state-driven economy that would support, rather than attack, existing business interests.<ref>Hallgarten, George (1973). "The Collusion of Capitalism". In Snell, John L. (ed.). "The Nazi Revolution: Hitler's Dictatorship and the German Nation". D. C. Heath and Company. pp. 137, 142</ref> By January 1933, the Nazi Party had secured the support of important sectors of German industry, mainly among the steel and coal producers, the insurance business, and the chemical industry.<ref>Hallgarten, George (1973). "The Collusion of Capitalism". In Snell, John L. (ed.). "The Nazi Revolution: Hitler's Dictatorship and the German Nation". D. C. Heath and Company. p. 141</ref> | |||
| However, if one restricts the definition of ''Fascism'' to those movements and governments that called ''themselves'' Fascist (e.g. ]'s regime in Italy and the ]), a number of differences between Nazism and Fascism can be observed. Fascists tended to believe that all elements in society should be unified through ] to form an "Organic State"; this meant that Fascists often had no strong opinion on the question of ], as it was only the State and ] that mattered. Nazism, on the other hand, emphasized the ] race or "Volk" over state to the point where the state simply became a means through which the Aryan race could realize its true destiny. Although they would later collaborate, tensions rose between Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany over the increasing possibility of an Austria-Germany merger, which would create a more powerful ]. In 1934, the ] Chancellor of Austria, ], was assassinated by Austrian Nazis, who acted on behalf of Hitler and the Party. | |||
| Large segments of the Nazi Party, particularly among the members of the '']'' (SA), were committed to the party's official socialist, revolutionary and ] positions and expected both a social and an economic revolution when the party gained power in 1933.<ref name="Joseph W. Bendersky 2007, p. 96"/> In the period immediately before the Nazi seizure of power, there were even Social Democrats and Communists who switched sides and became known as "]s": brown on the outside and red inside.<ref>Heiden, Konrad (1938) ''Hitler: A Biography'', London: Constable & Co. Ltd. p. 390</ref> The leader of the SA, ], pushed for a "second revolution" (the "first revolution" being the Nazis' seizure of power) that would enact socialist policies. Furthermore, Röhm desired that the SA absorb the much smaller German Army into its ranks under his leadership.<ref name="Joseph W. Bendersky 2007, p. 96"/> Once the Nazis achieved power, Röhm's SA was directed by Hitler to violently suppress the parties of the left, but they also began attacks against individuals deemed to be associated with conservative reaction.{{sfn|Nyomarkay|1967|pp=123–124, 130}} Hitler saw Röhm's independent actions as violating and possibly threatening his leadership, as well as jeopardising the regime by alienating the conservative President ] and the conservative-oriented German Army.{{sfn|Nyomarkay|1967|p=133}} This resulted in Hitler purging Röhm and other radical members of the SA in 1934, in what came to be known as the ].{{sfn|Nyomarkay|1967|p=133}} | |||
| ==Key elements of the Nazi ideology== | |||
| * ]. | |||
| * ]. | |||
| ** Especially ], which eventually culminated in ]. | |||
| ** The creation of a '']'' (or Herrenvolk) (''Master Race'' = by the ] (''Fountain of Life''; A department in the Third Reich)). | |||
| ** ]. | |||
| ** Belief in the superiority of the White, Germanic, Aryan or ]s. | |||
| * Anti-], ], Anti-]. | |||
| * ]. | |||
| * The rejection of ], with as a consequence the ending of the existence of ], ], and ]. | |||
| * ] (''Leader Principle'') Belief in the leader (responsibility up the ranks, and authority down the ranks). | |||
| * Strong show of local culture. | |||
| * ]. | |||
| * ]; sometimes included sterilization and ]. | |||
| * Limited ] (Point #24 in the 25 point plan). | |||
| * ]. | |||
| * Rejection of the ] movement and an embrace of ]. | |||
| * Defense of ''Blood and Soil'' (]: ''"Blut und Boden"'' - represented by the red and black colors in the Nazi flag). | |||
| * "Lebensraumpolitik", "] im Osten" (the creation of more living space for Germans in the east). | |||
| * Related to ]. | |||
| Before he joined the Bavarian Army to fight in World War I, Hitler had lived a ] lifestyle as a petty street watercolour artist in ] and ] and he maintained elements of this lifestyle later on, going to bed very late and rising in the afternoon, even after he became Chancellor and then Führer.<ref name="publishers"/> After the war, his battalion was absorbed by the ] from 1918 to 1919, where he was elected Deputy Battalion Representative. According to historian ], Hitler attended the funeral of communist ] (a German Jew), wearing a black mourning armband on one arm and a red communist armband on the other,<ref name="Thomas Weber 2011, p. 251"/> which he took as evidence that Hitler's political beliefs had not yet solidified.<ref name="Thomas Weber 2011, p. 251"/> In ''Mein Kampf'', Hitler never mentioned any service with the Bavarian Soviet Republic and he stated that he became an antisemite in 1913 during his years in Vienna. This statement has been disputed by the contention that he was not an antisemite at that time,<ref name="Jeffrey S. Gaab 2008, p. 61"/> even though it is well established that he read many antisemitic tracts and journals during that time and admired ], the antisemitic mayor of Vienna.{{sfn|Kershaw|1999|pages=34–35, 50–52, 60–67}} Hitler altered his political views in response to the signing of the Treaty of Versailles in June 1919 and it was then that he became an antisemitic, German nationalist.<ref name="Jeffrey S. Gaab 2008, p. 61"/> | |||
| ===Nazism and romanticism=== | |||
| According to ], Nazism comes from a different tradition than that of either Liberalism or Marxism. Thus, to understand values of Nazism, it is necessary to explore this connection, without trivializing the movement as it was in its peak years in the 1930s and dismissing it as little more than ]. | |||
| Hitler expressed opposition to capitalism, regarding it as having Jewish origins and accusing capitalism of holding nations ransom to the interests of a parasitic ] ] class.<ref name="R.J. Overy 2004. pp. 399-403"/> He also expressed opposition to communism and egalitarian forms of socialism, arguing that inequality and hierarchy are beneficial to the nation.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|p=49}} He believed that communism was invented by the Jews to weaken nations by promoting class struggle.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|p=50}} After his rise to power, Hitler took a pragmatic position on economics, accepting private property and allowing capitalist private enterprises to exist so long as they adhered to the goals of the Nazi state, but not tolerating enterprises that he saw as being opposed to the national interest.<ref name="Michael Mann 2004, p. 183"/> | |||
| Some historians say that the anti-Semitic element, which did not exist in the sister fascism movements in ] and ], was adopted by Hitler to gain popularity for the movement. {{fact}}Personal accounts by ], Hitler's childhood friend, have varied, offering ambiguous claims that anti-Semitism did and did not date back to Hitler's youth.{{ref_label|Kubizek|1|a}}Ironically, Germany had been a haven for many Jews over the years, including influencial families such as the ], although World War I and the Dolchstosslegende helped to end that legacy. Likewise, although it had always existed, anti-Semitism was rife in the former German Empire. Historians universally accept that Nazism's mass acceptance depended upon nationalistic and anti-immigrantion appeals (which also could include ] and anti-Semitism) and a patriotic flattery toward the wounded collective pride of defeated World War I veterans. Early support for the Nazis, displayed in various parades, came from the old conservative order that was the military. Others have focused on anti-Semitism (rather than general ]) claiming it to have been central to Hitler's '']'', or ''world view.'' | |||
| German business leaders disliked Nazi ideology but came to support Hitler, because they saw the Nazis as a useful ally to promote their interests.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=101}} Business groups made significant financial contributions to the Nazi Party both before and after the Nazi seizure of power, in the hope that a Nazi dictatorship would eliminate the organised labour movement and the left-wing parties.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|pp=100–101}} Hitler actively sought to gain the support of business leaders by arguing that private enterprise is incompatible with democracy.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=99}} | |||
| Many see strong connections to the values of Nazism and the ] tradition of the ] of the early 19th century. Strength, passion, frank declarations of feelings, and deep devotion to family and community were valued by the Nazis though first expressed by many Romantic ]s, ]s, and ]s. ] in particular expressed these values. For instance, Hitler identified closely with the ] of ], who harbored anti-Semitic views as the author of '']''. Some claim that he was one of Hitler's role models, a comment of Kubizek's that is also disputed. Nevertheless, Wagner's most important ]s, the ], express Aryanist ideals, and contain what some people interpret as anti-Semitic caricatures. {{fact}} The ] was also promoted by Hitler. | |||
| Although he opposed communist ideology, Hitler publicly praised the ]'s leader ] and ] on numerous occasions.<ref name="François Furet 1999. pp. 191-192"/> Hitler commended Stalin for seeking to purify the ] of Jewish influences, noting Stalin's purging of Jewish communists such as ], ], ] and ].<ref name="communism"/> While Hitler had always intended to bring Germany into conflict with the Soviet Union so he could gain '']'' ("living space"), he supported a temporary strategic alliance between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union to form a common anti-liberal front so they could defeat liberal democracies, particularly ].<ref name="François Furet 1999. pp. 191-192"/> | |||
| The idealization of tradition, folklore, classical thought, leadership (as exemplified by ]), their rejection of the liberalism of the ] and the decision to call the German state the Third ] (which traces back to the medieval ] and the pre-] ]) has led many to regard the Nazis as ]. | |||
| Hitler admired the ] and its ] as living proof of Germanic superiority over "inferior" races and saw the ] as Germany's natural ally.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Nicosia |first1=Francis R. |title=The Third Reich and the Palestine Question |date=2000 |publisher=Transaction Publishers |isbn=0-7658-0624-X |page=82 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kYFrAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA82}}</ref><ref name="britain"/> He wrote in ''Mein Kampf'': "For a long time to come there will be only two Powers in Europe with which it may be possible for Germany to conclude an alliance. These Powers are Great Britain and Italy."<ref name="britain">{{cite book |last1=Buchanan |first1=Patrick J. |title=Churchill, Hitler, and 'The Unnecessary War': How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World |date=2008 |publisher=Crown/Archetype |isbn=978-0-307-40956-0 |page=325 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PYESsQRyIIMC&pg=PA325 |access-date=7 March 2019 |archive-date=12 July 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712024918/https://books.google.com/books?id=PYESsQRyIIMC&pg=PA325#v=onepage&q&f=false |url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
| ===Nazi mysticism=== | |||
| ] emblem]] | |||
| ] is a term used to describe a ] undercurrent of Nazism that denotes the combination of Nazism with ], ], ], and/or the ]. The esoteric ] and ] were ] that, while only a small part of the ], led into the Nazi party.{{ref_label|Levenda2002|1|a}} | |||
| == Origins == | |||
| ], a member of Thule, actually coached Hitler on his ] skills, and while Hitler has not been shown to have been a member of Thule, he received support from the group. Hitler later dedicated '']'' to Eckart. | |||
| {{see also|Early timeline of Nazism}} | |||
| The historical roots of Nazism are to be found in various elements of European political culture which were in circulation in the intellectual capitals of the continent, what ] called the "scrapheap of ideas" prevalent at the time.<ref>{{cite book| last = Fest| first = Joachim C.|author-link = Joachim Fest | title = Hitler| location = London| publisher = Weidenfeld & Nicolson| year = 1974| orig-year = 1973| isbn = 978-0-297-76755-8}}</ref>{{sfn|Broszat|1987|p=38}} In ''Hitler and the Collapse of the Weimar Republic'', historian ] points out that | |||
| <blockquote>lmost all essential elements of ... Nazi ideology were to be found in the radical positions of ideological protest movements . These were: a virulent anti-Semitism, a blood-and-soil ideology, the notion of a master race, the idea of territorial acquisition and settlement in the East. These ideas were embedded in a popular nationalism which was vigorously anti-modernist, anti-humanist and pseudo-religious.{{sfn|Broszat|1987|p=38}}</blockquote> | |||
| ] showed a strong interest in such matters, although as Steigmann–Gall points out, Hitler and many of his key associates attended Christian services. | |||
| Brought together, the result was an anti-intellectual and politically semi-illiterate ideology lacking cohesion, a product of mass culture which allowed its followers emotional attachment and offered a simplified and easily-digestible world-view based on a political mythology for the masses.{{sfn|Broszat|1987|p=38}} | |||
| Nazi mysticism, however, plays a major role in some forms of contemporary Nazism, with a mythology including such ideas as interdimensional ]-powered ]'s, ] supermen, and a ], along with the more widely known myth of Hitler having escaped to ]. In addition, technology used by the Nazi's was derived from UFO's . | |||
| === Völkisch nationalism === | |||
| ===Ideological competition=== | |||
| {{Main|Völkisch nationalism}} | |||
| Nazism and Communism emerged as two serious contenders for power in ] after the ], particularly as the ] became increasingly unstable. | |||
| {{See also|German Question|German nationalism|Pan-Germanism|Unification of Germany|Völkisch movement}} | |||
| ], considered one of the fathers of ]]] | |||
| Adolf Hitler himself along with other members of the ] (German: ''Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei'', NSDAP) in the ] (1918–1933) were greatly influenced by several 19th- and early 20th-century thinkers and proponents of philosophical, onto-epistemic, and theoretical perspectives on ], ], ], and ] regarding the constitution of ] and theorization of organic-racial societies.<ref>{{cite book |last=Harrington |first=Anne |year=2021 |title=Reenchanted Science: Holism in German Culture from Wilhelm II to Hitler |chapter=Chapter Six: Life Science, Nazi Wholeness, and the 'Machine' in Germany's Midst |chapter-url=https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9780691218083-009/pdf |location=] |publisher=] |doi=10.1515/9780691218083-009 |page=175 |isbn=978-0-691-21808-3 |jstor=j.ctv14163kf.11 |s2cid=162490363 |quote=When Hans Shemm in 1935 declared National Socialism to be "politically applied biology," things began to look up, not only for ], but for the ] in general. After all, if the good National Socialist citizen was now seen as the man or woman who understood and revered what were called "Life's laws," then it seemed clear that the life scientists had a major role to play in defining a National Socialist educational program that would transmit the essence of these laws to every family in every village in the country. So much seemed familiar: the calls among the ] to return to authentic "German" values and "ways of knowing," to "overcome" the materialism and mechanism of the "West" and the "Jewish-international lie" of scientific objectivity; the use of traditional ''volkisch'' tropes that spoke of the ] (''Volk'') as a mystical, pseudobiological whole and the state as an "organism" in which the individual was subsumed in the whole ("You are nothing, your Volk is everything"); the condemnation of ] as an alien force representing chaos, mechanism, and inauthenticity. ] himself had even used the stock imagery of conservative holism in '']'' when he spoke of the democratic state as "a dead mechanism which only lays claim to existence for its own sake" and contrasted this with his vision of statehood for Germany in which "there must be formed a living organism with the exclusive aim of serving a higher idea." |access-date=2 March 2022 |archive-date=5 November 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221105142315/https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9780691218083-009/pdf |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Deichmann 2020">{{cite journal |last=Deichmann |first=Ute |date=2020 |title=Science and political ideology: The example of Nazi Germany |url=https://www.redalyc.org/journal/5117/511767145001/html/ |journal=Mètode Science Studies Journal |publisher=] |volume=10 |issue=Science and Nazism. The unconfessed collaboration of scientists with National Socialism |pages=129–137 |doi=10.7203/metode.10.13657 |issn=2174-9221 |s2cid=203335127 |quote=Although in their basic framework ] and ] were not grounded in science, scientists not only supported them in various ways, but also took advantage of them, for example by using the new possibilities of unethical experimentation in humans that these ideologies provided. Scientists' complicity with Nazi ideology and politics does, however, not mean that all sciences in ] were ideologically tainted. I argue, rather, that despite the fact that some areas of science continued at high levels, science in Nazi Germany was most negatively affected not by the imposition of Nazi ideology on the conduct of science but by the enactment of legal measures that ensured the ]. The ] of young faculty and students was particularly virulent. Moreover, I show that scientists supported Nazi ideologies and policies not only through so-called reductionist science such as ], but also by promoting organicist and holistic ideologies of the racial state. The ideology of leading Nazi party ideologues was strongly influenced by the ] which, in the wake of the writings of philosopher ] and other nineteenth century authors, promoted the idea of ''Volk'' (people) as an organic unity. They did not base their virulent anti-Semitism and racism on anthropological concepts. |doi-access=free |hdl=10550/89369 |hdl-access=free |access-date=2 March 2022 |archive-date=1 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220301195436/https://www.redalyc.org/journal/5117/511767145001/html/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Anker |first=Peder |year=2021 |title=Imperial Ecology: Environmental Order in the British Empire, 1895–1945 |chapter=The Politics of Holism, Ecology, and Human Rights |chapter-url=https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.4159/9780674020221-008/pdf |location=] and ] |publisher=] |doi=10.4159/9780674020221-008 |page=157 |isbn=978-0-674-02022-1 |s2cid=142173094 |quote=The paradoxical character of the politics of holism is the theme of this chapter, which focuses on the mutually shaping relationship between ], ], and the ] politician ]. Smuts was a promoter of international peace and understanding through the League of Nations, but also a defender of ] and ] in his own country. His politics, I will argue, were fully consistent with his holistic philosophy of science. Smuts was guided by the efforts of ecologists such as Bews and Phillips, who provided him with a day-to-day update of the latest advances in scientific knowledge of natural laws governing '']''. A substantial part of this chapter will thus return to their research on human ecology to explore the mutual field of inspiration linking them and Smuts. Two aspects of this human ecological research were particularly important: the human gradualism or ecological "succession" of human personalities researched by Bews, and the concept of an ecological biotic community explored by Phillips. Smuts transformed this research into a policy of racial gradualism that respected local ways of life in different (biotic) communities, a policy he tried to morally sanctify and promote as author of the famous ] about human rights.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author-last=Scheid |author-first=Volker |date=2016 |chapter=Chapter 3: Holism, Chinese Medicine, and Systems Ideologies: Rewriting the Past to Imagine the Future |chapter-url=https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK379258/ |editor1-last=Whitehead |editor1-first=A. |editor2-last=Woods |editor2-first=A. |editor3-last=Atkinson |editor3-first=S. |editor4-last=Macnaughton |editor4-first=J. |editor5-last=Richards |editor5-first=J. |title=The Edinburgh Companion to the Critical Medical Humanities |volume=1 |location=] |publisher=] |doi=10.3366/edinburgh/9781474400046.003.0003 |isbn=978-1-4744-0004-6 |id=Bookshelf ID:NBK379258 |s2cid=13333626 |url=https://www.doabooks.org/doab?func=fulltext&uiLanguage=en&rid=27082 |via=] |quote='''Common Roots: Holism Before and During the Interwar Years''': This chapter cannot explore in detail the complex entanglements between these different notions of holism, or how they reflect Germany's troubled path towards modernity. My starting point, instead, is the ]. By then, holism had become an important resource for people across Europe, the US and beyond—but once again specifically in Germany—for dealing with what ], in 1918, had famously analysed as a widely felt ] with the ]. The very word 'holism' (as opposed to ideas or practices designated as such today), as well as related words like 'emergence' or 'organicism', date from this time. It was coined in 1926 by Jan Smuts to describe a perceived tendency of evolutionary processes towards the formation of wholes, granting these wholes a special onto-epistemic significance that parts lack. This was cultural holism now underpinned by evolutionary science and deployed by Smuts not only as a tool for grasping the coming into being of the world but also as an ideological justification for the development of ] in ]. In ] and then ], holistic science became a mainstream academic endeavour, once more intermingling cultural politics and serious scientific research. Holistic perspectives also became popular in the interwar years among academics and the wider public throughout the UK and US. In France, it was associated with ] and the emergence of neo-Hippocratic thinking in medicine, manifesting the unease many people felt about the shifts that biomedicine was undergoing at the time. |access-date=12 August 2022 |archive-date=12 July 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712024930/https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/33913 |url-status=live }}</ref> In particular, one of the most significant ideological influences on the Nazis was the 19th-century ] philosopher ], whose works had served as an inspiration to Hitler and other Nazi Party members, and whose ideas were implemented among the philosophical and ideological foundations of Nazi-oriented ].<ref name="Deichmann 2020"/> | |||
| What became the Nazi movement arose out of resistance to the ]-inspired insurgencies that occurred in Germany in the aftermath of the First World War. The ] caused a great deal of excitement and interest in the ] version of ] and caused many socialists to adopt ] principles. The 1918-] ] and the 1919 ] in Berlin were both manifestations of this. The ], a loosely organized ] group (essentially a ] of former World War I soldiers) was used to crush both these uprisings and many leaders of the Freikorps, including ], later became leaders in the Nazi party. | |||
| Fichte's works served as an inspiration to Hitler and other Nazi Party members, including ] and ].<ref name="Deichmann 2020"/>{{sfn|Ryback|2010|pp=129–130}} In ''Speeches to the German Nation'' (1808), written amid the ]'s occupation of Berlin during the ], Fichte called for a German national revolution against the ] occupiers, making passionate public speeches, arming his students for battle against the French and stressing the need for action by the German nation so it could free itself.{{sfn|Ryback|2010|p=129}} Fichte's German nationalism was populist and opposed to traditional elites, spoke of the need for a "People's War" (''Volkskrieg'') and put forth concepts similar to those which the Nazis adopted.{{sfn|Ryback|2010|p=129}} Fichte promoted German ] and stressed the need for the German nation to purify itself (including purging the ] of French words, a policy that the Nazis undertook upon their rise to power).{{sfn|Ryback|2010|p=129}} | |||
| Capitalists and conservatives in Germany feared that a takeover by the ] was inevitable and did not trust the democratic parties of the ] to be able to resist a communist revolution. Increasing numbers of capitalists began looking to the nationalist movements as a bulwark against ]. After ]'s ]s took power in ] in 1922, fascism presented itself as a realistic option for opposing "Communism", particularly given Mussolini's success in crushing the Communist and ] movements that had destabilized Italy with a wave of strikes and factory occupations after the First World War. Fascist parties formed in numerous European countries. | |||
| Another important figure in pre-Nazi ''völkisch'' thinking was ], whose work—''Land und Leute'' (''Land and People'', written between 1857 and 1863)—collectively tied the organic German Volk to its native landscape and nature, a pairing which stood in stark opposition to the mechanical and materialistic civilisation which was then developing as a result of ].<ref>George L. Mosse, ''The Crisis of German Ideology: Intellectual Origins of the Third Reich'' (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1964), pp. 19–23.</ref> Geographers ] and ] borrowed from Riehl's work as did Nazi ideologues Alfred Rosenberg and ], both of whom employed some of Riehl's philosophy in arguing that "each nation-state was an organism that required a particular living space in order to survive".<ref>Thomas Lekan and Thomas Zeller, "Introduction: The Landscape of German Environmental History", in ''Germany's Nature: Cultural Landscapes and Environmental History'', edited by Thomas Lekan and Thomas Zeller (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2005), p. 3.</ref> Riehl's influence is overtly discernible in the '']'' (''Blood and Soil'') philosophy introduced by ], which the Nazi agriculturalist Walther Darré and other prominent Nazis adopted.<ref>The Nazi concept of '']'' has connections with this idea, with German farmers being rooted to their soil, needing more of it for the expansion of the German Volk—whereas the Jew is precisely the opposite, nomadic and urban by nature. See: Roderick Stackelberg, ''The Routledge Companion to Nazi Germany'' (New York: Routledge, 2007), p. 259.</ref><ref>Additional evidence of Riehl's legacy can be seen in the Riehl Prize, ''Die Volkskunde als Wissenschaft'' (Folklore as Science) which was awarded in 1935 by the Nazis. See: George L. Mosse, ''The Crisis of German Ideology: Intellectual Origins of the Third Reich'' (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1964), p. 23. Applicants for the Riehl prize had stipulations that included only being of Aryan blood, and no evidence of membership in any Marxist parties or any organisation that stood against National Socialism. See: Hermann Stroback, "Folklore and Fascism before and around 1933," in ''The Nazification of an Academic Discipline: Folklore in the Third Reich'', edited by James R Dow and Hannjost Lixfeld (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994), pp. 62–63.</ref> | |||
| Many historians, such as ] and ], argue that Hitler's Nazis were one of numerous nationalist and increasingly fascistic groups that existed in Germany and contended for leadership of the ] movement and, eventually, of the German state. Further, they assert that fascism and its German variant, ''National Socialism'', became the successful challengers to Communism because they were able to both appeal to the establishment as a bulwark against Bolshevism and appeal to the working class base, particularly the growing underclass of unemployed and unemployable and growingly impoverished middle class elements who were becoming declassed (the ]). The Nazis' use of pro-labor rhetoric appealed to those disaffected with capitalism by promoting the limiting of profits, the abolishing of rents and the increasing of social benefits (only for Germans) while simultaneously presenting a political and economic model that divested "Soviet socialism" of elements that were dangerous to capitalism, such as the concept of ], "the ]" or worker control of the ]. Thus, Nazism's populist ] and ] helped it become more powerful and popular than traditional ] parties, like the ]. The simplicity of Nazi rhetoric, campaigns, and ideology also made its conservative allies underestimate its strength, and its ability to govern or even to last as a ]. | |||
| ''Völkisch'' nationalism denounced soulless ], ] and ] ] industrial society, while advocating a "superior" society based on ethnic German "folk" culture and German "blood".<ref name="encyclopedia7" /> It denounced foreigners and foreign ideas and declared that Jews, ] and others were "traitors to the nation" and unworthy of inclusion.<ref name="constructing"/> ''Völkisch'' nationalism saw the world in terms of ] and ] and it viewed societies as organic, extolling the virtues of ] life, condemning the neglect of tradition and the decay of morals, denounced the destruction of the natural environment and condemned "cosmopolitan" cultures such as Jews and Romani.<ref name="Jonathan Olsen 1999, p. 62"/> | |||
| ===Support of anti-Communists for Fascism and Nazism=== | |||
| Various ] politicians and political parties in Europe welcomed the rise of fascism and the Nazis out of an intense aversion towards Communism. According to them, Hitler was the savior of ] and of capitalism against ]. During the later 1930s and 1940s, the Nazis were supported by the ] movement in Spain, and by political and military figures who would form the government of ]. A '']'' (LVF) and other anti-] fighting formations were formed. | |||
| The first party that attempted to combine nationalism and socialism was the ], which predominantly aimed to solve the conflict between the Austrian Germans and the Czechs in the multi-ethnic ], then part of ].<ref>Andrew Gladding Whiteside, Austrian National Socialism before 1918, (1962), pp. 1–3</ref> In 1896 the German politician Friedrich Naumann formed the National-Social Association which aimed to combine German nationalism and a non-Marxist form of socialism together; the attempt turned out to be futile and the idea of linking nationalism with socialism quickly became equated with antisemites, extreme German nationalists and the ''völkisch'' movement in general.{{sfn|Kershaw|1999|p=135}} | |||
| The British Conservative party and the right-wing parties in France ] the Nazi regime in the mid- and late-1930s, even though they had begun to criticise its ] and in Britain especially, Nazi Germany's policies towards the Jews. However, Britain under both Conservative and ] had appeased pre-Nazi Germany. Left-wing contemporary commentators suggested that these parties did in fact support the Nazis. Important reasons behind this appeasement included, first, the erroneous assumption that Hitler had no desire to precipitate another world war, and second, when the rebirth of the German military could no longer be ignored, a well-founded concern that neither Britain nor France was yet ready to fight an all-out war against Germany. In addition, some have argued that Nazi Germany was assisted in its development to create a front to counter early Bolshevik ambitions. | |||
| ], a major exponent of Pan-Germanism in Austria]] | |||
| In 1936, Nazi Germany and ] entered into the ], aimed directly at countering Soviet foreign policy. This later became the basis for the ] with Italy, the foundation of the ]. The three nations were united in their rabid opposition to ], as well as their militaristic, racist regimes, but they failed to coordinate their military efforts effectively. | |||
| During the era of the ], ''völkisch'' nationalism was overshadowed by both Prussian patriotism and the federalist tradition of its various component states.<ref name="Nina Witoszek 2002. pp. 89-90"/> The events of World War I, including the end of the Prussian monarchy in Germany, resulted in a surge of revolutionary ''völkisch'' nationalism.<ref name="witoszek"/> The Nazis supported such revolutionary ''völkisch'' nationalist policies<ref name="Nina Witoszek 2002. pp. 89-90"/> and they claimed that their ideology was influenced by the leadership and policies of ] ], who was instrumental in founding the German Empire.{{sfn|Gerwarth|2007|p=150}} The Nazis declared that they were dedicated to continuing the process of creating a unified German ] that Bismarck had begun and desired to achieve.{{sfn|Gerwarth|2007|p=149}} While Hitler was supportive of Bismarck's creation of the German Empire, he was critical of Bismarck's moderate domestic policies.{{sfn|Gerwarth|2007|p=54}} On the issue of Bismarck's support of a '']'' ("Lesser Germany", excluding Austria) versus the Pan-German '']'' ("Greater Germany") which the Nazis advocated, Hitler stated that Bismarck's attainment of ''Kleindeutschland'' was the "highest achievement" Bismarck could have achieved "within the limits possible at that time".{{sfn|Gerwarth|2007|pp=54, 131}} In ''Mein Kampf'', Hitler presented himself as a "second Bismarck".{{sfn|Gerwarth|2007|p=131}} | |||
| During his youth in Austria, Hitler was politically influenced by Austrian Pan-Germanist proponent ], who advocated radical ], antisemitism, ], ] and anti-Habsburg views.<ref name="nicholls236237"/> From von Schönerer and his followers, Hitler adopted for the Nazi movement the ''Heil'' greeting, the ''Führer'' title and the model of absolute party leadership.<ref name="nicholls236237"/> Hitler was also impressed by the ] antisemitism and the anti-liberal bourgeois agitation of ], who as the mayor of Vienna during Hitler's time in the city used a rabble-rousing style of oratory that appealed to the wider masses.<ref name="nicholls159160"/> Unlike von Schönerer, Lueger was not a German nationalist and instead was a pro-Catholic Habsburg supporter and only used German nationalist notions occasionally for his own agenda.<ref name="nicholls159160"/> Although Hitler praised both Lueger and Schönerer, he criticised the former for not applying a racial doctrine against the Jews and Slavs.<ref>{{cite book|author=Brigitte Hamann|title=Hitler's Vienna: A Portrait of the Tyrant as a Young Man|year=2010|publisher=Tauris Parke Paperbacks|isbn=978-1-84885-277-8|page=302}}</ref> | |||
| In his early years Hitler also greatly admired ]. In ''Mein Kampf'', he praised the United States for its ]-based ] laws and for the subordination of the "inferior" black population. According to Hitler, America was a successful nation because it kept itself "pure" of "lesser races". However, his view of the United States became more negative as time passed. In his later estimations, the United States was becoming a mongrel nation, calling it "half Judaised, half Negrified".{{citation needed}} | |||
| === Racial theories and antisemitism === | |||
| ==Economic practice== | |||
| {{main|Nazism and race}} | |||
| See also: ] | |||
| ], one of the key inventors of the theory of the "]"]] | |||
| ] as their symbol, using the colors red and black to represent ''Blut und Boden'' (blood and soil). Black, white, and red were in fact the colors of the old ] flag, based on the ] colors black and white, combined with the red and white of the medieval ]. In 1871, with the foundation of the German Reich, the flag of the North German Confederation became the German ''Reichsflagge'' (Reich's flag). Black, white, and red subsequently became the colors of German nationalism (e.g. during ] and the ] and arguably, even today).]] | |||
| Nazi economic practice concerned itself with immediate domestic issues and separately with ideological conceptions of ]. | |||
| The concept of the ], which the Nazis promoted, stems from racial theories asserting that Europeans are the descendants of Indo-Iranian settlers, people of ancient ] and ancient ].<ref name="autogenerated6"/> Proponents of this theory based their assertion on the fact that words in European languages and words in Indo-Iranian languages have similar pronunciations and meanings.<ref name=autogenerated6 /> ] argued that the Germanic peoples held close racial connections to the ancient Indians and the ancient Persians, who he claimed were advanced peoples that possessed a great capacity for wisdom, nobility, restraint and science.<ref name=autogenerated6/> Contemporaries of Herder used the concept of the Aryan race to draw a distinction between what they deemed to be "high and noble" Aryan culture versus that of "parasitic" Semitic culture.<ref name=autogenerated6/> | |||
| Domestic economic policy was narrowly concerned with three major goals: | |||
| * Elimination of unemployment. | |||
| * Elimination of hyperinflation. | |||
| * Expansion of production of consumer goods to improve middle and lower-class living standards. | |||
| Notions of ] and Aryan racial superiority were combined in the 19th century, with white supremacists maintaining the belief that certain groups of ] were members of an Aryan "master race" that is superior to other races and particularly superior to the Semitic race, which they associated with "cultural sterility".<ref name=autogenerated6 /> ], a French racial theorist and aristocrat, blamed the fall of the '']'' in France on racial degeneracy caused by ], which he argued had destroyed the purity of the Aryan race, a term which he only reserved for Germanic people.<ref name="autogenerated8"/><ref>A. J. Woodman. ''The Cambridge Companion to Tacitus'', 2009, p. 294: "The white race was defined as beautiful, honourable and destined to rule; within it the Aryans are '{{lang|fr|cette illustre famille humaine, la plus noble}}'." Originally a linguistic term synonymous with Indo-European, ']' became, not least because of the Essai, the designation of a race, which Gobineau specified was 'la race germanique'</ref> Gobineau's theories, which attracted a strong following in Germany,<ref name=autogenerated8 /> emphasised the existence of an irreconcilable ] between Aryan (]) and ]s.<ref name=autogenerated6/> | |||
| All of these policy goals were intended to address the perceived shortcomings of the ] and to solidify domestic support for the party. In this, the party was very successful. Between 1933 and 1936 the ] ] increased by an average annual rate of 9.5 percent, and the rate for industry alone rose by 17.2 percent. | |||
| ], whose book ''The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century'' would prove to be a seminal work in the history of German nationalism]] | |||
| This expansion propelled the German economy out of a deep ] and into full employment in less than four years. Public consumption during the same period increased by 18.7%, while private consumption increased by 3.6% annually. However, as this production was primarily consumptive rather than productive (make-work projects, expansion of the war-fighting machine, initiation of conscription to remove working age males from the labor force and thus lower unemployment), inflationary pressures began to rear their head again, although not to the highs of the Weimar Republic. These economic pressures, combined with the war-fighting machine created in the expansion (and concomitant pressures for its use), has led some to conclude that a European war was inevitable. (See ]). | |||
| Aryan ] claimed that ] originated in Aryan religious traditions, and that Jews had usurped the legend from Aryans.<ref name=autogenerated6 /> ], an English-born German proponent of racial theory, supported notions of Germanic supremacy and antisemitism in Germany.<ref name="autogenerated8"/> Chamberlain's work, '']'' (1899), praised Germanic peoples for their creativity and idealism while asserting that the Germanic spirit was threatened by a "Jewish" spirit of selfishness and ].<ref name=autogenerated8 /> Chamberlain used his thesis to promote ] ] while denouncing ], ] and ].<ref name=autogenerated8 /> The book became popular, especially in Germany.<ref name=autogenerated8 /> Chamberlain stressed a nation's need to maintain its racial purity in order to prevent its degeneration and argued that racial intermingling with Jews should never be permitted.<ref name=autogenerated8 /> In 1923, Chamberlain met Hitler, whom he admired as a leader of the rebirth of the free spirit.<ref name="encyclopedia9"/> ]'s work '']'' (1916) advocated ] and proposed that a ] program should be implemented in order to preserve the purity of the Nordic race. After reading the book, Hitler called it "my Bible".<ref>{{cite book |author=Stefan Kühl|title=Nazi Connection: Eugenics, American Racism, and German National Socialism|year=2002|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-514978-4}}</ref> | |||
| Some economists {{fact}} argue that the expansion of the German economy between 1933 and 1936 was not the result of measures adopted by the Nazi Party, but rather the consequence of economic policies of the prior Weimar Republic, which had begun to have an effect on factors such as ]. However, it was the policies of Nazi Germany that restored national confidence, arguably the key ingrediant to any successful economic policy. | |||
| In Germany, the belief that Jews were economically exploiting Germans became prominent due to the ascendancy of many wealthy Jews into prominent positions upon the ] in 1871.<ref name="Brustein207">William Brustein. ''Roots of Hate: Anti-Semitism in Europe Before the Holocaust''. Cambridge University Press, 2003, p. 207.</ref> From 1871 to the early 20th century, German Jews were overrepresented in Germany's upper and middle classes while they were underrepresented in Germany's lower classes, particularly in the fields of agricultural and industrial labour.<ref name="Brustein210"/> German Jewish financiers and bankers played a key role in fostering Germany's economic growth from 1871 to 1913 and they benefited enormously from this boom. In 1908, amongst the twenty-nine wealthiest German families with aggregate fortunes of up to 55 million marks at the time, five were Jewish and the ] were the second wealthiest German family.<ref>William Brustein. ''Roots of Hate: Anti-Semitism in Europe Before the Holocaust''. Cambridge University Press, 2003, pp. 207, 209.</ref> The predominance of Jews in Germany's banking, commerce and industry sectors during this time period was very high, even though Jews were estimated to account for only 1% of the population of Germany.<ref name="Brustein207"/> The overrepresentation of Jews in these areas fuelled resentment among non-Jewish Germans during periods of economic crisis.<ref name="Brustein210">Brustein, 2003, p. 210.</ref> The 1873 stock market crash and the ensuing depression resulted in a spate of attacks on alleged Jewish economic dominance in Germany and antisemitism increased.<ref name="Brustein210" /> During this time period, in the 1870s, German ] began to adopt antisemitic and racist themes and it was also adopted by a number of radical right political movements.<ref name="witoszek10" /> | |||
| ] (born 7 October 1886 in Heidelberg; died 2 November 1950 in Heidelberg) was a Board member of ''']''' Germanys largest insurance company and was a German economic leader and the Reich Economy Minister from June 1933 until January 1935. | |||
| Radical antisemitism was promoted by prominent advocates of ''völkisch'' nationalism, including ], ] and ].<ref name="Jonathan Olsen 1999, p. 62"/> De Lagarde called the Jews a "], the carriers of decay ... who pollute every national culture ... and destroy all faiths with their materialistic liberalism" and he called for the extermination of the Jews.<ref name="Jack Fischel 1998, p. 5"/> Langbehn called for a war of annihilation against the Jews, and his genocidal policies were later published by the Nazis and given to soldiers on the front during ].<ref name="Jack Fischel 1998, p. 5"/> One antisemitic ideologue of the period, ], even used the term "National Socialism" to describe his own anti-capitalist take on the ''völkisch'' nationalist template.<ref>], '']'', Simon & Schuster, 1990, p. 220</ref> | |||
| Internationally, the Nazi Party believed that an ] ] was behind the global depression of the 1930s. Control of this cabal, which had grown to a position where it controlled both Europe and the United States, was identified with an elite and powerful group of Jews. However, a number of people believed that this was part of an ongoing plot by the Jewish people, as a whole, to achieve ]. The ], which began its circulation in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century, were said to have confirmed this, already showing "evidence" that the Bolshevik takeover in Russia was in accordance with one of the protocols. Broadly speaking, the existence of large international ] or merchant banking organizations was well known at this time. Many of these banking organizations were able to exert influence upon nation states by extension or withholding of credit. This influence is not limited to the small states that preceded the creation of the ] as a ] in the 1870s, but is noted in most major histories of all ] powers from the 16th century onward. Nevertheless, after the ], this libelous and unverified manuscript took on an important role in Nazi Germany, thus providing another link in the Nazis ideological motivation for the destruction of that group in ]. | |||
| Johann Gottlieb Fichte accused Jews in Germany of having been and inevitably of continuing to be a "state within a state" that threatened German national unity.{{sfn|Ryback|2010|p=129}} Fichte promoted two options in order to address this, his first one being the creation of a Jewish state in ] so the Jews could be impelled to leave Europe.{{sfn|Ryback|2010|p=130}} His second option was violence against Jews and he said that the goal of the violence would be "to cut off all their heads in one night, and set new ones on their shoulders, which should not contain a single Jewish idea".{{sfn|Ryback|2010|p=130}} | |||
| == Effects == | |||
| These theories were used to justify a ] political agenda of racialism, which grew to include the racist persecution of Jews while ]. | |||
| '']'' (1912) is an antisemitic forgery created by the secret service of the ], the ]. Many antisemites believed it was real and thus it became widely popular after World War I.<ref name="stackelberg"/> ''The Protocols'' claimed that there was a secret international Jewish conspiracy to take over the world.<ref name="kershaw"/> Hitler had been introduced to ''The Protocols'' by ] and from 1920 onwards he focused his attacks by claiming that ] and Marxism were directly connected, that Jews and ] were one and the same and that Marxism was a Jewish ideology-this became known as "]".<ref name="dictator"/> Hitler believed that ''The Protocols'' were authentic.<ref name="dictator11"/> | |||
| Like other fascist regimes, the Nazi regime emphasized ], opposition to corporate interests not aligned with the state, uniting all workers to work for the common good, and the '''leader principle''' ''(])'', a key element of fascist ideology in which the ruler is deemed to embody the political movement and the nation. Unlike some other fascist ideologies, Nazism was virulently racist. Some of the manifestations of Nazi racism were: | |||
| During his life in ] between 1907 and 1913, Hitler became fervently ].<ref>{{Cite web |title=Nazism |url=https://www.britannica.com/event/Nazisma |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240228205817/https://www.britannica.com/event/Nazism |archive-date=28 February 2024 |website=Britannica}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Pinkus |first=Oscar |title=The War Aims and Strategies of Adolf Hitler |publisher=McFarland & Company, Inc. |year=2005 |isbn=978-0-7864-2054-4 |pages=27}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Davies |first=Norman |title=Europe: A History |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1997 |isbn=0-19-820171-0 |location=New York |page=850}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Housden |first=Martyn |title=Hitler: Study of a Revolutionary? |publisher=Routledge |year=2000 |isbn=0-415-16359-5 |location=New York |page=32 |chapter=2: Ideologue}}</ref> Prior to the Nazi ascension to power, Hitler often blamed moral degradation on '']'' ("racial defilement"), a way to assure his followers of his continuing antisemitism, which had been toned down for popular consumption.<ref name="Koonz2005">{{cite book|author=Claudia Koonz|author-link=Claudia Koonz|title=The Nazi Conscience|year=2005|publisher=Belknap Press of Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-01842-6}}</ref> Prior to the induction of the Nuremberg Race Laws in 1935 by the Nazis, many German nationalists such as ] strongly supported laws to ban ''Rassenschande'' between Aryans and Jews as racial treason.<ref name="Koonz2005"/> Even before the laws were officially passed, the Nazis banned sexual relations and marriages between party members and Jews.<ref name="Weikart2009">{{cite book|author=Richard Weikart|title=Hitler's Ethic|url=https://archive.org/details/hitlersethicnazi00weik|url-access=limited|year=2009|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-0-230-62398-9|page=}}</ref> Party members found guilty of ''Rassenschande'' were severely punished; some party members were even sentenced to death.<ref name="Gordon1984">{{cite book|author=Sarah Ann Gordon|title=Hitler, Germans, and the 'Jewish Question'|year=1984|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-0-691-10162-0|page=|url=https://archive.org/details/hitlergermansjew0000gord/page/265}}</ref> | |||
| * ], culminating in ]. | |||
| * ], including the notion of Germanic people's status as the '']'' ("master race") and '']''. | |||
| * A belief in the need to purify the German race through ] (this culminated in the involuntary ] of disabled people and the ] of people with mental deficiencies or illnesses perceived as hereditary). | |||
| The Nazis claimed that Bismarck was unable to complete German national unification because Jews had infiltrated the German parliament and they claimed that their abolition of parliament had ended this obstacle to unification.{{sfn|Gerwarth|2007|p=150}} Using the ], the Nazis accused Jews—and other populations who it considered non-German—of possessing extra-national loyalties, thereby exacerbating German ] about the '']'' (the Jewish Question), the ] political ] which was popular when the ethnic ''völkisch'' movement and its politics of ] for establishing a '']'' was strong.<ref name=PostWWIAntisemitism/><ref name="JFrage"/> | |||
| Anti-clericalism can also be interpreted as part of Nazi ideology, simply because the new Nazi hierarchy was not about to let itself be overode by the power that the Church traditionally held. In Austria, clerics had a powerful role in politics and ultimately responded to the ]. Although a few exceptions exist, ] persecution was primarily limited to those who refused to accommodate the new regime and yield to its power. The Nazis often used the church to justify their stance and included many ] symbols in the Third Reich (Steigmann–Gall). A particularly poignant exemplar is the seen in the life of ]. | |||
| Nazism's racial policy positions may have developed from the views of important biologists of the 19th century, including French ] ], through ]'s idealist version of ] and the father of ], German ] ].<ref name="Peter J. Bowler 1989. pp. 304-305"/> Haeckel's works were later condemned by the Nazis as inappropriate for "National-Socialist formation and education in the Third Reich". This may have been because of his "]" ], ] philosophy, which the Nazis disliked, along with his friendliness to Jews, opposition to militarism and support altruism, with one Nazi official calling for them to be banned.<ref name="Robert J. Richards 2008. pp. 7-8"/> Unlike Darwinian theory, Lamarckian theory officially ranked races in a hierarchy of evolution from ]s while Darwinian theory did not grade races in a hierarchy of higher or lower evolution from apes, but simply stated that all humans as a whole had progressed in their evolution from apes.<ref name="Peter J. Bowler 1989. pp. 304-305"/> Many Lamarckians viewed "lower" races as having been exposed to debilitating conditions for too long for any significant "improvement" of their condition to take place in the near future.<ref name="evolution"/> Haeckel used Lamarckian theory to describe the existence of interracial struggle and put races on a hierarchy of evolution, ranging from wholly human to ].<ref name="Peter J. Bowler 1989. pp. 304-305"/> | |||
| == Backlash and Societal Effects == | |||
| Perhaps the primary intellectual effect has been that Nazi doctrines discredited the attempt to use ] to explain or influence social issues, for at least two generations after Nazi Germany's brief existence. | |||
| ], or Mendelism, was supported by the Nazis, as well as by mainstream eugenicists of the time. The Mendelian theory of inheritance declared that genetic traits and attributes were passed from one generation to another.<ref name="university14"/> Eugenicists used Mendelian inheritance theory to demonstrate the transfer of biological illness and impairments from parents to children, including mental disability, whereas others also used Mendelian theory to demonstrate the inheritance of social traits, with racialists claiming a racial nature behind certain general traits such as inventiveness or criminal behaviour.<ref name="friedlander"/> | |||
| The Nazi descendants have been mute in the post-war democracies, with some exceptions, when interviewed by psychologists and historians. In Norway, a group of descendants have taken the official stigmatizing appellation "]" in order to break the silence and to protest against the continuous demonization of their families. Some ] disseminate ] that minimizes the Holocaust and other Nazi acts in order to remove the stigma attached to National Socialism. Often, attempts are also made to put a ] on the policies of the Nazi regime and the events that occurred under it. | |||
| These revisionists are often, however, involved in political matters and aligned with, or in the employ of, neo-Nazis. This fact itself often casts suspicion on their beliefs. | |||
| ==== Use of the American racist model ==== | |||
| == People and history == | |||
| Hitler and other Nazi legal theorists were inspired by America's ] and saw it as the model to follow. In particular, they saw it as a model for the expansion of territory and the elimination of indigenous inhabitants therefrom, for ], which they wanted to implement also against Jews, and for ] banning some races. In ''Mein Kampf'', Hitler extolled America as the only contemporary example of a country with racist ("völkisch") citizenship statutes in the 1920s, and Nazi lawyers made use of the American models in crafting laws for Nazi Germany.<ref name="Whitman"/> U.S. citizenship laws and ] directly inspired the two principal ]—the Citizenship Law and the Blood Law.<ref name="Whitman">{{cite book|last1=Whitman|first1=James Q.|title=Hitler's American Model: The United States and the Making of Nazi Race Law|date=2017|publisher=Princeton University Press|pages=37–47}}</ref> | |||
| ] | |||
| === Response to World War I and Italian Fascism === | |||
| The most prominent Nazi was ], who ruled ] from ], ], until his suicide on ], ], and led the German ] into ]. After the war, many prominent Nazis were convicted of ]s and ] at the ], where 21 were executed. | |||
| During World War I, German sociologist ] spoke of the rise of a "National Socialism" in Germany within what he termed the "]" that were a declaration of war against the "ideas of 1789" (the ]).<ref name="Martin Kitchen 2006, p. 205"/> According to Plenge, the "ideas of 1789" which included the rights of man, democracy, individualism and liberalism were being rejected in favour of "the ideas of 1914" which included the "German values" of duty, discipline, law and order.<ref name="Martin Kitchen 2006, p. 205" /> Plenge believed that ethnic solidarity ('']'') would replace class division and that "racial comrades" would unite to create a socialist society in the struggle of "proletarian" Germany against "capitalist" Britain.<ref name="Martin Kitchen 2006, p. 205" /> He believed that the "Spirit of 1914" manifested itself in the concept of the "People's League of National Socialism".<ref name="Bernd-Rüdiger Hüppauf 1997, p. 92" /> This National Socialism was a form of ] that rejected the "idea of boundless freedom" and promoted an economy that would serve the whole of Germany under the leadership of the state.<ref name="Bernd-Rüdiger Hüppauf 1997, p. 92" /> This National Socialism was opposed to capitalism due to the components that were against "the national interest" of Germany, but insisted that National Socialism would strive for greater efficiency in the economy.<ref name="Bernd-Rüdiger Hüppauf 1997, p. 92" /> Plenge advocated an authoritarian, rational ruling elite to develop National Socialism through a hierarchical ] state,<ref name="Thomas Rohkrämer 2007, p. 130" /> and his ideas were part of the basis of Nazism.<ref name="Martin Kitchen 2006, p. 205"/> | |||
| ], a philosopher of history]] | |||
| A few scattered people, mostly not from Germany, converted to Nazism during or after ] and contributed to further development of the ideology, especially in a spiritual or esoteric direction: ] of Ireland, ] of France, ] of Italy, ] of Chile and ], as well as ], within the United States. | |||
| ], a German cultural philosopher, was a major influence on Nazism, although after 1933 he became alienated from Nazism and was later condemned by the Nazis for criticising Adolf Hitler.<ref name="autogenerated16"/> Spengler's conception of national socialism and a number of his political views were shared by the Nazis and the ].<ref name=autogenerated7 /> Spengler's views were also popular amongst ], including ].<ref name="encyclopedia15"/> | |||
| ==The role of the nation== | |||
| ] or ''gamma cross''.]] | |||
| Spengler's book '']'' (1918), written during the final months of World War I, addressed the supposed ] of modern European civilisation, which he claimed was caused by atomising and irreligious individualisation and ].<ref name=autogenerated16/> Spengler's major thesis was that a law of historical development of cultures existed involving a cycle of birth, maturity, ageing and death when it reaches its final form of civilisation.<ref name="autogenerated16"/> Upon reaching the point of civilisation, a culture will lose its creative capacity and succumb to ] until the emergence of "]s" creates a new epoch.<ref name="autogenerated16"/> Spengler considered the ] as having succumbed to decadence of intellect, money, cosmopolitan urban life, irreligious life, ] ] and believed that it was at the end of its biological and "spiritual" fertility.<ref name="autogenerated16"/> He believed that the "young" German nation as an imperial power would inherit the legacy of ], lead a restoration of value in "]" and instinct, while the ideals of rationalism would be revealed as absurd.<ref name="autogenerated16"/> | |||
| The Nazi state was founded upon a racially defined "German Volk". This is a central concept of '']'', symbolized by the motto ''Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Führer'' (one people, one empire, one leader). The Nazi relationship between the Volk and the state was called the '']'' ("people's community"), a neologism that defined a communal duty of citizens in service to the Reich. The term "National Socialism", arguably derives from this citizen-nation relationship, whereby the term ''socialism'' is invoked (despite the fact that socialism is traditionally defined as "worker's ownership over the means of production") and is meant to be realized through the common duty of the Volk to the Reich or German nation; all actions are to be in service of the Reich. This notion of the Reich, in turn, was a virulently ''nationalist'' ideology, a tendency that decisively defined its organizational thrust and overall immediate and long-term aims. In practice, the Nazis argued, their goal was to bring forth a nation-state as the locus and embodiment of the people's collective will, bound by the ''Volksgemeinschaft'' as both an ideal and an operating instrument, geared to serve the interests of the German people. | |||
| Spengler's notions of "Prussian socialism" as described in his book '']'' ("Prussiandom and Socialism", 1919), influenced Nazism and the ].<ref name=autogenerated7/> Spengler wrote: "The meaning of socialism is that life is controlled not by the opposition between rich and poor, but by the rank that achievement and talent bestow. That is ''our'' freedom, freedom from the economic despotism of the individual".<ref name="autogenerated7"/> Spengler adopted the anti-English ideas addressed by Plenge and Sombart during World War I that condemned ] and ] while advocating a national socialism that was free from ] and that would connect the individual to the state through ] organisation.<ref name="autogenerated16"/> Spengler claimed that socialistic Prussian characteristics existed across Germany, including creativity, discipline, concern for the greater good, productivity and self-sacrifice.<ref name="university17"/> He prescribed war as a necessity by saying: "War is the eternal form of higher human existence and states exist for war: they are the expression of the will to war".<ref name="university18"/> | |||
| In comparison, many socialist ideologies oppose the idea of nations, which they see as artificial divisions that support the ] and ]. They argue that one crucial consequence of national divisions is that they lead to wars of aggression, waged for the interest of the ]. The contested relationship between socialism and collectivism on the one hand, and the Nazi and Fascist movements on the other, is discussed at ]. | |||
| ] during the ] in Berlin, 1920<ref>German Federal Archive image description</ref> (The Marinebrigade Erhardt used the ] as its symbol, as seen on their helmets and on the truck, which inspired the Nazi Party to adopt it as the movement's symbol.)]] | |||
| == Factors that promoted the success of Nazism == | |||
| An important question about Nazism is the factors that promoted its success in Germany. These factors may have included: | |||
| Spengler's definition of socialism did not advocate a change to property relations.<ref name=autogenerated7/> He denounced Marxism for seeking to train the proletariat to "expropriate the expropriator", the capitalist and then to let them live a life of leisure on this expropriation.<ref name="H. Stuart Hughes 1992, p. 108"/> He claimed that "Marxism is the capitalism of the working class" and not true socialism.<ref name="H. Stuart Hughes 1992, p. 108"/> According to Spengler, true socialism would be in the form of corporatism, stating that "local corporate bodies organised according to the importance of each occupation to the people as a whole; higher representation in stages up to a supreme council of the state; mandates revocable at any time; no organised parties, no professional politicians, no periodic elections".<ref name="transaction"/> | |||
| * ] devastation all over ] after ]. | |||
| * Humiliation of Germany at the ], and the widespread belief that the German military were not defeated on the battlefield but "]" by politicians and ]s. | |||
| * A perception that there were a disproportionate number of rich ] ]s controlling Germany's finances. | |||
| * Perceived Jewish involvement in ] during WWI. | |||
| * Appeal of ] rhetoric. | |||
| * Rejection of ] and the perception that Communism was a Jewish-inspired and Jewish-led movement; hence the Nazi use of the term ''Judeo-Bolshevik''. | |||
| * The split in the working class between Social Democrats (SPD) and Communists, exacerbated by the Communists' policy of treating the SPD as ] | |||
| * The ]. | |||
| * Hitler's choice of taking power through legal political means rather than a violent ] after the failure of the ]. | |||
| ]'' (1923), translated as "The Third Reich", by ]]] | |||
| == Nazi / Third Reich terminology in popular culture == | |||
| The multiple atrocities and racist ideology that the Nazis followed have made them notorious in popular discourse as well as history. The term "Nazi" has become a genericised term of abuse. So have other Third Reich terms like "Führer" (often spelled "fuhrer" or less often, but more correctly, "fuehrer" in English-speaking countries), "Fascist", "]" (short for ''Geheime Staatspolizei'', or ''Secret State Police'' in English) or "Hitler". The terms are used to describe any people or behaviours that are viewed as thuggish, overly authoritarian, or extremist. | |||
| ], an antisemitic German intellectual, used Spengler's thesis on the cultural confrontation between Jews as whom Spengler described as a ]an people versus ] as a ]ian people.<ref name="MordecaiKaplan">{{cite book |first=Mordecai M. |last=Kaplan |title=Judaism as a Civilization: Toward a Reconstruction of American-Jewish Life |page=73}}</ref> Stapel described Jews as a landless nomadic people in pursuit of an international culture whereby they can integrate into Western civilisation.<ref name="MordecaiKaplan"/> As such, Stapel claims that Jews have been attracted to "international" versions of socialism, pacifism or capitalism because as a landless people the Jews have transgressed various national cultural boundaries.<ref name="MordecaiKaplan"/> | |||
| The terms are also used to describe anyone or anything seen as strict or doctrinaire. Phrases like "]", "]", and "] Nazi" are examples of those in use in the USA. These uses are offensive to some, as the controversy in the popular press over the '']'' "]" episode indicates, but still the terms are used so frequently as to inspire "]". | |||
| For all of Spengler's influence on the movement, he was opposed to its antisemitism. He wrote in his personal papers "ow much envy of the capability of other people in view of one's lack of it lies hidden in anti-Semitism!" as well as "hen one would rather destroy business and scholarship than see Jews in them, one is an ideologue, i.e., a danger for the nation. Idiotic."<ref>{{cite book |first=John |last=Farrenkopf |title=Prophet of Decline: Spengler on World History and Politics|date=2001 |pages=237–238|publisher=LSU Press |isbn=9780807127278}}</ref> | |||
| More innocent terms, like "fashion police", also bear some resemblance to Nazi terminology (Gestapo, Secret State Police) as well as references to ]s in general. | |||
| ] was initially the dominant figure of the Conservative Revolutionaries influenced Nazism.<ref name="university19"/> He rejected ] conservatism while proposing a new state that he coined the "Third Reich", which would unite all classes under ] rule.<ref name="macmillan"/> Van den Bruck advocated a combination of the nationalism of the right and the socialism of the left.<ref name="millennial"/> | |||
| Another similar effect can be observed in the usage of ]s. Some people strongly associate the ] typefaces (e.g. ] or ]) with Nazi propaganda (although the typeface is much older, and its usage, ironically, was banned by government order in 1941). A less strong association can be observed with the '']'' typeface, which today is sometimes described as "germanic" and "muscular". | |||
| ] was a major influence on Nazism. The seizure of power by Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini in the ] in 1922 drew admiration by Hitler, who less than a month later had begun to model himself and the ] upon Mussolini and the Fascists.{{sfn|Kershaw|1999|p=182}} Hitler presented the Nazis as a form of German fascism.<ref name="Fulda, Bernhard 2009, p. 65"/><ref name="Carlsten, F. L. 1982, p. 80"/> In November 1923, the Nazis attempted a "March on Berlin" modelled after the March on Rome, which resulted in the failed ] in ].<ref name="dissolution"/> | |||
| In popular culture such as films like the '']'' series, Nazis are often considered to be ideal villains whom the heroes can battle without mercy. | |||
| Hitler spoke of Nazism being indebted to the success of Fascism's rise to power in Italy.<ref name="Hugh R. Trevor-Roper 2008. p10">Hugh R. Trevor-Roper (ed.), Gerhard L. Weinberg (ed.). ''Hitler's Table Talk 1941–1944: Secret Conversations''. Enigma Books, 2008. p. 10</ref> In a private conversation in 1941, Hitler said that "the brown shirt would probably not have existed without the black shirt", the "brown shirt" referring to the ] and the "black shirt" referring to the ].<ref name="Hugh R. Trevor-Roper 2008. p10"/> He also said in regards to the 1920s: "If Mussolini had been outdistanced by Marxism, I don't know whether we could have succeeded in holding out. At that period National Socialism was a very fragile growth".<ref name="Hugh R. Trevor-Roper 2008. p10"/> | |||
| Video game website ] declared Nazis to be the most memorable ]s ever . | |||
| Other Nazis—especially those at the time associated with the party's more radical wing such as ], Joseph Goebbels and Heinrich Himmler—rejected ], accusing it of being too conservative or capitalist.<ref name="university21"/> ] condemned Italian Fascism for being racially confused and having influences from ].<ref name="stanley"/> Strasser criticised the policy of {{Lang|de|]}} as being created by Mussolini and considered its presence in Nazism as a foreign imported idea.<ref name="Stanley G. Payne 1995, p. 464"/> Throughout the relationship between Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, a number of lower-ranking Nazis scornfully viewed fascism as a conservative movement that lacked a full revolutionary potential.<ref name="Stanley G. Payne 1995, p. 464"/> | |||
| ==Nazi sites== | |||
| Nazism, both before and after World War II, was a quasi-religion to its followers, and like many world religions it had its own venerated locations or sites. ] visited many of them during a ] of the sites in 1953. | |||
| == Ideology and programme == | |||
| *], home of the ]. | |||
| In his book ''The Hitler State'' (''Der Staat Hitlers''), historian ] writes: | |||
| *], birthplace of Adolf Hitler. | |||
| *], site of, the failed ] | |||
| *], where the parents of Adolf Hitler were buried. | |||
| *], where Hitler went to school. | |||
| *], where Hitler was imprisoned. | |||
| *], home of the dreaded Nazi Editors | |||
| *], site of the enormous Nazi rallies. | |||
| *], headquarters of the ]. | |||
| *], burial site of ]. | |||
| <blockquote>...National Socialism was not primarily an ideological and programmatic, but a ], whose ideology was incorporated in the Führer, Hitler, and which would have lost all its power to integrate without him. ... he abstract, utopian and vague National Socialistic ideology only achieved what reality and certainty it had through the medium of Hitler.</blockquote> | |||
| Devi also visited some sites, not directly connected to Nazism, but perceived to be of spiritual or German-national significance: | |||
| *], pre-christian formation | |||
| *], statue of Germany's national hero ] the ] | |||
| Thus, any explication of the ideology of Nazism must be descriptive, as it was not generated primarily from first principles, but was the result of numerous factors, including Hitler's strongly-held personal views, some parts of the ], the general goals of the '']'' and nationalist movements, and the conflicts between Nazi Party functionaries who battled "to win over to their respective interpretations of ." Once the Party had been purged of divergent influences such as ], Hitler was accepted by the Party's leadership as the "supreme authority to rule on ideological matters".{{sfn|Broszat|1981|p=29}} | |||
| Source: | |||
| Nazi ideology was based on a bio-geo-political "'']''" (worldview), advocating territorial expansionism to cultivate what it viewed as a "purified and homogeneous ]." Nazi regime's policies were shaped by the integration of ] and ] within the ] worldview, amalgamating spatial theory, practice, and imagination with biopolitics. In Hitlerism, the concepts of space and ] were not separate but existed in tension, forming a distinct bio-geo-political framework at the core of the Nazi project. This ideology viewed German territorial conquests and extermination of those ethnic groups it dehumanised as "'']''" as part of a biopolitical process to establish an ideal German community.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Hitler's Geographies: The Spatialities of the Third Reich |publisher=The University of Chicago Press |year=2016 |isbn=978-0-226-27442-3 |editor-last1=Giaccaria |editor-last2=Minca |editor-first1=Paolo |editor-first2=Claudio |location=Chicago |pages=10, 11, 29}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Neumann |first=Boaz |date=2002 |title=The National Socialist Politics of Life |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/3115178 |journal=New German Critique |issue=85 |pages=107–130 |doi=10.2307/3115178 |jstor=3115178 |access-date=9 December 2023 |archive-date=9 December 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231209075248/https://www.jstor.org/stable/3115178 |url-status=live | issn=0094-033X}}</ref> | |||
| ==Notes== | |||
| === Nationalism and racialism === | |||
| # {{note|Levenda2002a}} ], ''Unholy Alliance: A History of the Nazi Involvement With the Occult'', 2002 2nd edition ISBN 0826414095 | |||
| {{further|Nazism and race|Racial policy of Nazi Germany}} | |||
| Nazism emphasised German nationalism, including both ] and ]. Nazism held racial theories based upon a belief in the existence of an Aryan master race that was superior to all other races. The Nazis emphasised the existence of racial conflict between the Aryan race and others—particularly Jews, whom the Nazis viewed as a mixed race that had infiltrated multiple societies and was responsible for exploitation and repression of the Aryan race. The Nazis also categorised ] as '']'' (sub-human).<ref>Steve Thorne. ''The Language of War''. London: Routledge, 2006, p. 38. {{ISBN|978-0-415-35867-5}}</ref> | |||
| Wolfgang Bialas argues that the Nazis' sense of morality could be described as a form of procedural ], as it demanded ] to absolute virtues with the attitude of social engineering and replaced common sense intuitions with an ideological catalogue of virtues and commands. The ideal Nazi new man was to be race-conscious and an ideologically dedicated warrior who would commit actions for the sake of the German race while at the same time convinced he was doing the right thing and acting morally. The Nazis believed an individual could only develop their capabilities and individual characteristics within the framework of the individual's racial membership; the race one belonged to determined whether or not one was worthy of moral care. The Christian concept of ] was to be replaced with the idea of self-assertion towards those deemed inferior. Natural selection and the struggle for existence were declared by the Nazis to be the most divine laws; peoples and individuals deemed inferior were said to be incapable of surviving without those deemed superior, yet by doing so they imposed a burden on the superior. Natural selection was deemed to favour the strong over the weak and the Nazis deemed that protecting those declared inferior was preventing nature from taking its course; those incapable of asserting themselves were viewed as doomed to annihilation, with the right to life being granted only to those who could survive on their own.<ref>Bialas, Wolfgang, and Lothar Fritze, eds. ''Nazi Ideology and Ethics.'' Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014, pp. 15–57 {{ISBN|978-1443854221}}</ref> | |||
| # {{note|Kubizek}} For an account of Hitler's apparent lack of early anti-Semitism, read ], ''The Young Hitler I Knew'', Greenhill Books, 2006 ed. ISBN 1853676942. Bear in mind, however, this post-war claim is rumored to be contradicted by the pre-war claim made in Kubizek's largely out of print, mid-war ''Reminiscences.'' | |||
| ==== Irredentism and expansionism ==== | |||
| ==References== | |||
| {{further|Lebensraum}} | |||
| ] from ], 1939]] | |||
| At the core of the Nazi ideology was the bio-geo-political project to acquire '']'' ("living space") through territorial conquests.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Hitler's Geographies: The Spatialities of the Third Reich |publisher=The University of Chicago Press |year=2016 |isbn=978-0-226-27442-3 |editor-last1=Giaccaria |editor-last2=Minca |editor-first1=Paolo |editor-first2=Claudio |location=Chicago |page=37 |chapter=1: For a Tentative Spatial Theory of the Third Reich}}</ref> The German Nazi Party supported German irredentist claims to Austria, ], the region of ], and the territory known since 1919 as the ]. A major policy of the German Nazi Party was ''Lebensraum'' for the German nation based on claims that Germany after World War I was facing an overpopulation crisis and that expansion was needed to end the country's overpopulation within existing confined territory, and provide resources necessary to its people's well-being.<ref name="Stephen J. Lee 1945, p. 237">Stephen J. Lee. ''Europe, 1890–1945'', p. 237. {{ISBN?}}</ref> Since the 1920s, the Nazi Party publicly promoted the expansion of Germany into territories held by the Soviet Union.<ref name="Peter D. Stachura P. 31">Peter D. Stachura. ''The Shaping of the Nazi State'', p. 31.</ref> | |||
| Richard Steigmann–Gall, ''The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919–1945'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003). | |||
| In ''Mein Kampf'', Hitler stated that ''Lebensraum'' would be acquired in Eastern Europe, especially Russia.<ref>Joseph W. Bendersk, A History of Nazi Germany: 1919–1945, p. 177</ref> In his early years as the Nazi leader, Hitler had claimed that he would be willing to accept friendly relations with Russia on the tactical condition that Russia agree to return to the borders established by the German–Russian peace agreement of the ] signed by ] of the ] in 1918 which gave large territories held by Russia to German control in exchange for peace.<ref name="Peter D. Stachura P. 31"/> In 1921, Hitler had commended the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk as opening the possibility for restoration of relations between Germany and Russia by saying: | |||
| David Redles. 2005. ''Hitler's Millennial Reich: Apocalyptic Belief and the Search for Salvation''. New York University Press. ISBN 0814775241 | |||
| ], which took place in ] in 1935. The accused claimed that the ] should be part of Germany, not ], and spread propaganda, prepared for an armed uprising.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Gliožaitis |first1=Algirdas |title=Neumanno-Sasso byla |trans-title=The Case of Neumann-Sass |url=https://www.mle.lt/straipsniai/neumanno-sasso-byla |website=Mažosios Lietuvos enciklopedija |access-date=12 February 2022 |language=lt |archive-date=12 February 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220212210419/https://www.mle.lt/straipsniai/neumanno-sasso-byla |url-status=live }}</ref>]] | |||
| {{blockquote|Through the peace with Russia the sustenance of Germany as well as the provision of work were to have been secured by the acquisition of land and soil, by access to raw materials, and by friendly relations between the two lands.|Adolf Hitler<ref name="Peter D. Stachura P. 31"/>}} | |||
| From 1921 to 1922, Hitler evoked rhetoric of both the achievement of ''Lebensraum'' involving the acceptance of a territorially reduced Russia as well as supporting ] in overthrowing the ] and establishing a new ] government.<ref name="Peter D. Stachura P. 31"/> Hitler's attitudes changed by the end of 1922, in which he then supported an alliance of Germany with Britain to destroy Russia.<ref name="Peter D. Stachura P. 31"/> Hitler later declared how far he intended to expand Germany into Russia: | |||
| ===Further reading=== | |||
| * ] | |||
| {{blockquote|Asia, what a disquieting reservoir of men! The safety of Europe will not be assured until we have driven Asia back behind the Urals. No organized Russian state must be allowed to exist west of that line.|Adolf Hitler<ref name="André Mineau 2004, p. 36">André Mineau. ''Operation Barbarossa: Ideology and Ethics Against Human Dignity''. Rodopi, 2004, p. 36</ref>}} | |||
| *], ] (1947) | |||
| {{quote box | |||
| *{{cite book|author=]|title=The Anatomy of Fascism|publisher=London, Penguin Books Ltd|year=2005|id=ISBN 0141014326}} | |||
| | title = Hitler's doctrine of ''Lebensraum''|"For the future of the German nation the 1914 frontiers are of no significance. They did not serve to protect us in the past, nor do they offer any guarantee for our defence in the future. With these frontiers the ] cannot maintain themselves as a compact unit, nor can they be assured of their maintenance. ... Against all this we, National Socialists, must stick firmly to the aim that we have set for our foreign policy; namely, that the German people must be assured the territorial area which is necessary for it to exist on this earth. ... The right to territory may become a duty when a great nation seems destined to go under unless its territory be extended. And that is particularly true when the nation in question is not some little group of negro people but the Germanic mother of all the life which has given cultural shape to the modern world." | |||
| *{{cite book|author=]|title=Economy and Class Structure of German Fascism|publisher=London, CSE Bks|year=1978|id=ISBN 0906336007}} | |||
| | author = — ] | |||
| *{{cite book|author=Fritzsche, Peter|year=1990|title=Rehearsals for Fascism: Populism and Political Mobilization in Weimar Germany|location=New York | publisher=Oxford University Press|id=ISBN 0195057805}} | |||
| | source = — ("'']''", Volume 2, Chapter 14: "Germany's policy in Eastern Europe")<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hitler |first=Adolf |date=1939 |title=Mein Kampf |publisher=Hurst & Blackett Ltd.|chapter= XIV: Germany's policy in Eastern Europe|pages=498, 500}}</ref> | |||
| *{{cite book|title=The Nazi Seizure of Power: The Experience of a Single German Town 1922-1945|author=Allen, W.S|year=1965|publisher=Penguin|id=ISBN 0140239685}} | |||
| | align = right | |||
| | width = 25em | |||
| }} | |||
| Policy for ''Lebensraum'' planned mass expansion of Germany's borders to eastwards of the ].<ref name="André Mineau 2004, p. 36"/><ref>], ]. '']''. Berghahn Books, 2009, p. 89.</ref> Hitler planned for the "surplus" Russian population living west of the Urals to be deported to the east of the Urals.<ref>Bradl Lightbody. ''The Second World War: Ambitions to Nemesis''. London; New York: Routledge, 2004, p. 97.{{ISBN?}}</ref> | |||
| Historian Adam Tooze explains that Hitler believed that lebensraum was vital to securing American-style consumer affluence for the German people. In this light, Tooze argues that the view that the regime faced a "]" contrast is mistaken. While it is true that resources were diverted from civilian consumption to military production, Tooze explains that at a strategic level "guns were ultimately viewed as a means to obtaining more butter".{{sfn|Tooze|2008|pp=161–162}} | |||
| While the Nazi pre-occupation with agrarian living and food production are often seen as a sign of their backwardness, Tooze explains this was in fact a major driving issue in European society for at least the last two centuries. The issue of how European societies should respond to the new ] in food was one of the major issues facing Europe in the early 20th century. Agrarian life in Europe (except perhaps with the exception of Britain) was incredibly common—in the early 1930s, over 9 million Germans (almost a third of the work force) were still working in agriculture and many people not working in agriculture still had small allotments or otherwise grew their own food. Tooze estimates that just over half the German population in the 1930s was living in towns and villages with populations under 20,000 people. Many people in cities still had memories of rural-urban migration—Tooze thus explains that the Nazis obsessions with agrarianism were not an atavistic gloss on a modern industrial nation but a consequence of the fact that Nazism (as both an ideology and as a movement) was the product of a society still in economic transition.{{sfn|Tooze|2008|pp=166–167}} | |||
| ]'' (expansion of Germany east to the Ural Mountains), that is shown on the upper right side of the map as a brown diagonal line.]] | |||
| The Nazis obsession with food production was a consequence of the First World War. While Europe was able to avert famine with international imports, blockades brought the issue of ] back into European politics, the ] in and after World War I did not cause an outright famine but chronic malnutrition did kill an estimated 600,000 people in Germany and Austria. The economic crises of the interwar period meant that most Germans had memories of acute hunger. Thus Tooze concludes that the Nazis obsession with acquiring land was not a case of "turning back the clock" but more a refusal to accept that the result of the distribution of land, resources and population, which had resulted from the imperialist wars of the 18th and 19th centuries, should be accepted as final. While the victors of the First World War had either suitable agricultural land to population ratios or large empires (or both), allowing them to declare the issue of living space closed, the Nazis, knowing Germany lacked either of these, refused to accept that Germany's place in the world was to be a medium-sized workshop dependent upon imported food.{{sfn|Tooze|2008|pp=167–168}} | |||
| According to Goebbels, the conquest of ''Lebensraum'' was intended as an initial step<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FhEFAAAAMAAJ&q=%22Whoever+dominates+Europe+will+thereby+assume+the+leadership+of+the+world.+%22|title=The Goebbels Diaries, 1942–1943|first=Joseph|last=Goebbels|date=1970|publisher=Greenwood Press|isbn=978-0-8371-3815-2|via=Google Books|access-date=15 September 2020|archive-date=12 July 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712024922/https://books.google.com/books?id=FhEFAAAAMAAJ&q=%22Whoever+dominates+Europe+will+thereby+assume+the+leadership+of+the+world.+%22|url-status=live}}</ref> towards the final goal of Nazi ideology, which was the establishment of complete German global hegemony.<ref name="Weinberg">Weinberg, Gerhard L. (1995) ''Germany, Hitler, and World War II: Essays in modern German and world history'' ], {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230415163518/https://books.google.com/books?id=9OfrTvu7CNYC&q=world%20peace&pg=PA28 |date=15 April 2023 }}</ref> ] relayed to ] Hitler's belief that ] could only be acquired "when one power, the ], has attained uncontested supremacy". When this control would be achieved, this power could then set up for itself a world police and assure itself "the necessary living space. The lower races will have to restrict themselves accordingly".<ref name="Weinberg"/> | |||
| ==== Racial theories ==== | |||
| In its ], Nazism viewed what it called the Aryan race as the ] of the world—a race that was superior to all other races.<ref name="George Lachmann Mosse p79">George Lachmann Mosse. Nazi Culture: Intellectual, Cultural and Social Life in the Third Reich, p. 79.</ref> It viewed Aryans as being in racial conflict with a mixed race people, the Jews, whom the Nazis identified as a dangerous enemy of the Aryans. It also viewed a number of other peoples as dangerous to the well-being of the Aryan race. In order to preserve the perceived racial purity of the Aryan race, a set of race laws was introduced in 1935 which came to be known as the Nuremberg Laws. At first these laws only prevented sexual relations and marriages between Germans and Jews, but they were later extended to the "], ], and their bastard offspring", who were described by the Nazis as people of "alien blood".<ref name=RGallately>{{cite book |author=S.H. Milton |chapter="Gypsies" as social outsiders in Nazi Germany|title=Social Outsiders in Nazi Germany |editor1=Robert Gellately |editor2=Nathan Stoltzfus |year=2001 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-0-691-08684-2 |pages=216, 231}}</ref><ref name="Burleigh1991">{{cite book |author=Michael Burleigh |title=The Racial State: Germany 1933–1945 |date=1991 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-39802-2 |page= |url=https://archive.org/details/racialstate00mich/page/49}}</ref> Such relations between Aryans (cf. ]) and non-Aryans were now punishable under the race laws as '']'' or "race defilement".<ref name=RGallately /> After the war began, the race defilement law was extended to include all foreigners (non-Germans).{{sfn|Majer|2003|p=180}} At the bottom of the racial scale of non-Aryans were Jews, Romanis, Slavs<ref name="Mineau, André 2004 p. 180">Mineau, André (2004). ''Operation Barbarossa: Ideology and Ethics Against Human Dignity''. Amsterdam; New York: Rodopi, p. 180. {{ISBN|90-420-1633-7}}.</ref> and blacks.<ref name="Simone Gigliotti 2005. Pp. 14">Simone Gigliotti, ]. ''The Holocaust: a reader''. Malden, MA; Oxford, England; Carlton, Victoria, Australia: Blackwell Publishing, 2005, p. 14.</ref> To maintain the "purity and strength" of the Aryan race, the Nazis eventually sought to ] Jews, Romani, Slavs and the ] and ].<ref name="Mineau, André 2004 p. 180"/><ref name="Simone Gigliotti 2005, p. 14"/> Other groups deemed "]" and "]" who were not targeted for extermination, but were subjected to ] by the Nazi state, included ], ], ] and political opponents.<ref name="Simone Gigliotti 2005, p. 14"/> One of Hitler's ambitions at the start of the war was to ] most or all Slavs from ] and ] in order to acquire ] for German settlers.<ref name="google"/> | |||
| ] | |||
| A Nazi-era school textbook for German students entitled ''Heredity and Racial Biology for Students'' written by Jakob Graf described to students the Nazi conception of the Aryan race in a section titled "The Aryan: The Creative Force in Human History".<ref name="George Lachmann Mosse p79"/> Graf claimed that the original Aryans developed from Nordic peoples who invaded ] and launched the initial development of Aryan culture there that later spread to ] and he claimed that the Aryan presence in Persia was what was responsible for its development into an empire.<ref name="George Lachmann Mosse p79"/> He claimed that ] was developed by Nordic peoples due to paintings of the time which showed Greeks who were tall, light-skinned, light-eyed, blond-haired people.<ref name="George Lachmann Mosse p79"/> He said that the ] was developed by the ] who were related to the ] who were also a Nordic people.<ref name="George Lachmann Mosse p79"/> He believed that the vanishing of the Nordic component of the populations in Ancient Greece and ] led to their downfall.<ref name="George Lachmann Mosse p79"/> The ] was claimed to have developed in the ] because of the ] that brought new Nordic blood to the Empire's lands, such as the presence of Nordic blood in the ] (referred to as Longobards in the book); that remnants of the ] were responsible for the creation of the ]; and that the heritage of the ], ] and ] in ] was what was responsible for its rise as a major power.<ref name="George Lachmann Mosse p79" /> He claimed that the rise of the Russian Empire was due to its leadership by people of ] descent.<ref name="George Lachmann Mosse p79" /> He described the rise of Anglo-Saxon societies in ], ] and ] as being the result of the Nordic heritage of ].<ref name="George Lachmann Mosse p79"/> He concluded these points by saying: "Everywhere Nordic creative power has built mighty empires with high-minded ideas, and to this very day ] and cultural values are spread over a large part of the world, though the creative Nordic blood has long since vanished in many places".<ref name="George Lachmann Mosse p79"/> | |||
| ]]] | |||
| In Nazi Germany, the idea of creating a master race resulted in efforts to "purify" the ''Deutsche Volk'' through ] and its culmination was the ] or the ] of physically or mentally disabled people. After World War II, the euthanasia programme was named ].<ref>Sandner (1999): 385 ( {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221112122424/https://www.ifz-muenchen.de/heftarchiv/1999_3.pdf |date=12 November 2022 }}) Note 2. The author claims that the term Aktion T4 was not used by the Nazis and that it was first used in the trials of the doctors and later included in the historiography.</ref> The ideological justification for ] was Hitler's view of ] (11th century – 195 BC) as the original ''völkisch'' state and he praised Sparta's dispassionate destruction of congenitally deformed infants in order to maintain racial purity.<ref name="pathological"/><ref name="Social Darwinism in European and American Thought, 1860–1945: nature as model and nature as threat"/> Some non-Aryans enlisted in Nazi organisations like the Hitler Youth and the '']'', including Germans of African descent<ref name="experiences"/> and Jewish descent.<ref>{{cite book|author=Bryan Mark Rigg|title=Hitler's Jewish Soldiers: The Untold Story Of Nazi Racial Laws And Men Of Jewish Descent In The German Military|date=2004|publisher=University Press of Kansas|isbn=978-0-7006-1358-8}}</ref> The Nazis began to implement "racial hygiene" policies as soon as they came to power. The July 1933 "]" prescribed ] for people with a range of conditions which were thought to be hereditary, such as ], ], ] and "]". Sterilization was also mandated for chronic ] and other forms of ].{{sfn|Evans|2005|p=507}} An estimated 360,000 people were sterilised under this law between 1933 and 1939. Although some Nazis suggested that the programme should be extended to people with physical disabilities, such ideas had to be expressed carefully, given the fact that some Nazis had physical disabilities, one example being one of the most powerful figures of the regime, Joseph Goebbels, who had a deformed right leg.<ref>This was the result of either a ] or ]. Goebbels is commonly said to have had ] (''talipes equinovarus''), a congenital condition. ], who worked in Berlin as a journalist in the 1930s and was acquainted with Goebbels, wrote in '']'' (1960) that the deformity was caused by a childhood attack of ] and a failed operation to correct it.</ref> | |||
| ]'' envisaged the deportation, extermination, Germanization and enslavement of all or most ], ], ], ] and ].]] | |||
| Nazi racial theorist ] argued that European peoples were divided into five races: ], ], ], ] and ].<ref name="Baum2006_156" /> Günther applied a ] conception in order to justify his belief that Nordics were the highest in the racial hierarchy.<ref name="Baum2006_156" /> In his book '']'' (1922) ("Racial Science of the German People"), Günther recognised Germans as being composed of all five races, but emphasised the strong Nordic heritage among them.<ref name="Maxwell150">Anne Maxwell (2010 ). ''Picture Imperfect: Photography and Eugenics, 1870–1940''. Eastbourne, England; Portland, OR: Sussex Academic Press p. 150. {{ISBN?}}</ref> Hitler read ''Rassenkunde des deutschen Volkes'', which influenced his racial policy.<ref>John Cornwell. ''Hitler's Scientists: Science, War, and the Devil's Pact''. Penguin, 2004. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230406165051/https://books.google.com/books?id=5bA2vTgvobAC&dq=hitler%20gunther%20aryan&pg=PT68|date=6 April 2023}}</ref> Gunther believed that Slavs belonged to an "Eastern race" and he warned against Germans mixing with them.<ref>Racisms Made in. Germany (Racism Analysis |Yearbook 2 – 2011) Ed. by Wulf D. Hund, Christian Koller, Moshe Zimmermann p. 19</ref> The Nazis described Jews as being a racially mixed group of primarily ] and ] racial types.<ref name="Weinreich111">Max Weinreich. ''Hitler's Professors: The Part of Scholarship in Germany's Crimes Against the Jewish People''. Yale University Press, 1999, p. 111.</ref> Because such racial groups were concentrated outside Europe, the Nazis claimed that Jews were "racially alien" to all European peoples and that they did not have deep racial roots in Europe.<ref name="Weinreich111" /> | |||
| Günther emphasised Jews' Near Eastern racial heritage.{{sfn|Steinweis|2008|p=28}} Günther identified the mass conversion of the ] to ] in the 8th century as creating the two major branches of the Jewish people: those of primarily Near Eastern racial heritage became the ] (that he called Eastern Jews) while those of primarily Oriental racial heritage became the ] (that he called Southern Jews).{{sfn|Steinweis|2008|pp=31–32}} Günther claimed that the Near Eastern type was composed of commercially spirited and artful traders, and that the type held strong ] skills which aided them in trade.{{sfn|Steinweis|2008|p=28}} He claimed that the Near Eastern race had been "bred not so much for the conquest and exploitation of nature as it had been for the conquest and exploitation of people".{{sfn|Steinweis|2008|p=28}} Günther believed that European peoples had a racially motivated aversion to peoples of Near Eastern racial origin and their traits, and as evidence of this he showed multiple examples of depictions of satanic figures with Near Eastern physiognomies in European art.{{sfn|Steinweis|2008|p=29}} | |||
| ] in 1942. 4 million copies of the brochure were printed by Nazi Germany and distributed across occupied territories. The pamphlet depicted the ] and Jewish inhabitants of ] as primitive people.<ref>Sources: | |||
| * {{cite book |last1=Müller |last2=Ueberschar |first1=Rolf-Dieter |first2=Gerd R. |title= Hitler's war in the East, 1941–1945 |publisher= Berghahn Books |year=2009 |isbn=978-1-84545-501-9 |location= New York |page=245}} | |||
| * {{Cite journal |title=Der Untermensch |url=https://digital.kenyon.edu/bulmash/1077/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201126075206/https://digital.kenyon.edu/bulmash/1077/ |archive-date=26 November 2020 |journal=Bulmash Family Holocaust Collection|date=January 1942 }} | |||
| * {{cite book |last1=E. Aschheim |first1= Steven |title=The Nietzsche Legacy in Germany, 1890–1990 |publisher=University of California Press |year=1992 |isbn=0-520-08555-8 |location= Los Angeles |pages=236–237 |chapter=8: Nietzsche in the Third Reich}}</ref>]] | |||
| Hitler's conception of the Aryan '']'' ("Aryan master race") excluded the vast majority of Slavs from Central and Eastern Europe (i.e. ], ], ], ], etc.). They were regarded as a race of men not inclined to a higher form of ], which was under an instinctive force that reverted them back to nature. The Nazis also regarded the Slavs as having dangerous Jewish and Asiatic, meaning ], influences.<ref>André Mineau. ''Operation Barbarossa: Ideology and Ethics Against Human Dignity''. Rodopi, 2004. pp. 34–36.</ref> Because of this, the Nazis declared Slavs to be ''Untermenschen'' ("subhumans").<ref>Steve Thorne. ''The Language of War''. London: Routledge, 2006, p. 38.</ref> | |||
| Nazi anthropologists attempted to scientifically prove the historical admixture of the Slavs who lived further East and leading Nazi racial theorist ] regarded the Slavs as being primarily Nordic centuries ago but he believed that they had mixed with non-Nordic types over time.<ref name="Wendt2010">{{cite book|author=Anton Weiss-Wendt|author-link = Anton Weiss-Wendt|title=Eradicating Differences: The Treatment of Minorities in Nazi-Dominated Europe|date=2010|publisher=Cambridge Scholars Publishing|isbn=978-1-4438-2449-1|page=63}}</ref> Exceptions were made for a small percentage of Slavs who the Nazis saw as descended from German settlers and therefore fit to be Germanised and considered part of the Aryan master race.<ref>]. ''Nazi Empire-building and the Holocaust In Ukraine''. The University of North Carolina Press, 2005, p. 27.</ref> Hitler described Slavs as "a mass of born slaves who feel the need for a master".<ref>Marvin Perry. Western Civilization: A Brief History. Cengage Learning, 2012, p. 468.</ref> Himmler classified ] as "bestial ''untermenschen''" and Jews as the "decisive leader of the ''Untermenschen''".<ref>{{cite book |last1=E. Aschheim |first1= Steven |title=The Nietzsche Legacy in Germany, 1890–1990 |publisher=University of California Press |year=1992 |isbn=0-520-08555-8 |location= Los Angeles|pages=236–237 |chapter=8: Nietzsche in the Third Reich}}</ref> These ideas were fervently advocated through ], which had a massive impact on the indoctrination of the German population. "''Der Untermenschen''", a racist brochure published by the SS in 1942, has been regarded as one of the most infamous pieces of ].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Müller |last2=Ueberschar |first1=Rolf-Dieter |first2=Gerd R. |title= Hitler's war in the East, 1941–1945 |publisher= Berghahn Books |year=2009 |isbn=978-1-84545-501-9 |location= New York |page=245}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=E. Aschheim |first1= Steven |title=The Nietzsche Legacy in Germany, 1890-1990 |publisher=University of California Press |year=1992 |isbn=0-520-08555-8 |location= Los Angeles |page=236 |chapter=8: Nietzsche in the Third Reich}}</ref> | |||
| The Nazi notion of Slavs as inferior served as a legitimisation of their desire to create ''Lebensraum'' for Germans and other Germanic people in eastern Europe, where millions of Germans and other Germanic settlers would be moved into once those territories were conquered, while the original Slavic inhabitants were to be annihilated, removed or enslaved.<ref name="Bendersky">{{cite book|last=Bendersky|first=Joseph W.|title=A Concise History of Nazi Germany|year=2007|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Inc.|location=Plymouth, England|isbn=978-0-7425-5363-7|pages=161–162}}</ref> Nazi Germany's policy changed towards Slavs in response to military manpower shortages, forcing it to allow Slavs to serve in its armed forces within the occupied territories in spite of the fact that they were considered "subhuman".<ref>Norman Davies. '']''. Pan Macmillan, 2008. pp. 167, 209.</ref> | |||
| Hitler declared that racial conflict against Jews was necessary in order to save Germany from suffering under them and he dismissed concerns that the conflict with them was inhumane and unjust: | |||
| <blockquote>We may be inhumane, but if we rescue Germany we have achieved the greatest deed in the world. We may work injustice, but if we rescue Germany then we have removed the greatest injustice in the world. We may be immoral, but if our people is rescued we have opened the way for morality.<ref name="koenigsberg"/></blockquote> | |||
| Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels frequently employed antisemitic rhetoric to underline this view: "The Jew is the enemy and the destroyer of the purity of blood, the conscious destroyer of our race."<ref name="thosedamnednazis"/> | |||
| {{clear}} | |||
| === Social class === | |||
| National Socialist politics was based on competition and struggle as its organising principle, and the Nazis believed that "human life consisted of eternal struggle and competition and derived its meaning from struggle and competition."{{sfn|Mason|1993|p=6}} The Nazis saw this eternal struggle in military terms, and advocated a society organised like an army in order to achieve success. They promoted the idea of a national-racial "people's community" ('']'') in order to accomplish "the efficient prosecution of the struggle against other peoples and states."{{sfn|Mason|1993|p=7}} Like an army, the ''Volksgemeinschaft'' was meant to consist of a hierarchy of ranks or classes of people, some commanding and others obeying, all working together for a common goal.{{sfn|Mason|1993|p=7}} This concept was rooted in the writings of 19th century ''völkisch'' authors who glorified medieval German society, viewing it as a "community rooted in the land and bound together by custom and tradition," in which there was neither class conflict nor selfish individualism.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|p=40}} The Nazis concept of the ''volksgemeinschaft'' appealed to many, as it was seen as it seemed at once to affirm a commitment to a new type of society for the modern age yet also offer protection from the tensions and insecurities of modernisation. It would balance individual achievement with group solidarity and cooperation with competition. Stripped of its ideological overtones, the Nazi vision of modernisation without internal conflict and a political community that offered both security and opportunity was so potent a vision of the future that many Germans were willing to overlook its racist and anti-Semitic essence.<ref>Fritz, Stephen. ''Frontsoldaten: The German Soldier in World War II.'' University Press of Kentucky, 1997.{{ISBN?}}</ref> | |||
| Nazism rejected the Marxist concept of ], and it praised both German capitalists and German workers as essential to the ''Volksgemeinschaft''. In the ''Volksgemeinschaft'', social classes would continue to exist, but there would be no class conflict between them.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|p=48}} Hitler said that "the capitalists have worked their way to the top through their capacity, and as the basis of this selection, which again only proves their higher race, they have a right to lead."<ref name="Nicholls 245">David Nicholls. ''Adolf Hitler: A Biographical Companion''. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2000, p. 245.{{ISBN?}}</ref> German business leaders co-operated with the Nazis during their rise to power and received substantial benefits from the Nazi state after it was established, including high profits and state-sanctioned monopolies and cartels.<ref>Grunberger, Richard, ''A Social History of the Third Reich'', Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1971. pp. 167, 175–176</ref> Large celebrations and symbolism were used extensively to encourage those engaged in physical labour on behalf of Germany, with leading National Socialists often praising the "honour of labour", which fostered a sense of community (''Gemeinschaft'') for the German people and promoted solidarity towards the Nazi cause.<ref>Alf Lüdtke, "The 'Honor of Labor': Industrial Workers and the Power of Symbols under National Socialism", in ''Nazism and German Society, 1933–1945'', edited by David F. Crew (New York: Routledge, 1994), pp. 67–109.</ref> To win workers away from Marxism, ] sometimes presented its expansionist foreign policy goals as a "class struggle between nations."<ref name="Nicholls 245"/> Bonfires were made of school children's differently coloured caps as symbolic of the unity of different social classes.<ref name="Grunberger46">], ''The 12-Year Reich'', p. 46, {{ISBN|0-03-076435-1}}</ref> | |||
| In 1922, Hitler disparaged other nationalist and ] political parties as disconnected from the mass populace, especially lower and working-class young people: | |||
| {{blockquote|The racialists were not capable of drawing the practical conclusions from correct theoretical judgements, especially in the Jewish Question. In this way, the German racialist movement developed a similar pattern to that of the 1880s and 1890s. As in those days, its leadership gradually fell into the hands of highly honourable, but fantastically naïve men of learning, professors, district counsellors, schoolmasters, and lawyers—in short a bourgeois, idealistic, and refined class. It lacked the warm breath of the nation's youthful vigour.<ref name="burleigh"/>}} | |||
| Nevertheless, the Nazi Party's voter base consisted mainly of farmers and the middle class, including groups such as Weimar government officials, school teachers, doctors, clerks, self-employed businessmen, salesmen, retired officers, engineers, and students.{{sfn|Mason|1993|pp=48–50}} Their demands included lower taxes, higher prices for food, restrictions on department stores and consumer co-operatives, and reductions in social services and wages.{{sfn|Mason|1993|p=49}} The need to maintain the support of these groups made it difficult for the Nazis to appeal to the working class, since the working class often had opposite demands.{{sfn|Mason|1993|p=49}} | |||
| From 1928 onward, the Nazi Party's growth into a large national political movement was dependent on middle class support, and on the public perception that it "promised to side with the middle classes and to confront the economic and political power of the working class."{{sfn|Mason|1993|p=44}} The financial collapse of the ] middle-class of the 1920s figures much in their strong support of Nazism.<ref name="Burleigh, 2000, p. 77"/> Although the Nazis continued to make appeals to "the German worker", historian Timothy Mason concludes that "Hitler had nothing but slogans to offer the working class."{{sfn|Mason|1993|p=48}} Historians Conan Fischer and Detlef Mühlberger argue that while the Nazis were primarily rooted in the lower middle class, they were able to appeal to all classes in society and that while workers were generally underrepresented, they were still a substantial source of support for the Nazis.<ref>Fischer, Conan, ed. The rise of national socialism and the working classes in Weimar Germany. Berghahn Books, 1996.</ref><ref>Mühlberger, Detlef. "The sociology of the NSDAP: The question of working-class membership." Journal of Contemporary History 15, no. 3 (1980): 493–511.</ref> H.L. Ansbacher argues that the working-class soldiers had the most faith in Hitler out of any occupational group in Germany.<ref>Fritz, Stephen. Frontsoldaten: The German Soldier in World War II. University Press of Kentucky, 1997, p. 210</ref> | |||
| The Nazis also established a norm that every worker should be semi-skilled, which was not simply rhetorical; the number of men leaving school to enter the work force as unskilled labourers fell from 200,000 in 1934 to 30,000 in 1939. For many working-class families, the 1930s and 1940s were a time of social mobility; not in the sense of moving into the middle class but rather moving within the blue-collar skill hierarchy.{{sfn|Tooze|2008|p=143}} Overall, the experience of workers varied considerably under Nazism. Workers' wages did not increase much during Nazi rule, as the government feared wage-price inflation and thus wage growth was limited. Prices for food and clothing rose, though costs for heating, rent and light decreased. Skilled workers were in shortage from 1936 onward, meaning that workers who engaged in vocational training could look forward to considerably higher wages. Benefits provided by the Labour Front were generally positively received, even if workers did not always buy in to propaganda about the ''volksgemeinschaft''. Workers welcomed opportunities for employment after the harsh years of the Great Depression, creating a common belief that the Nazis had removed the insecurity of unemployment. Workers who remained discontented risked the ]'s informants. Ultimately, the Nazis faced a conflict between their rearmament program, which by necessity would require material sacrifices from workers (longer hours and a lower standard of living), versus a need to maintain the confidence of the working class in the regime. Hitler was sympathetic to the view that stressed taking further measures for rearmament but he did not fully implement the measures required for it in order to avoid alienating the working class.<ref>Spielvogel, Jackson J. Hitler and Nazi Germany: A History. Routledge, 2016.</ref> | |||
| While the Nazis had substantial support amongst the middle-class, they often attacked traditional middle-class values and Hitler personally held great contempt for them. This was because the traditional image of the middle class was one that was obsessed with personal status, material attainment and quiet, comfortable living, which was in opposition to the Nazism's ideal of a New Man. The Nazis' New Man was envisioned as a heroic figure who rejected a materialistic and private life for a public life and a pervasive sense of duty, willing to sacrifice everything for the nation. Despite the Nazis' contempt for these values, they were still able to secure millions of middle-class votes. Hermann Beck argues that while some members of the middle-class dismissed this as mere rhetoric, many others in some ways agreed with the Nazis—the defeat of 1918 and the failures of the Weimar period caused many middle-class Germans to question their own identity, thinking their traditional values to be anachronisms and agreeing with the Nazis that these values were no longer viable. While this rhetoric would become less frequent after 1933 due to the increased emphasis on the ''volksgemeinschaft'', it and its ideas would never truly disappear until the overthrow of the regime. The Nazis instead emphasised that the middle-class must become ''staatsbürger'', a publicly active and involved citizen, rather than a selfish, materialistic ''spießbürger'', who was only interested in private life.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Beck |first=Hermann |title=The Antibourgeois Character of National Socialism |journal=The Journal of Modern History |volume=88 |issue=3 |publisher=The University of Chicago Press |date=2016 |pages=572–609 |doi=10.1086/687528 |s2cid=157869544 |url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/687528 |access-date=7 October 2021 |archive-date=12 July 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025420/https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/687528?journalCode=jmh |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>Steele, David Ramsay. "The Mystery of Fascism." Liberty Magazine (2001).</ref> | |||
| === Sex and gender === | |||
| {{further|Women in Nazi Germany}} | |||
| ] | |||
| Nazi ideology advocated excluding women from political involvement and confining them to the spheres of "]" (Children, Kitchen, Church).<ref>For more elucidation about this conception and its oversimplification, see: Renate Bridenthal and Claudia Koonz, "Beyond ''Kinder, Küche, Kirche'': Weimar Women in Politics and Work" in Renate Bridenthal, et al. (eds), ''When Biology Became Destiny in Weimar and Nazi Germany'' (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1984), pp. 33–65.</ref> Many women enthusiastically supported the regime, but formed their own internal hierarchies.<ref>], ''Mothers in the Fatherland: Women, the Family and Nazi Politics'' (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1988), pp. 53–59.</ref> Hitler's own opinion on the matter of women in Nazi Germany was that while other eras of German history had experienced the development and liberation of the female mind, the National Socialist goal was essentially singular in that it wished for them to produce a child.<ref>Hitler on 23 November 1937. In Max Domarus ed., ''Hitler: Reden und Proklamationen, 1932–1945'', (vol I). Triumph. (Würzburg: Verlagsdruckerei Schmidt, 1962), p. 452.</ref> Based on this theme, Hitler once remarked about women that "with every child that she brings into the world, she fights her battle for the nation. The man stands up for the ''Volk'', exactly as the woman stands up for the family".<ref>Adolf Hitler in a speech to the National Socialist Women's Congress, published in the ''Völkischer Beobachter'', 15 September 1935 (Wiener Library Clipping Collection). Cited from: George Mosse, ''Nazi Culture: Intellectual, Cultural and Social Life in the Third Reich'' (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2003), p. 40.</ref> Proto-natalist programs in Nazi Germany offered favourable loans and grants to newlyweds and encouraged them to give birth to offspring by providing them with additional incentives.<ref>], ''Mothers in the Fatherland: Women, the Family and Nazi Politics'' (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1988), pp. 149, 185–187.</ref> ] was discouraged for racially valuable women in Nazi Germany and ] was forbidden by strict legal mandates, including prison sentences for women who sought them as well as prison sentences for doctors who performed them, whereas abortion for racially "undesirable" persons was encouraged.<ref>Jill Stephenson, ''Women in Nazi Germany'' (London and New York: Longman, 2001), pp. 37–40.</ref><ref>Gerda Bormann was concerned by the ratio of racially valuable women that outnumbered men and she thought that the war would make the situation worse in terms of childbirths, so much so that she advocated a law (never passed) which allowed healthy Aryan men to have two wives. See: Anna Maria Sigmund, ''Women of the Third Reich'' (Ontario: NDE, 2000), pp. 17–19.</ref> | |||
| While unmarried until the very end of the regime, Hitler often made excuses about his busy life hindering any chance for marriage.<ref>Anna Maria Sigmund, ''Women of the Third Reich'' (Ontario: NDE, 2000), p. 17.</ref> Among National Socialist ideologues, marriage was valued not for moral considerations but because it provided an optimal breeding environment. '']'' Heinrich Himmler reportedly told a confidant that when he established the '']'' program, an organisation that would dramatically increase the birth rate of "Aryan" children through extramarital relations between women classified as racially pure and their male equals, he had only the purest male "conception assistants" in mind.<ref>Himmler was thinking about members of the SS fulfilling this task. See: Felix Kersten, ''Totenkopf und Treue. Aus den Tagebuchblättern des finnischen Medizinalrats Felix Kersten'' (Hamburg: Mölich Verlag, 1952), pp. 228–229.</ref> | |||
| Since the Nazis extended the '']'' ("race defilement") law to all foreigners at the beginning of the war,{{sfn|Majer|2003|p=180}} pamphlets were issued to German women which ordered them to avoid sexual relations with foreign workers who were brought to Germany and the pamphlets also ordered German women to view these same foreign workers as a danger to their blood.<ref name="Rupp1978">{{cite book|author=Leila J. Rupp|title=Mobilizing Women for War: German and American Propaganda, 1939–1945|date=1978|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-0-691-04649-5|url=https://archive.org/details/mobilizingwomenf00leil}}</ref> Although the law was applicable to both genders, German women were punished more severely for having sexual relations with foreign ] in Germany.<ref>{{cite web |author=Helen Boak |title=Nazi policies on German women during the Second World War – Lessons learned from the First World War? |url=https://www.academia.edu/4794258 |pages=4–5 |access-date=2 November 2017 |archive-date=12 July 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025420/https://www.academia.edu/4794258 |url-status=live }}</ref> The Nazis issued the ] on 8 March 1940 which contained regulations concerning the Polish forced labourers (]) who were brought to Germany during World War II. One of the regulations stated that any Pole "who has sexual relations with a German man or woman, or approaches them in any other improper manner, will be punished by death".<ref name="Gellately2001">{{cite book|author=Robert Gellately|title=Backing Hitler: Consent and Coercion in Nazi Germany|url=https://archive.org/details/backinghitlercon00gell|url-access=registration|date =2001|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-160452-2|page=}}</ref> After the decrees were enacted, Himmler stated: | |||
| {{blockquote|Fellow Germans who engage in sexual relations with male or female civil workers of the ] nationality, commit other immoral acts or engage in love affairs shall be arrested immediately.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/the-dishonorable-german-girls-the-forgotten-persecution-of-women-in-world-war-ii-a-672803.html|title=The 'Dishonorable' German Girls: The Forgotten Persecution of Women in World War II|last=Friedmann|first=Jan|work=Der Spiegel|access-date=January 21, 2010|date=2010-01-21|archive-date=23 November 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221123090421/https://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/the-dishonorable-german-girls-the-forgotten-persecution-of-women-in-world-war-ii-a-672803.html|url-status=live}}</ref>}} | |||
| The Nazis later issued similar regulations against the Eastern Workers ''(])'', including the imposition of the death penalty if they engaged in sexual relations with German persons.<ref name="Gellately1990">{{cite book|author=Robert Gellately|title=The Gestapo and German Society: Enforcing Racial Policy, 1933–1945|year=1990|publisher=Clarendon Press|isbn=978-0-19-820297-4|page=224}}</ref> Heydrich issued a decree on 20 February 1942 which declared that sexual intercourse between a German woman and a Russian worker or prisoner of war would result in the Russian man being punished with the death penalty.<ref name="Evans2012">{{cite book|author=Richard J. Evans|title=The Third Reich at War: How the Nazis Led Germany from Conquest to Disaster|date= 2012|publisher=Penguin Books Limited|isbn=978-0-14-191755-9|page=355}}</ref> Another decree issued by Himmler on 7 December 1942 stated that any "unauthorised sexual intercourse" would result in the death penalty.{{sfn|Majer|2003|p=369}} Because the ] did not permit capital punishment for race defilement, special courts were convened in order to allow the death penalty to be imposed in some cases.{{sfn|Majer|2003|pp=331–32}} German women accused of race defilement were marched through the streets with their head shaven and placards detailing their crimes were placed around their necks<ref name="Stephenson2001">{{cite book|author=Jill Stephenson|title=Women in Nazi Germany|year=2001|publisher=Longman|isbn=978-0-582-41836-3|page=156}}</ref> and those convicted of race defilement were sent to concentration camps.<ref name="Rupp1978"/> When Himmler reportedly asked Hitler what the punishment should be for German girls and German women who were found guilty of race defilement with prisoners of war (POWs), he ordered that "every POW who has relations with a German girl or a German would be shot" and the German woman should be publicly humiliated by "having her hair shorn and being sent to a concentration camp".<ref name="Longerich2012">{{cite book|author=Peter Longerich|title=Heinrich Himmler: A Life|url=https://archive.org/details/heinrichhimmlerl00long|url-access=limited|year=2012|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-959232-6|page=}}</ref> | |||
| The ] was particularly regarded as instructing girls to avoid race defilement, which was treated with particular importance for young females.<ref>" {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101225172546/http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/fink.htm |date=25 December 2010 }}"</ref> ] people ] depending on whether they were considered "Aryan" or capable of useful work.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Nunn |first1=Zavier |date=2022 |title=Trans Liminality and the Nazi State |journal=Past & Present |issue=260 |pages=123–157 |doi=10.1093/pastj/gtac018|doi-access=free }}</ref> Several historians have noted that transgender people were targeted by the Nazis through legislation and were sent to concentration camps.<ref>{{cite web |title=Paper: Trans Identities and "Cross Dressing" in Nazi Germany: Trans People as a Discrete Target of State Violence (134th Annual Meeting (January 3–6, 2020)) |url=https://aha.confex.com/aha/2020/webprogram/Paper27446.html |access-date=3 January 2023 |website=aha.confex.com |archive-date=3 January 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230103035935/https://aha.confex.com/aha/2020/webprogram/Paper27446.html |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Sutton">{{Cite journal |last=Sutton |first=Katie |date=2012 |title='We Too Deserve a Place in the Sun': The Politics of Transvestite Identity in Weimar Germany |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/23269669 |journal=German Studies Review |volume=35 |issue=2 |page=348 |doi=10.1353/gsr.2012.a478043 |jstor=23269669 |access-date=16 June 2023 |archive-date=29 March 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230329104623/https://www.jstor.org/stable/23269669 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Paragraph 175 and the Nazi Campaign against Homosexuality |url=https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/paragraph-175-and-the-nazi-campaign-against-homosexuality |access-date=12 March 2023 |website=] |quote=Not everyone arrested under Paragraph 175 identified as a man. During the German Empire and the Weimar Republic, Germany was home to a developing community of people who identified as 'transvestites.' Initially, this term encompassed people who performed in drag, people who cross-dressed for pleasure, as well as those who today might identify as trans or transgender. |archive-date=12 January 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230112154217/https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/paragraph-175-and-the-nazi-campaign-against-homosexuality |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Transgender Experiences in Weimar and Nazi Germany |url=https://mjhnyc.org/events/transgender-experiences-in-weimar-and-nazi-germany/ |access-date=19 June 2023 |website=Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust |language=en-US |archive-date=28 June 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230628134816/https://mjhnyc.org/events/transgender-experiences-in-weimar-and-nazi-germany/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Marhoefer |first=Laurie |date=6 June 2023 |title=Historians are learning more about how the Nazis targeted trans people |url=http://theconversation.com/historians-are-learning-more-about-how-the-nazis-targeted-trans-people-205622 |access-date=19 June 2023 |website=The Conversation |language=en |archive-date=7 January 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240107131119/https://theconversation.com/historians-are-learning-more-about-how-the-nazis-targeted-trans-people-205622 |url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
| ==== Opposition to homosexuality ==== | |||
| {{further|Persecution of homosexuals in Nazi Germany}} | |||
| ] | |||
| After the Night of the Long Knives, Hitler promoted Himmler and the SS, who then zealously suppressed homosexuality by saying: "We must exterminate these people root and branch ... the homosexual must be eliminated".{{sfn|Plant|1988|p=99}} In 1936, Himmler established the "]" ("Reich Central Office for the Combating of Homosexuality and Abortion").<ref name="Homosexualität und Staatsräson. Männlichkeit, Homophobie und Politik in Deutschland 1900-1945"/> The Nazi regime incarcerated some 100,000 homosexuals during the 1930s.<ref name="Holocaust: Gay activists press for German apology" /> As concentration camp prisoners, homosexual men were forced to wear ] badges.<ref name="international"/>{{sfn|Plant|1988|pp=1–276}} Nazi ideology still viewed German men who were gay as a part of the Aryan master race, but the Nazi regime attempted to force them into sexual and social conformity. Homosexuals were viewed as failing in their duty to procreate and reproduce for the Aryan nation. Gay men who would not change or feign a change in their ] were sent to concentration camps under the "Extermination Through Work" campaign.<ref>{{cite web |last=Neander |first=Biedron |title=Homosexuals. A Separate Category of Prisoners |publisher=Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum |url=http://en.auschwitz.org/h/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=3 |access-date=10 August 2013 |archive-date=14 January 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140114033949/http://en.auschwitz.org/h/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=3 |url-status=dead }}</ref> | |||
| === Religion === | |||
| {{Main|Religion in Nazi Germany}} | |||
| {{further|Catholic Church and Nazi Germany|German Christians (movement)|German Faith Movement|Kreuz und Adler|Positive Christianity||Religious aspects of Nazism|Anti-Masonry#Nazi Germany and occupied Europe|Religious views of Adolf Hitler}} | |||
| ] organisation celebrating Luther Day in Berlin in 1933. A speech is given by Bishop Hossenfelder.]] | |||
| ], the ]'s ]]] | |||
| The ] of 1920 guaranteed freedom for all religious denominations which were not hostile to the State and it also endorsed ] in order to combat "the Jewish-materialist spirit".<ref name="documents"/> Positive Christianity was a modified version of ] which emphasised ] and ].{{sfn|McNab|2009|p=182}} The Nazis were aided by theologians such as ]. In his work ''Die 25 Thesen der Deutschreligion'' (''Twenty-five Points of the German Religion''), Bergmann held the view that the ] of the ] was inaccurate along with portions of the ], claimed that ] was not a Jew but was instead of Aryan origin and he also claimed that Adolf Hitler was the new ].{{sfn|McNab|2009|p=182}} | |||
| Hitler denounced the Old Testament as "]'s Bible" and using components of the New Testament he attempted to prove that Jesus was both an Aryan and an antisemite by citing passages such as where he noted that Jesus is yelling at "the Jews", as well as saying to them "your father is the devil" and the ], which describes Jesus' whipping of the "Children of the Devil".<ref name="Redles60">David Redles. ''Hitler's Millennial Reich: Apocalyptic Belief and the Search for Salvation''. New York; London: New York University Press, 2005, p. 60.</ref> Hitler claimed that the New Testament included distortions by ], who Hitler described as a "mass-murderer turned saint".<ref name="Redles60"/> In their propaganda, the Nazis used the writings of ], the ] ]. They publicly displayed an original edition of Luther's '']'' during the annual Nuremberg rallies.<ref name="understandably"/><ref name="baylor"/> | |||
| The Nazis were initially very hostile to Catholics because most Catholics supported the ]. Catholics opposed the Nazis' promotion of ] of those whom they deemed inferior and the ] forbade its members to vote for the Nazis. In 1933, extensive Nazi violence occurred against Catholics due to their association with the Centre Party and their opposition to the Nazi regime's sterilisation laws.<ref name="international27"/> The Nazis demanded that Catholics declare their loyalty to the German state.<ref name="Robert Anthony Krieg 2004, p. 4"/> In their propaganda, the Nazis used elements of Germany's Catholic history, in particular the German Catholic ] and their campaigns in ]. The Nazis identified them as "sentinels" in the East against "Slavic chaos", though beyond that symbolism, the influence of the Teutonic Knights on Nazism was limited.<ref name="interaction"/> Hitler also admitted that the Nazis' night rallies were inspired by the Catholic rituals which he had witnessed during his Catholic upbringing.<ref name="Roger Griffin 2005, p. 85"/> The Nazis did seek official reconciliation with the Catholic Church and they endorsed the creation of the pro-Nazi Catholic '']'', an organisation which advocated a form of ] that would reconcile the Catholic Church's beliefs with Nazism.<ref name="Robert Anthony Krieg 2004, p. 4"/> On 20 July 1933, a concordat ('']'') was signed between Nazi Germany and the Catholic Church, which in exchange for acceptance of the Catholic Church in Germany required German Catholics to be loyal to the German state. The Catholic Church then ended its ban on members supporting the Nazi Party.<ref name="Robert Anthony Krieg 2004, p. 4"/> | |||
| During the Second World War and the fanaticization of National Socialism, priests and nuns increasingly came into the focus of the Gestapo and the SS. In the concentration camps, separate priestly blocks were formed and any church resistance was strictly persecuted. The monastery sister ] was sentenced to death by the People's Court and executed only for a harmless song critical of the regime.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.doew.at/erinnern/biographien/spurensuche/maria-restituta-helene-kafka-1894-1943|title=DÖW – Erinnern – Biographien – Spurensuche – Maria Restituta (Helene Kafka, 1894–1943)|website=www.doew.at|access-date=2 February 2021|archive-date=27 October 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221027132933/https://www.doew.at/erinnern/biographien/spurensuche/maria-restituta-helene-kafka-1894-1943|url-status=live}}</ref> Polish priests came en masse to the Auschwitz concentration camp. Catholic resistance groups like those around ] were persecuted uncompromisingly.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://roman-karl-scholz.zurerinnerung.at/|title=Zur Erinnerung an Dr. Roman Karl Scholz|website=roman-karl-scholz.zurerinnerung.at|access-date=2 February 2021|archive-date=5 December 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221205173720/https://roman-karl-scholz.zurerinnerung.at/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.noen.at/klosterneuburg/klosterneuburg-gedenken-an-widerstandskaempfer-roman-scholz-klosterneuburg-roman-scholz-148011362|title=Gedenken an Widerstandskämpfer Roman Scholz|date=25 May 2019|website=www.noen.at|access-date=2 February 2021|archive-date=5 December 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221205175218/https://www.noen.at/klosterneuburg/klosterneuburg-gedenken-an-widerstandskaempfer-roman-scholz-klosterneuburg-roman-scholz-148011362|url-status=live}}</ref> While the Catholic resistance was often anti-war and passive, there are also examples of actively combating National Socialism. The group around the priest ] approached the American secret service and provided them with plans and location sketches of for ]s, ]s, ] and ] and their production sites so that they could successfully bomb the factories.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://ausstellung.de.doew.at/popup.php?t=img&id=240|title=DöW – Dokumentationsarchiv des Österreichischen Widerstandes|website=ausstellung.de.doew.at|access-date=2 February 2021|archive-date=8 February 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210208210500/https://ausstellung.de.doew.at/popup.php?t=img&id=240|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.zeit.de/1996/02/Die_Spione_aus_dem_Pfarrhaus/seite-2 |title=Die Spione aus dem Pfarrhaus |newspaper=Die Zeit |date=5 January 1996 |access-date=2 February 2021 |archive-date=5 February 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210205231043/https://www.zeit.de/1996/02/Die_Spione_aus_dem_Pfarrhaus/seite-2 |url-status=live |last1=Stehle |first1=Hansjakob }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.derstandard.at/story/1271378203933/im-netz-der-verraeter|title=Im Netz der Verräter|website=Der Standard|access-date=2 February 2021|archive-date=5 December 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221205173717/https://www.derstandard.at/story/1271378203933/im-netz-der-verraeter|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>Hecht, Rauch, Rodt: Geköpft für Christus & Österreich. (1995).</ref><ref>Pirker, Peter (2012). Suberversion deutscher Herrschaft. Der britische Geheimdienst SOE und Österreich. Zeitgeschichte im Kontext. 6. Göttingen: V & R Unipress. p. 252. {{ISBN|978-3-86234-990-6}}.</ref> After the war, their history was often forgotten, also because they acted against the express instructions of their church authorities.<ref>Erika Weinzierl: Kirchlicher Widerstand gegen den Nationalsozialismus. In: Themen der Zeitgeschichte und der Gegenwart. Vienna 2004, {{ISBN|3-8258-7549-0}}, p. 76.</ref><ref>Helga Thoma "Mahner-Helfer-Patrioten: Porträts aus dem österreichischen Widerstand" (2004), p 159.</ref><ref>Benedicta Maria Kempner: "Priester vor Hitlers Tribunalen" (1966).</ref> | |||
| Historian ] claims that Nazism used Christianity for political purposes, but such use required that "fundamental tenets were stripped out, but the remaining diffuse religious emotionality had its uses".<ref name="Roger Griffin 2005, p. 85"/> Burleigh claims that Nazism's conception of spirituality was "self-consciously pagan and primitive".<ref name="Roger Griffin 2005, p. 85"/> Historian ] rejects the claim that Nazism was primarily pagan, noting that although there were some influential neo-paganists in the Nazi Party, such as Heinrich Himmler and ], they represented a minority and their views did not influence Nazi ideology beyond its use for symbolism. It is noted that Hitler denounced Germanic paganism in ''Mein Kampf'' and condemned Rosenberg's and Himmler's paganism as "nonsense".<ref name="totalitarianism"/> | |||
| === Economics === | |||
| {{main|Economy of Nazi Germany}} | |||
| {{further|Economics of fascism}} | |||
| ]]] | |||
| The Nazis came to power in the midst of ], when the ] rate at that point in time was close to 30%.<ref name="DeLong 1997">{{cite web|last=DeLong|first=J. Bradford|title=Slouching Towards Utopia?: The Economic History of the Twentieth Century. XV. Nazis and Soviets|date=February 1997|publisher=University of California at Berkeley|work=econ161.berkeley.edu|url=http://econ161.berkeley.edu/TCEH/Slouch_Purge15.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080511190923/http://econ161.berkeley.edu/TCEH/Slouch_Purge15.html|access-date = 21 April 2013|archive-date=11 May 2008}}</ref> Generally speaking, Nazi theorists and politicians blamed Germany's previous economic failures on political causes like the influence of Marxism on the workforce, the sinister and exploitative machinations of what they called international Jewry and the vindictiveness of the western political leaders' ] demands. Instead of traditional economic incentives, the Nazis offered solutions of a political nature, such as the elimination of organised ]s, rearmament (in contravention of the Versailles Treaty) and biological politics.<ref>], ''War and Economy in the Third Reich'' (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995), pp. 1–5.</ref> Various work programs designed to establish full-employment for the German population were instituted once the Nazis seized full national power. Hitler encouraged nationally supported projects like the construction of the '']'' highway system, the introduction of an affordable people's car ('']'') and later the Nazis bolstered the economy through the business and employment generated by military rearmament.<ref>], ''War and Economy in the Third Reich'' (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995), pp. 7–11.</ref> The Nazis benefited early in the regime's existence from the first post-Depression economic upswing, and this combined with their public works projects, job-procurement program and subsidised home repair program reduced unemployment by as much as 40 per cent in one year. This development tempered the unfavourable psychological climate caused by the earlier economic crisis and encouraged Germans to march in step with the regime.<ref>Richard Grunberger, ''The 12-Year Reich: A Social History of Nazi Germany, 1933–1945'' (New York: Henry Holt & Co., 1971), p. 19.</ref> | |||
| The economic policies of the Nazis were in many respects a continuation of the policies of the ], a ] party and the Nazis' coalition partner.<ref>Beck Hermann, ''The Fateful Alliance: German Conservatives and Nazis in 1933: The Machtergreifung in a New Light'' (New York: Berghahn Books, 2008), p. 243.</ref> While other Western capitalist countries strove for increased ] of industry during the same period, the Nazis transferred ] into the ] and handed over some ]s to private organizations, mostly affiliated with the Nazi Party. It was an intentional policy with multiple objectives rather than ideologically driven and was used as a tool to enhance support for the Nazi government and the party.<ref name=":2">{{cite journal |last=Bel |first=Germà |date=April 2006 |title=Against the mainstream: Nazi privatization in 1930s Germany |url=http://www.ub.edu/graap/nazi.pdf |journal=Economic History Review |publisher=University of Barcelona |volume=63 |issue=1 |pages=34–55 |doi=10.1111/j.1468-0289.2009.00473.x |ssrn=895247 |access-date=20 September 2020 |hdl-access=free |hdl=2445/11716 |s2cid=154486694|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110720073011/http://www.ub.edu/graap/nazi.pdf |archive-date=20 July 2011 }}</ref> According to historian ], the Nazi ] was a ] that combined ]s with ] and described the economy as being somewhere in between the ] of the Soviet Union and the ] of the United States.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Overy |first=Richard |author-link=Richard Overy |title=Why The Allies Won |publisher=Random House |year=2006 |isbn=978-1-84595-065-1 |location=London}}</ref> | |||
| The Nazi government continued the economic policies introduced by the government of ] in 1932 to combat the effects of the Depression.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=49}} Upon being appointed Chancellor in 1933, Hitler appointed ], a former member of the ], as President of the ] in 1933 and Minister of Economics in 1934.<ref name="DeLong 1997"/> Hitler promised measures to increase employment, protect the German currency, and promote recovery from the Great Depression. These included an agrarian settlement program, labour service, and a guarantee to maintain health care and pensions.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=37}} However, these policies and programs, which included a large ] programs supported by ] such as the construction of the ''Autobahn'' network to stimulate the economy and reduce unemployment,{{sfn|Tooze|2007|p={{page needed|date=January 2011}}}} were inherited and planned to be undertaken by the ] during conservative ]'s presidency and which the Nazis appropriated as their own after coming to power.<ref>W. Dick; A. Lichtenberg (4 August 2012). {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221216105109/https://www.dw.com/en/the-myth-of-hitlers-role-in-building-the-autobahn/a-16144981 |date=16 December 2022 }}. Deutsche Welle. Retrieved 4 August 2012.</ref> Above all, Hitler's priority was rearmament and the buildup of the German military in preparation for an eventual war to conquer '']'' in the East.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=38}} The policies of Schacht created a scheme for deficit financing, in which capital projects were paid for with the issuance of promissory notes called ], which could be traded by companies with each other.<ref>{{cite book|last= Overy|first=R.J.|author-link=Richard Overy|title= The Nazi economic recovery 1932–1938|year= 1996|publisher= Cambridge Univ. Press|location= Cambridge |isbn= 0-521-55767-4|page= 42|edition= 2nd}}</ref> This was particularly useful in allowing Germany to rearm because the Mefo bills were not ]s and did not appear in the federal budget, so they helped conceal rearmament.<ref>William L. Shirer, ''The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany'' (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011), p. 260.</ref> At the beginning of his rule, Hitler said that "the future of Germany depends exclusively and only on the reconstruction of the Wehrmacht. All other tasks must cede precedence to the task of rearmament."{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=38}} This policy was implemented immediately, with military expenditures quickly growing far larger than the civilian work-creation programs. As early as June 1933, military spending for the year was budgeted to be three times larger than the spending on all civilian work-creation measures in 1932 and 1933 combined.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=55}} Nazi Germany increased its military spending faster than any other state in peacetime, with the share of military spending rising from 1 per cent to 10 per cent of national income in the first two years of the regime alone.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=66}} Eventually, it reached as high as 75 per cent by 1944.{{sfn|Evans|2008|p=333}} | |||
| In spite of their rhetoric condemning ] prior to their rise to power, the Nazis quickly entered into a partnership with German business from as early as February 1933. That month, after being appointed Chancellor but before gaining dictatorial powers, Hitler made a personal appeal to German business leaders to help fund the Nazi Party for the crucial months that were to follow. He argued that they should support him in establishing a dictatorship because "private enterprise cannot be maintained in the age of democracy" and because democracy would allegedly lead to communism.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=99}} He promised to destroy the German left and the trade unions, without any mention of anti-Jewish policies or foreign conquests.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=100}} In the following weeks, the Nazi Party received contributions from seventeen different business groups, with the largest coming from ] and ].{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=100}} Historian Adam Tooze writes that the leaders of German business were therefore "willing partners in the destruction of political pluralism in Germany".{{sfn|Tooze|2006|pp=101}} In exchange, owners and managers of German businesses were granted unprecedented powers to control their workforce, ] was abolished and wages were frozen at a relatively low level.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=102}} Business profits also rose very rapidly, as did corporate investment.{{sfn|Tooze|2006|p=114}} In addition, the Nazis privatised public properties and public services, only increasing economic state control through regulations.<ref name="guillebaud"/> Hitler believed that private ownership was useful in that it encouraged creative competition and technical innovation, but insisted that it had to conform to national interests and be "productive" rather than "parasitical".<ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 403"/> Private property rights were conditional upon following the economic priorities set by the Nazi leadership, with high profits as a reward for firms who followed them and the threat of nationalisation being used against those who did not.<ref name=economic573/> Under Nazi economics, free competition and self-regulating markets diminished, but Hitler's ] beliefs made him retain business competition and private property as economic engines.<ref name="economics"/><ref name="university28"/> | |||
| The Nazis were hostile to the idea of ] in principle, upholding instead the social Darwinist concept that the weak and feeble should perish.{{sfn|Evans|2005|pp=483–484}} They condemned the welfare system of the Weimar Republic as well as private charity, accusing them of supporting people regarded as racially inferior and weak, who should have been weeded out in the process of natural selection.{{sfn|Evans|2005|p=484}} Nevertheless, faced with the mass unemployment and poverty of the Great Depression, the Nazis found it necessary to set up charitable institutions to help racially-pure Germans in order to maintain popular support, while arguing that this represented "racial self-help" and not indiscriminate charity or universal social welfare.{{sfn|Evans|2005|pp=484–485}} Nazi programs such as the ] and the broader ] (NSV) were organised as quasi-private institutions, officially relying on private donations from Germans to help others of their race, although in practice those who refused to donate could face severe consequences.{{sfn|Evans|2005|pp=486–487}} Unlike the social welfare institutions of the Weimar Republic and the Christian charities, the NSV distributed assistance on explicitly racial grounds. It provided support only to those who were "racially sound, capable of and willing to work, politically reliable, and willing and able to reproduce". Non-Aryans were excluded, as well as the "work-shy", "asocials" and the "hereditarily ill".{{sfn|Evans|2005|p=489}} Successful efforts were made to get middle-class women involved in social work assisting large families,<ref name="Grunberger46"/> and the Winter Relief campaigns acted as a ritual to generate public sympathy.<ref name="Richard Grunberger p 79">Richard Grunberger, ''The 12-Year Reich'', p. 79, {{ISBN|0-03-076435-1}}</ref> | |||
| Agrarian policies were also important to the Nazis since they corresponded not just to the economy but to their geopolitical conception of ''Lebensraum'' as well. For Hitler, the acquisition of land and soil was requisite in moulding the German economy.<ref>Ian Kershaw, ''Hitler, the Germans, and the Final Solution'' (New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 2008), pp. 52–53.</ref> To tie farmers to their land, selling agricultural land was prohibited.<ref>Rafael Scheck, ''Germany, 1871–1945: A Concise History'', p. 167.</ref> Farm ownership remained private, but business monopoly rights were granted to marketing boards to control production and prices with a quota system.<ref name=berman >{{cite book |title=The Primacy of Politics: Social Democracy and the Making of Europe's Twentieth Century |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BNV5uVCQnq8C&q=146&pg=PA146 |first=Sheri |last=Berman |author-link=Sheri Berman |page=146 |isbn=978-0-521-52110-9 |date=2006 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |access-date=18 November 2020 |archive-date=12 July 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025420/https://books.google.com/books?id=BNV5uVCQnq8C&q=146&pg=PA146#v=snippet&q=146&f=false |url-status=live }}</ref> The Hereditary Farm Law of 1933 established a cartel structure under a government body known as the ] (RNST) which determined "everything from what seeds and fertilizers were used to how land was inherited".<ref name=berman/> Hitler primarily viewed the German economy as an instrument of power and believed the economy was not about creating wealth and technical progress so as to improve the quality of life for a nation's citizenry, but rather that economic success was paramount for providing the means and material foundations necessary for military conquest.<ref>], ''War and Economy in the Third Reich'' (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995), pp. 1–30.</ref> While economic progress generated by National Socialist programs had its role in appeasing the German people, the Nazis and Hitler in particular did not believe that economic solutions alone were sufficient to thrust Germany onto the stage as a world power. The Nazis thus sought to secure a general economic revival accompanied by massive military spending for rearmament, especially later through the implementation of the ], which consolidated their rule and firmly secured a command relationship between the German arms industry and the National Socialist government.<ref>Klaus Hildebrand, ''The Third Reich'' (London & New York: Routledge, 1986), pp. 39–48.</ref> Between 1933 and 1939, military expenditures were upwards of 82 billion Reichsmarks and represented 23 per cent of Germany's gross national product as the Nazis mobilised their people and economy for war.<ref>Jost Dülffer, ''Nazi Germany 1933–1945: Faith and Annihilation'' (London: Bloomsbury, 2009), pp. 72–73.</ref> | |||
| ==== Anti-communism ==== | |||
| ] | |||
| The Nazis claimed that communism was dangerous to the well-being of nations because of its intention to dissolve ], its support of ], its aggression against the ], its hostility towards small business and its ].<ref name=autogenerated20 /> Nazism rejected class conflict-based socialism and ], favouring instead a ] economy with ]es based on merit and talent, retaining private property and the creation of national solidarity that transcends class distinction.<ref name=autogenerated11/> During the late 1930s and the 1940s, anti-communist regimes and groups that supported Nazism included the ] in ], the ] and the ] in France and the ] under ].<ref name="carroll"/> | |||
| In ''Mein Kampf'', Hitler stated his desire to "make war upon the Marxist principle that all men are equal".<ref>Hitler, Adolf, ''Mein Kampf'', Hurst and Blackett ltd., 1939, p. 343</ref> He believed that "the notion of equality was a sin against nature."{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|p=51}} Nazism upheld the "natural inequality of men," including inequality between races and also within each race. The Nazi state aimed to advance those individuals with special talents or intelligence, so they could rule over the masses.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|p=49}} Nazi ideology relied on elitism and the {{Lang|de|]}} (leadership principle), arguing that elite minorities should assume leadership roles over the majority, and that the elite minority should itself be organised according to a "hierarchy of talent", with a single leader—the ]—at the top.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|pp=49–50}} The {{Lang|de|Führerprinzip}} held that each member of the hierarchy owed absolute obedience to those above him and should hold absolute power over those below him.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|p=50}} | |||
| During the 1920s, Hitler urged disparate Nazi factions to unite in opposition to ].<ref name="Adolf Hitler"/> Hitler asserted that the "three vices" of "Jewish Marxism" were democracy, ] and ].<ref name="Hitler, the Germans, and the Final Solution"/> The Communist movement, the trade unions, the Social Democratic Party and the left-wing press were all considered to be Jewish-controlled and part of the "international Jewish conspiracy" to weaken the German nation by promoting internal disunity through class struggle.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|p=50}} The Nazis also believed that the Jews had instigated the ] in Russia and that Communists had ] and caused it to lose the First World War.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|p=52}} They further argued that modern cultural trends of the 1920s (such as ] and ]) represented "]" and were part of a political assault aimed at the spiritual degeneration of the German ''Volk''.{{sfn|Bendersky|1985|p=52}} Joseph Goebbels published a pamphlet titled ''The Nazi-Sozi'' which gave brief points of how Nazism differed from Marxism.<ref>{{cite web|title=The Nazi-Sozi|url=http://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/nazi-sozi.htm|trans-title=Joseph Goebbels, Der Nazi-Sozi (Elberfeld: Verlag der Nationalsozialistischen Briefe, 1927)|access-date=22 August 2017|archive-date=29 October 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141029223830/http://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/nazi-sozi.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> In 1930, Hitler said: "Our adopted term 'Socialist' has nothing to do with Marxist Socialism. Marxism is anti-property; true Socialism is not".<ref name="university29"/> | |||
| The ] (KPD) was the largest Communist Party in the world outside of the Soviet Union, until it was destroyed by the Nazis in 1933.<ref>David Nicholls. ''Adolf Hitler: A Biographical Companion''. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2000, p. 50.</ref> In the 1920s and early 1930s, Communists and Nazis often fought each other directly in ], with the Nazi paramilitary organisations being opposed by the Communist ] and ]. After the beginning of the Great Depression, both Communists and Nazis saw their share of the vote increase. While the Nazis were willing to form alliances with other parties of the right, the Communists refused to form an alliance with the ], the largest party of the left.<ref>Ben Fowkes. ''Communism in Germany under the Weimar Republic''. St. Martin's Press, New York, 1984. pp. 166–167</ref> After the Nazis came to power, they quickly banned the Communist Party under the allegation that it was preparing for revolution and that it had caused the ].<ref>Ben Fowkes. ''Communism in Germany under the Weimar Republic''. St. Martin's Press, New York, 1984. pp. 170–171</ref> Four thousand KPD officials were arrested in February 1933, and by the end of the year 130,000 communists had been sent to ].<ref>Ben Fowkes. ''Communism in Germany under the Weimar Republic''. St. Martin's Press, New York, 1984, p. 171</ref> | |||
| ==== Views of capitalism ==== | |||
| {{see also|List of companies involved in the Holocaust}} | |||
| The Nazis argued that ] damages nations due to ] and the worldwide economic dominance of disloyal big business, which they considered to be the product of Jewish influences.<ref name="autogenerated20"/> Nazi propaganda posters in ] districts emphasised anti-capitalism, such as one that said: "The maintenance of a rotten industrial system has nothing to do with nationalism. I can love Germany and hate capitalism".<ref name="publishers30"/> | |||
| Both in public and in private Hitler opposed free-market capitalism because it "could not be trusted to put national interests first", arguing that it holds nations ransom in the interests of a parasitic ] ] class.<ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 399"/> He believed that ] would lead to global domination by the British Empire and the United States, which he believed were controlled by Jewish bankers in ] and the ]. In particular, Hitler saw the United States as a major future rival and feared that the ] after World War I would allow ] to displace ] as the world's most powerful continent. Hitler's anxiety over the economic rise of the United States was a major theme in his unpublished '']''. He even hoped for a time that Britain could be swayed into an alliance with Germany on the basis of a shared economic rivalry with the United States.<ref name=":0">{{Harvp|Tooze|2006|pp=8–11}}</ref> Hitler desired an economy that would direct resources "in ways that matched the many national goals of the regime" such as the buildup of the military, building programs for cities and roads, and economic self-sufficiency.<ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 403"/> Hitler also distrusted free-market capitalism for being unreliable due to its ] and preferred a state-directed economy that maintains private property and competition but subordinates them to the interests of the '']'' and Nation.<ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 399"/> | |||
| Hitler told a party leader in 1934: "The economic system of our day is the creation of the Jews".<ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 399" /> Hitler said to ] that capitalism had "run its course".<ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 399"/> Hitler also said that the business ] "know nothing except their profit. 'Fatherland' is only a word for them."<ref name="dictators"/> Hitler was personally disgusted with the ruling bourgeois elites of Germany during the period of the Weimar Republic, whom he referred to as "cowardly shits".<ref>Kritika: ''explorations in Russian and Eurasian history'', Volume 7, Issue 4. Slavica Publishers, 2006, p. 922.</ref> | |||
| In ''Mein Kampf'', Hitler effectively supported ] in the belief that economic resources from their respective territories should be seized by force, as he believed that the policy of '']'' would provide Germany with such economically valuable territories.<ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 402"/> He argued that the United States and the United Kingdom only benefitted from free trade because they had already conquered substantial internal markets through British colonial conquests and ].<ref name=":0" /> Hitler argued that the only means to maintain economic security was to ] rather than being forced to rely on world trade.<ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 402"/> Hitler claimed that war to gain such resources was the only means to surpass the failing capitalist economic system.<ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 402"/> | |||
| In practice, however, the Nazis merely opposed one ], namely 19th-century ] and the '']'' model, which they nonetheless applied to the social sphere in the form of ].{{sfn|Evans|2005|pp=483–484}} Some have described Nazi Germany as an example of ], ], or ].<ref name=":2" /><ref name="SJSU">{{Cite web |title=The Economic System of Corporatism |url=https://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/corporatism.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200712232229/https://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/corporatism.htm |archive-date=12 July 2020 |access-date=2 October 2021 |publisher=San José University Department of Economics}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/china/2007-07-01/return-authoritarian-great-powers|title=The Return of Authoritarian Great Powers|last=Gat|first=Azar|date=1 July 2007|work=Foreign Affairs|access-date=8 June 2019|archive-date=17 December 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221217213850/https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/china/2007-07-01/return-authoritarian-great-powers|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Fuchs |first=Christian |date=29 June 2017 |title=The Relevance of Franz L. Neumann's Critical Theory in 2017: Anxiety and Politics in the New Age of Authoritarian Capitalism |url=https://westminsterresearch.westminster.ac.uk/download/3d32b4bfd248b58cca5d0f68ede8ee936bb6e3dd0572344e82c86089553b79b0/570163/Neumann_Christian_tripleC.pdf |journal=Media, Culture & Society |volume=40 |issue=5 |pages=779–791 |doi=10.1177/0163443718772147 |access-date=8 July 2020 |s2cid=149705789 |archive-date=13 October 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191013201910/https://westminsterresearch.westminster.ac.uk/download/3d32b4bfd248b58cca5d0f68ede8ee936bb6e3dd0572344e82c86089553b79b0/570163/Neumann_Christian_tripleC.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> While claiming to strive for autarky in propaganda, the Nazis crushed existing movements towards self-sufficiency<ref>{{cite book|title=Italian fascism: Its Origins and Development|orig-year=1938|last=De Grand|first=Alexander J.|year=2000|publisher=University of Nebraska Press|isbn=978-0-8032-6622-3|edition=3rd|location=Lincoln|oclc=42462895}}</ref> and established extensive capital connections in efforts to ready for expansionist war and genocide<ref>{{cite book|title=IBM and the Holocaust: The Strategic Alliance Between Nazi Germany and America's Most Powerful Corporation|last=Edwin|first=Black|date=2001|publisher=Crown Publishers|isbn=978-0-609-60799-2|edition=1st|location=New York|oclc=45896166}}</ref> in alliance with traditional ] and ] elites.<ref>{{cite book|title=]|last=Paxton|first=Robert O.|author-link=Robert Paxton|date=2005|publisher=Vintage Books|isbn=978-1-4000-3391-1|edition=1st|location=New York|oclc=58452991}} – </ref> In spite of their anti-capitalist rhetoric in opposition to big business, the Nazis allied with German business as soon as they got in power by appealing to the fear of communism and promising to destroy the German left and trade unions,{{sfn|Tooze|2006|pp=99–100}} eventually purging both more radical and reactionary elements from the party in 1934.{{sfn|Nyomarkay|1967|p=133}} | |||
| Joseph Goebbels, who would later go on to become the Nazi Propaganda Minister, was strongly opposed to both capitalism and communism, viewing them as the "two great pillars of materialism" that were "part of the international Jewish conspiracy for world domination".<ref>Read, Anthony, ''The Devil's Disciples: Hitler's Inner Circle'', New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2004, p. 138</ref> Nevertheless, he wrote in his diary in 1925 that if he were forced to choose between them, "in the final analysis, it would be better for us to go down with Bolshevism than live in eternal slavery under capitalism".<ref name="disciples"/> Goebbels also linked his antisemitism to his anti-capitalism, stating in a 1929 pamphlet that "we see, in the Hebrews, the incarnation of capitalism, the misuse of the nation's goods".<ref name="thosedamnednazis"/> | |||
| Within the Nazi Party, the faction associated with anti-capitalist beliefs was the SA, a paramilitary wing led by ]. The SA had a complicated relationship with the rest of the party, giving both Röhm himself and local SA leaders significant autonomy.{{sfn|Nyomarkay|1967|pp=1110–111}} Different local leaders would even promote different political ideas in their units, including "nationalistic, socialistic, anti-Semitic, racist, völkisch, or conservative ideas."{{sfn|Nyomarkay|1967|p=113}} There was tension between the SA and Hitler, especially from 1930 onward, as Hitler's "increasingly close association with big industrial interests and traditional rightist forces" caused many in the SA to distrust him.{{sfn|Nyomarkay|1967|p=119}} The SA regarded Hitler's seizure of power in 1933 as a "first revolution" against the left, and some voices within the ranks began arguing for a "second revolution" against the right.{{sfn|Nyomarkay|1967|pp=123–124}} After engaging in violence against the left in 1933, Röhm's SA also began attacks against individuals deemed to be associated with conservative reaction.{{sfn|Nyomarkay|1967|pp=123–124, 130}} Hitler saw Röhm's independent actions as violating and possibly threatening his leadership, as well as jeopardising the regime by alienating the conservative President Paul von Hindenburg and the conservative-oriented German Army.{{sfn|Nyomarkay|1967|p=133}} This resulted in Hitler purging Röhm and other radical members of the SA in 1934, during the Night of the Long Knives.{{sfn|Nyomarkay|1967|p=133}} | |||
| === Totalitarianism === | |||
| {{see also|Totalitarianism}} | |||
| ] in ], 1936]] | |||
| Under Nazism, with its emphasis on the nation, individualism was denounced and instead importance was placed upon Germans belonging to the German '']'' and "people's community" (''Volksgemeinschaft)''.<ref>{{cite book|last=Mosse|first=George Lachmann|title=Nazi Culture: Intellectual, Cultural and Social Life in the Third Reich|year=1966|publisher=Univ of Wisconsin Press|isbn=978-0-299-19304-1|page=239}}</ref> Hitler declared that "every activity and every need of every individual will be regulated by the collectivity represented by the party" and that "there are no longer any free realms in which the individual belongs to himself".<ref name="Fest">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BjDrszaNTygC&q=%22individual%27s+entire+life%22+hitler&pg=PA418|title=Hitler|publisher=Houghton Mifflin Harcourt|author=Fest, Joachim|page=418|isbn=978-0-544-19554-7|date=2013|access-date=18 November 2020|archive-date=12 July 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025421/https://books.google.com/books?id=BjDrszaNTygC&q=%22individual%27s+entire+life%22+hitler&pg=PA418#v=snippet&q=%22individual's%20entire%20life%22%20hitler&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| One of the core objectives of the ] was the establishment of a ] which indoctrinated the German population with ] ideas and violently enforced its ideological worldview upon the society.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Revolutions and the Revolutionary Tradition: In the West 1560–1991 |publisher=Routledge |year=2000 |isbn=0-415-17294-2 |editor-last=Parker |editor-first=David |location=London |pages=3, 192, 193, 194}}</ref> Heinrich Himmler justified the establishment of a repressive ], in which the security forces could exercise power arbitrarily, by claiming that national security and order should take precedence over the needs of the individual.<ref name="Browder">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Syyy2MtOrcsC&q=individual+needs+nazism&pg=PA240|title=Foundations of the Nazi Police State: The Formation of Sipo and SD|publisher=University Press of Kentucky|author=Browder, George C|page=240|isbn=978-0-8131-9111-9|date=2004|access-date=18 November 2020|archive-date=12 July 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025430/https://books.google.com/books?id=Syyy2MtOrcsC&q=individual+needs+nazism&pg=PA240#v=snippet&q=individual%20needs%20nazism&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref> In his speech delivered at the inauguration of the ] on 15 November 1933, ] stated:<blockquote>"The revolution we have carried out is a total one. It has embraced all areas of public life and transformed them from below. It has completely changed and recast the relationship of people to each other, to the State, and to life itself. It was in fact the breakthrough of a fresh ], which had fought for power in opposition for fourteen years to provide the basis for the German people to develop a new relationship with the State. What has been happening since 30 January is only the visible expression of this revolutionary process."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Griffin |first=Roger |title=Fascism |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1995 |isbn=978-0-19-289249-2 |pages=133, 134}}</ref></blockquote> | |||
| According to the famous philosopher and political theorist, ], the allure of Nazism as a totalitarian ideology (with its attendant mobilisation of the German population) resided within the construct of helping that society deal with the ] resultant from the tragic interruption of the First World War and the economic and material suffering consequent to the Depression and brought to order the revolutionary unrest occurring all around them. Instead of the ] that existed in ] or ], Nazism as a totalitarian system promulgated "clear" solutions to the historical problems faced by Germany, levied support by de-legitimizing the former government of Weimar and provided a politico-biological pathway to a better future, one free from the uncertainty of the past. It was the atomised and disaffected masses that Hitler and the party elite pointed in a particular direction and using clever propaganda to make them into ideological adherents, exploited in bringing Nazism to life.<ref>Hannah Arendt, ''The Origins of Totalitarianism'' (Orlando, FL Harcourt Inc., 1973), pp. 305–459.</ref> | |||
| While the ideologues of Nazism, ], abhorred democratic or parliamentary governance as practised in the United States or Britain, their differences are substantial. An ] crisis occurs when one tries to synthesize and contrast Nazism and Stalinism as two-sides of the same coin with their similarly tyrannical leaders, state-controlled economies and repressive police structures. Namely, while they share a common thematic political construction, they are entirely inimical to one another in their worldviews and when more carefully analysed against one another on a one-to-one level, an "irreconcilable asymmetry" results.<ref>Michael Geyer and Sheila Fitzpatrick, eds., "Introduction – After Totalitarianism: Stalinism and Nazism Compared", in ''Beyond Totalitarianism: Stalinism and Nazism Compared'' (Cambridge & New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008), pp. 20–21.</ref> | |||
| ], a Nazi legal theorist and member of ], characterized the "'']''" as the ideological foundation of Nazi Germany's "total state".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Griffin |first=Roger |title=Revolutions and the Revolutionary Tradition: In the West 1560–1991 |publisher=Routledge |year=2000 |isbn=0-415-17294-2 |editor-last=Parker |editor-first=David |location= London |page=193 |chapter=11: Revolution from the Right: Fascism}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Griffin |first=Roger |title=Fascism |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1995 |isbn=978-0-19-289249-2 |pages=138, 139}}</ref> In his book "''Staat, Bewegung, Volk'' " (1933), Schmitt wrote: <blockquote>"National Socialism does not think in abstractions and clichés. It is the enemy of all normative and functionalist ways of proceeding. It supports and cultivates every authentic substance of the people wherever it encounters it, in the countryside, in ethnic groups or classes. It has created the hereditary farm law; saved the peasantry; purged the Civil Service of alien elements and thus re-stored it as a class. It has the courage to treat unequally what is unequal and enforce necessary differentiations."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Griffin |first=Roger |title=Fascism |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1995 |isbn=978-0-19-289249-2 |pages=138}}</ref></blockquote> | |||
| == Classification: Reactionary or Revolutionary == | |||
| Although Nazism is often seen as a reactionary movement, it did not seek a return of Germany to the pre-Weimar monarchy, but instead looked much further back to a mythic halcyon Germany which never existed. It has also been seen—as it was by the ] scholar ]—as the result of a crisis of capitalism which manifested as a "totalitarian monopoly capitalism". In this view Nazism is a mass movement of the middle class which was in opposition to a mass movement of workers in socialism and its extreme form, Communism.{{sfn|Bracher|1970|pp=19–20}} Historian ] argues: | |||
| <blockquote>Such an interpretation runs the risk of misjudging the revolutionary component of National Socialism, which cannot be dismissed as being simply reactionary. Rather, from the very outset, and particularly as it developed into the SS state, National Socialism aimed at a transformation of state and society.{{sfn|Bracher|1970|pp=19–20}}</blockquote> | |||
| About Hitler's and the Nazi Party's political positions, Bracher further claims: | |||
| <blockquote> were of a revolutionary nature: destruction of existing political and social structures and their supporting elites; profound disdain for civic order, for human and moral values, for ] and ], for liberal and Marxist ideas. The middle class and middle-class values, bourgeois nationalism and capitalism, the professionals, the intelligentsia and the upper class were dealt the sharpest rebuff. These were the groups which had to be uprooted .{{sfn|Bracher|1970|p=165}}</blockquote> | |||
| See the condemnations of Nazism made by Kaiser ] of the House of Hohenzollern and ] of the House of Hapsburg in the next section. | |||
| Similarly, historian ] argued: | |||
| <blockquote>Contrary to many interpretations of Nazism, which tend to view it as a reactionary movement, as, in the words of ], an "explosion of antiquarianism", intent on turning Germany into a pastoral folk community of thatched cottages and happy peasants, the general thrust of the movement, despite archaisms, was futuristic. Nazism was a headlong plunge into the future, towards a "brave new world." Of course it used to advantage residual conservative and utopian longings, paid respect to these romantic visions, and picked its ideological trappings from the German past. but its goals were, by its own lights, distinctly progressive. It was not a double-faced ] whose aspects were equally attentive to the past and the future, nor was it a modern ], the god of metamorphosis, who duplicates pre-existing forms. The intention of the movement was to create a new type of human being from whom would spring a new morality, a new social system, and eventually a new international order. That was, in fact, the intention of all the fascist movements. After a visit to Italy and a meeting with Mussolini, ] wrote that fascism "has produced not only a new system of government, but also a new type of man, who differs from politicians of the old world as men from another planet." Hitler talked in these terms endlessly. National Socialism was more than a political movement, he said; it was more than a faith; it was a desire to create mankind anew.<ref>Eksteins, Modris. Rites of spring: The Great War and the birth of the modern age. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2000, p. 303</ref></blockquote> | |||
| British historian ], in his history of Europe in the first half of the 20th century, ''To Hell and Back'', says about Nazism, ] and Bolshevism: | |||
| <blockquote>They were different forms of a completely new, modern type of dictatorship—the complete antithesis to ]. They were all revolutionary, if by that term we understand a major political upheaval driven by the utopian aim of changing society fundamentally. They were not content simply to use repression as a means of control, but sought to mobilize behind an exclusive ideology to "educate" people into becoming committed believers, to claim them soul as well as body. Each of the regimes was, therefore, dynamic in ways that "conventional" authoritarianism was not.<ref>{{cite hellback| page=265}}</ref></blockquote> | |||
| Despite such tactical breaks necessitated by pragmatic concerns, which were typical for Hitler during his rise to power and in the early years of his regime, those who see Hitler as a revolutionary argue that he never ceased being a revolutionary dedicated to the radical transformation of Germany, especially when it concerned racial matters. In his monograph, ''Hitler: Study of a Revolutionary?'', ] concludes: | |||
| <blockquote> compiled a most extensive set of revolutionary goals (calling for radical social and political change); he mobilized a revolutionary following so extensive and powerful that many of his aims were achieved; he established and ran a dictatorial revolutionary state; and he disseminated his ideas abroad through a revolutionary foreign policy and war. In short, he defined and controlled the National Socialist revolution in all its phases.<ref>] (2000) ''Hitler: Study of a Revolutionary?''. New York: Routledge, p. 193. {{isbn|0-415-16359-5}}</ref></blockquote> | |||
| There were aspects of Nazism which were undoubtedly reactionary, such as their attitude toward the role of women in society, which was completely traditionalist,{{sfn|Bracher|1970|p=179}} calling for the return of women to the home as wives, mothers and homemakers, although ironically this ideological policy was undermined in reality by the growing labour shortages and need for more workers caused by men leaving the workforce for military service. The number of working women actually increased from 4.24 million in 1933 to 4.52 million in 1936 and 5.2 million in 1938,{{sfn|Bracher|1970|pp=421–422}} despite active discouragement and legal barriers put in place by the Nazi regime.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sarti |first1=Wendy Adele-Marie |title=Women and Nazis: Perpetrators of Genocide and Other Crimes During Hitler's Regime, 1933–1945 |date=2011 |publisher=Academica Press |isbn=978-1-936320-11-0 |page=19 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1CosAQAAMAAJ |access-date=14 June 2021 |language=en |archive-date=12 July 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025923/https://books.google.com/books?id=1CosAQAAMAAJ |url-status=live }}</ref> Another reactionary aspect of Nazism was in their arts policy, which stemmed from Hitler's rejection of all forms of ] ], ] and ].{{sfn|Kershaw|1999|p=82}} | |||
| Historian ] describes Nazism as having: | |||
| <blockquote>...a peculiar hybrid, half-reactionary, half-revolutionary relationship to established society, to the political system and tradition. ... ideology was almost like a backwards-looking Utopia. It derived from romantic pictures and clichés of the past, from warlike-heroic, patriarchal or absolutist ages, social and political systems, which, however, were translated into the popular and avant-garde, into the fighting slogans of totalitarian nationalism. The élitist notion of aristocratic nobility became the ''völkische'' 'nobility of blood' of the 'master race', the princely ']' gave way to the popular national Führer; the obedient submission to the active national ']'.{{sfn|Broszat|1981|pages=21–22}}</blockquote> | |||
| === Contemporary events and views === | |||
| After the failure of the Beer Hall Putsch in 1923, and his subsequent trial and imprisonment, Hitler decided that the way for the Nazi Party to achieve power was not through insurrection, but through legal and quasi-legal means. This did not sit well with the brown-shirted stormtroopers of the SA, especially those in Berlin, who chafed under the restrictions that Hitler placed on them, and their subordination to the party. This resulted in the ] of 1930–31, after which Hitler made himself the Supreme Commander of the SA and brought Ernst Röhm back to be their Chief of Staff and keep them in line. The quashing of the SA's revolutionary fervor convinced many businessmen and military leaders that the Nazis had put aside their insurrectionist past, and that Hitler could be a reliable partner.{{sfn|Bracher|1970|pp=231–232}}{{sfn|Evans|2003|p=274}} | |||
| After the Nazis' "]" in 1933, Röhm and the Brown Shirts were not content for the party to simply carry the reins of power. Instead, they pressed for a continuation of the "National Socialist revolution" to bring about sweeping social changes, which Hitler, primarily for tactical reasons, was not willing to do at that time. He was instead focused on rebuilding the military and reorienting the economy to provide the rearmament necessary for invasion of the countries to the east of Germany, especially Poland and Russia, to get the '']'' ("living space") he believed was necessary to the survival of the Aryan race. For this, he needed the co-operation of not only the military, but also the vital organs of capitalism, the banks and big businesses, which he would be unlikely to get if Germany's social and economic structure was being radically overhauled. Röhm's public proclamation that the SA would not allow the "German Revolution" to be halted or undermined caused Hitler to announce that "The revolution is not a permanent condition." The unwillingness of Röhm and the SA to cease their agitation for a "Second Revolution", and the unwarranted fear of a "Röhm putsch" to accomplish it, were factors behind Hitler's purging of the SA leadership in the Night of the Long Knives in the summer of 1934.{{sfn|Kershaw|1999|pp=501–503}}{{sfn|Bracher|1970|pp=300–302}} | |||
| Kaiser ], the last ], was appalled at the ] of 9–10 November 1938, stating "For the first time, I am ashamed to be a German":{{Sfn | Balfour | 1964 | p = 419}} | |||
| {{blockquote|There's a man alone, without family, without children, without God ... He builds legions, but he doesn't build a nation. A nation is created by families, a religion, traditions: it is made up out of the hearts of mothers, the wisdom of fathers, the joy and the exuberance of children ... For a few months I was inclined to believe in National Socialism. I thought of it as a necessary fever. And I was gratified to see that there were, associated with it for a time, some of the wisest and most outstanding Germans. But these, one by one, he has got rid of or even killed ... He has left nothing but a bunch of shirted gangsters! This man could bring home victories to our people each year, without bringing them either glory or danger. But of our Germany, which was a nation of poets and musicians, of artists and soldiers, he has made a nation of hysterics and hermits, engulfed in a mob and led by a thousand liars or fanatics.|Wilhelm on Hitler, December 1938<ref name="Ken 1938" />}} | |||
| ], the last ] of ], denounced Nazism, stating:<ref name="gunther1936">{{cite book | url=https://openlibrary.org/works/OL16059565W/Inside_Europe | title=Inside Europe | publisher=Harper & Brothers | last=Gunther | first=John | date=1936 | pages=321–323 | access-date=4 February 2024 | archive-date=29 November 2019 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191129104306/https://openlibrary.org/works/OL16059565W/Inside_Europe | url-status=live }}</ref> | |||
| {{blockquote|I absolutely reject Fascism for Austria ... This un-Austrian movement promises everything to everyone, but really intends the most ruthless subjugation of the Austrian people ... The people of Austria will never tolerate that our beautiful fatherland should become an exploited colony, and that the Austrian should become a man of second category.}} | |||
| Following the German annexation of Austria, Otto was sentenced to death by the Nazi regime; ] ordered that Otto was to be executed immediately if caught.<ref name="guardian-obit">{{cite news |author=Dan van der Vat |author-link=Dan van der Vat |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jul/04/otto-von-habsburg-obituary |title=Otto von Habsburg obituary |work=The Guardian |date=4 July 2011 |access-date=6 July 2011 |location=London |archive-date=30 September 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130930132055/http://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jul/04/otto-von-habsburg-obituary |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Biography |url=https://habsburgottoalapitvany.hu/en/biography/ |access-date=2023-02-03 |website=Otto von Habsburg Foundation |date=12 August 2019 |language=en-GB |archive-date=28 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231128124737/https://habsburgottoalapitvany.hu/en/biography/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>Omeidl "Rudolf Hess, der Stellvertreter des Führers, hatte den deutschen Invasionstruppen für das neutrale Belgien den Befehl erteilt, Otto von Habsburg und seine Brüder, falls sie gefasst würden, ohne jedes weitere Verfahren sofort zu erschießen." {{cite web |url=http://www.omeidl.com/monarch.html |title=Monarch |access-date=2011-11-01 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101005080553/http://www.omeidl.com/monarch.html |archive-date=5 October 2010}}</ref> As ordered by ], his personal property and that of the House of Habsburg were confiscated. It was not returned after the war.<ref>{{cite news|last=Zoch |first=Irene |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/1455082/Habsburgs-demand-return-of-estates-seized-by-Nazis-in-1938.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220112/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/1455082/Habsburgs-demand-return-of-estates-seized-by-Nazis-in-1938.html |archive-date=12 January 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |title=Habsburgs demand return of estates seized by Nazis in 1938 |work=The Daily Telegraph |date=22 February 2004 |access-date=6 July 2011 |location=London}}{{cbignore}}</ref> The so-called "]", which had previously been repealed, was reintroduced by the Nazis.<ref name="newser">{{cite web |url=http://www.newser.com/article/d9o8qcb00/otto-von-habsburg-oldest-son-of-austria-hungarys-last-emperor-dies-at-age-98.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191026093053/https://www.newser.com/article/d9o8qcb00/otto-von-habsburg-dies-at-age-98.html |archive-date=26 October 2019 |title=Otto von Habsburg dies at age 98 |website=] |agency=] |access-date=4 February 2024}}</ref> | |||
| === Post-war Nazism === | |||
| {{main|Neo-Nazism}} | |||
| Following ] and the end of ], overt expressions of support for Nazi ideas were prohibited in Germany and other European countries. Nonetheless, movements which self-identify as National Socialist or which are described as adhering to Nazism continue to exist on the fringes of politics in many Western societies. Usually espousing a white supremacist ideology, many deliberately adopt the symbols of Nazi Germany.<ref>{{cite book|last=Blamires|first=Cyprian P.|editor1-last=Blamires|editor1-first=C. P.|editor2-last=Jackson|editor2-first=Paul|year=2006|title=World Fascism: A Historical Encyclopedia|volume=1: A–K|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=978-1-57607-940-9|pages=459–461|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nvD2rZSVau4C&q=neo-nazism&pg=PA460|access-date=18 November 2020|archive-date=12 July 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025946/https://books.google.com/books?id=nvD2rZSVau4C&q=neo-nazism&pg=PA460|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| == See also == | == See also == | ||
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| {{div col end}} | |||
| == |
== References == | ||
| ===Notes=== | |||
| * | |||
| {{reflist|refs= | |||
| * | |||
| * | |||
| * | |||
| * | |||
| * | |||
| * - Large collection of original scanned Nazi documents | |||
| * - contains a lot of information on the Axis countries | |||
| * - Modern day National Socialists | |||
| * by Jacques R. Pauwels | |||
| <!-- <ref name=Jones2003>{{cite book|last=Jones|first=Daniel|author-link=Daniel Jones (phonetician)|year=2003|orig-year=1917|title=English Pronouncing Dictionary|editor-last1=Roach|editor-first1=Peter|editor-last2=Hartmann|editor-first2=James|editor-last3=Setter|editor-first3=Jane|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-3-12-539683-8}}</ref> --> | |||
| {{authoritarian}} | |||
| <ref name=Baum2006_156>{{cite book|last=Baum|first=Bruce David|year=2006|title=The Rise and Fall of the Caucasian Race: A Political History of Racial Identity|url=https://archive.org/details/risefallcaucasia00baum|url-access=limited|location=New York/London|publisher=New York University Press|page=|isbn=978-1-4294-1506-4}}</ref> | |||
| ] | |||
| ] | |||
| ] | |||
| ] | |||
| ] | |||
| ] | |||
| ] | |||
| <ref name=Kobrak2004>{{cite book|last1=Kobrak|first1=Christopher|last2=Hansen|first2=Per H.|last3=Kopper|first3=Christopher|chapter=Business, Political Risk, and Historians in the Twentieth Century|year=2004|editor-last1=Kobrak|editor-first1=Christopher|editor-last2=Hansen|editor-first2=Per H.|title=European Business, Dictatorship, and Political Risk, 1920–1945|location=New York/Oxford|publisher=Berghahn Books|isbn=978-1-57181-629-0|pages=16–17|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1oXbDyeLYXoC&q=anti-capitalist+enough&pg=PA16|access-date=18 November 2020|archive-date=12 July 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025924/https://books.google.com/books?id=1oXbDyeLYXoC&q=anti-capitalist+enough&pg=PA16#v=snippet&q=anti-capitalist%20enough&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| {{Link FA|no}} | |||
| <ref name=Lepage2009_9>{{cite book|first=Jean-Denis|last=Lepage|year=2009|title=Hitler Youth, 1922–1945: An Illustrated History|url=https://archive.org/details/hitleryouthillus00lepa|url-access=limited|publisher=McFarland|isbn=978-0-7864-3935-5|page=}}</ref> | |||
| {{Link FA|pt}} | |||
| {{Link FA|sv}} | |||
| <ref name=GottliebMorgensen2007>{{cite book|editor1-last=Gottlieb|editor1-first=Henrik|editor1-link=Henrik Gottlieb|editor2-last=Morgensen|editor2-first=Jens Erik|year=2007|title=Dictionary Visions, Research and Practice: Selected Papers from the 12th International Symposium on Lexicography, Copenhagen 2004|edition=illustrated|location=Amsterdam|publisher=J. Benjamins Pub. Co.|isbn=978-90-272-2334-0|page=247|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UaggHAJ7jToC&pg=PA247|access-date=22 October 2014|archive-date=12 July 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025924/https://books.google.com/books?id=UaggHAJ7jToC&pg=PA247#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| <!-- 5 --> | |||
| <ref name=HarperOED>{{cite web|last1=Harper|first1=Douglas|title=Nazi|website=etymonline.com|publisher=Online Etymology Dictionary|url=http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Nazi|access-date=22 October 2014|archive-date=6 October 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141006134952/http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Nazi|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| <ref name=Sourcebook>{{cite book|editor1-last=Rabinbach|editor1-first=Anson|editor1-link=Anson Rabinbach|editor2-last=Gilman|editor2-first=Sander|editor2-link=Sander Gilman|year=2013|title=The Third Reich Sourcebook|location=Berkeley|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=978-0-520-95514-1|page=4|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XhDakMp55i0C&pg=PA4|access-date=14 August 2015|archive-date=12 July 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025925/https://books.google.com/books?id=XhDakMp55i0C&pg=PA4#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| <ref name=DailyTelegraph23102011>{{cite news|last1=Copping|first1=Jasper|date=23 October 2011|title=Why Hitler hated being called a Nazi and what's really in humble pie – origins of words and phrases revealed|newspaper=The Daily Telegraph|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/8843158/Why-Hitler-hated-being-called-a-Nazi-and-whats-really-in-humble-pie-origins-of-words-and-phrases-revealed.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220110/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/8843158/Why-Hitler-hated-being-called-a-Nazi-and-whats-really-in-humble-pie-origins-of-words-and-phrases-revealed.html |archive-date=10 January 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live|access-date=22 October 2014}}{{cbignore}}</ref> | |||
| <ref name=Seebold2002>{{cite book|editor-last=Seebold|editor-first=Elmar|editor-link=Elmar Seebold|year=2002|title=Kluge Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache|edition=24th|location=Berlin|publisher=]|language=de|isbn=978-3-11-017473-1}}</ref> | |||
| <!-- 10 --> | |||
| <ref name=Fritzsche_Eatwell_Griffin>{{cite book|last=Fritzsche|first=Peter|author-link=Peter Fritzsche|year=1998|title=Germans into Nazis|url=https://archive.org/details/germansintonazis00frit|url-access=registration|location=Cambridge, Massachusetts|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-35092-2}}<br />{{cite book|last=Eatwell|first=Roger|year=1997|title=Fascism, A History|publisher=Viking-Penguin|isbn=978-0-14-025700-7|pages=xvii–xxiv, 21, 26–31, 114–140, 352}}<br />{{cite book|last=Griffin|first=Roger|author-link=Roger Griffin|year=2000|chapter=Revolution from the Right: Fascism|editor-last=Parker|editor-first=David|title=Revolutions and the Revolutionary Tradition in the West 1560–1991|location=London|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-0-415-17295-0|pages=185–201}}</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Adolf Hitler 2010, p. 287">Hitler, Adolf, ''Mein Kampf'', Bottom of the Hill Publishing, 2010, p. 287.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Adolf Hitler p. 170">Hitler, Adolf in ] and Patrick Romane, eds. ''The Essential Hitler: Speeches and Commentary'', Waulconda, Illinois: Bolchazi-Carducci Publishers, Inc., 2007, p. 170.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Adolf Hitler">"They must unite, said, to defeat the common enemy, Jewish Marxism." ''A New Beginning,'' Adolf Hitler, ''Völkischer Beobachter.'' February 1925. Cited in: {{cite book|last=Toland |first=John|year=1992|title=Adolf Hitler|publisher=Anchor Books|page=207|isbn=978-0-385-03724-2}}</ref> | |||
| <!-- ref name="autogenerated1">Blamires, Cyprian; Jackson, Paul. ''World Fascism: A Historical Encyclopedia: Volume 1''. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, Inc, 2006, p. 61.</ref --> | |||
| <ref name="autogenerated11">Bendersky, Joseph W. ''A History of Nazi Germany: 1919–1945''. 2nd ed. Burnham Publishers, 2000, p. 40.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="autogenerated16">Blamires, Cyprian; Jackson, Paul. ''World Fascism: A Historical Encyclopedia: Volume 1''. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, Inc, 2006, p. 628.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="autogenerated20">Bendersky, Joseph W. ''A History of Nazi Germany: 1919–1945''. 2nd ed. Burnham Publishers, 2000, p. 72.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="autogenerated6">Blamires, Cyprian; Jackson, Paul. ''World Fascism: A Historical Encyclopedia: Volume 1''. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, Inc, 2006, p. 62.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="autogenerated7">Winkler, Heinrich August and Alexander Sager, ''Germany: The Long Road West'', English ed. 2006, p. 414.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="autogenerated8">Stackelberg, Roderick; Winkle, Sally Anne. ''The Nazi Germany Sourcebook: An Anthology of Texts'', London: Routledge, 2002, p. 11.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="baylor">]. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070710100514/http://www3.baylor.edu/American_Jewish/everythingthatusedtobehere/resources/PowerPoints/Christian%20Anti-Semitism%20%28part%202%29.ppt |date=10 July 2007}}, Baylor University Center for American and Jewish Studies, Spring 2004, slide 14. Also see {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060321151237/http://elsinore.cis.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/imt/proc/04-29-46.htm |date=21 March 2006}}, Vol. 12, p. 318, Avalon Project, Yale Law School, 19 April 1946.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Bernd-Rüdiger Hüppauf 1997, p. 92">Hüppauf, Bernd-Rüdiger ''War, Violence, and the Modern Condition'', Berlin: Walter de Gruyter & Co., 1997, p. 92.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Burleigh, 2000, p. 77">Burleigh, Michael. ''The Third Reich: A New History'', New York: Hill and Wang, 2000, p. 77.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="burleigh">Burleigh, Michael. ''The Third Reich: A New History'', New York: Hill and Wang, 2000. pp. 76–77.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Carlsten, F. L. 1982, p. 80">Carlsten, F. L. ''The Rise of Fascism''. 2nd ed. University of California Press, 1982, p. 80.</ref> | |||
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| <ref name="communism">Furet, François, ''Passing of an Illusion: The Idea of Communism in the Twentieth Century'', 1999, p. 191.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="constructing">Keith H. Pickus. ''Constructing Modern Identities: Jewish University Students in Germany, 1815–1914''. Detroit, MI: Wayne State University Press, 1999, p. 86.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="dictator">David Welch. ''Hitler: Profile of a Dictator''. 2nd edition. New York: UCL Press, 2001. pp. 13–14.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="dictator11">David Welch. ''Hitler: Profile of a Dictator'', 2001, p. 16.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="dictators">], ''The Dictators: Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia'', W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2004, p. 230.</ref> | |||
| <!-- <ref name="dictatorship">MacGregor Knox. ''Common Destiny: Dictatorship, Foreign Policy, and War in Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany''. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 2000, p. 208.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="dictionary">]. ''Dictionary of Politics'', 1992, p. 327.</ref --> | |||
| <ref name="disciples">Read, Anthony, ''The Devil's Disciples: Hitler's Inner Circle'', New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2004, p. 142</ref> | |||
| <ref name="dissolution">David Jablonsky. ''The Nazi Party in Dissolution: Hitler and the Verbotzeit, 1923–1925''. London; Totowa, NJ: Frank Cass and Company Ltd., 1989. pp. 20–26, 30</ref> | |||
| <ref name="documents">J Noakes and G Pridham, ''Documents on Nazism, 1919–1945'', London 1974</ref> | |||
| <ref name=economic573>{{cite journal|last=Temin|first=Peter|author-link=Peter Temin|date=November 1991|title=Soviet and Nazi economic planning in the 1930s|journal=The Economic History Review|series=New Series|volume=44|issue=4|pages=573–593|doi=10.2307/2597802|url=http://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/1721.1/64262/1/sovietnazieconom00temi.pdf|jstor=2597802|hdl=1721.1/64262|hdl-access=free|access-date=4 November 2018|archive-date=12 July 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025923/http://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/1721.1/64262/1/sovietnazieconom00temi.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| <ref name="economics">Barkai, Avaraham 1990. ''Nazi Economics: Ideology, Theory and Policy.'' Oxford Berg Publisher.</ref> | |||
| <!-- unused citation <ref name="education">Lisa Pine. ''Education in Nazi Germany''. Oxford, England; New York: Berg, 2011, p. 5.</ref> --> | |||
| <!-- <ref name="encyclopedia">L.L. Snyder, ''Encyclopedia Of The Third Reich'', Wordsworth Editions Ltd, 1998, p. 245</ref> --> | |||
| <ref name="encyclopedia15">Blamires, Cyprian; Jackson, Paul. ''World Fascism: A Historical Encyclopedia: Volume 1'', 2006, p. 629.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="encyclopedia7">Cyprian Blamires. ''World Fascism: A Historical Encyclopedia, Volume 1''. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, Inc., 2006, p. 542.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="encyclopedia9">Blamires, Cyprian and Paul Jackson, ''World Fascism: A Historical Encyclopedia: Volume 1'', 2006, p. 126.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="evolution">Peter J. Bowler. ''Evolution: The History of an Idea'', 1989, p. 305.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="experiences">]. ''Hitler's Black Victims: The Historical Experiences of Afro-Germans, European Blacks, Africans, and African Americans in the Nazi Era''. Routledge, 2002. pp. 112–113, 189.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="foundations">Browder, George C., ''Foundations of the Nazi Police State: The Formation of Sipo and SD'', Lexington: Kentucky University Press, 2004, p. 202.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="François Furet 1999. pp. 191-192">Furet, François, ''Passing of an Illusion: The Idea of Communism in the Twentieth Century'', Chicago; London: University of Chicago Press, 1999. {{ISBN|0-226-27340-7}}, pp. 191–192.</ref> | |||
| <!-- <ref name="Frank McDonough 2003, p. 64">Frank McDonough. ''Hitler and the Rise of the Nazi Party''. Pearson/Longman, 2003, p. 64.</ref> --> | |||
| <ref name="friedlander">Henry Friedlander. ''The Origins of Nazi Genocide: From Euthanasia to the Final Solution''. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1995, p. 5.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Fulda, Bernhard 2009, p. 65">Fulda, Bernhard. ''Press and Politics in the Weimar Republic''. Oxford University Press, 2009, p. 65.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="google">] (2012). "'' {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201002232035/https://books.google.com/books?id=zBgr3kL-PP4C&pg=&dq&hl=en |date=2 October 2020 }}''". Cambridge University Press, p. 313. {{ISBN|0-521-19190-4}}</ref> | |||
| <ref name="guillebaud">Guillebaud, Claude W. 1939. ''The Economic Recovery of Germany 1933–1938''. London: MacMillan and Co. Limited.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="H. Stuart Hughes 1992, p. 108">Hughes, H. Stuart, ''Oswald Spengler'', New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1992, p. 108.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Hitler, the Germans, and the Final Solution">{{cite book|last=Kershaw|first=Ian|year=2008|title=Hitler, the Germans, and the Final Solution|publisher=Yale University Press|page=|isbn=978-0-300-12427-9|url=https://archive.org/details/hitlergermansfin00kers/page/53}}</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Holocaust: Gay activists press for German apology">{{Cite news |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/holocaust-gay-activists-press-for-german-apology-1291337.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220618/https://www.independent.co.uk/news/holocaust-gay-activists-press-for-german-apology-1291337.html |archive-date=18 June 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |title=Holocaust: Gay activists press for German apology |last=Bennetto |first=Jason |date=22 October 2011 |work=] |access-date=21 May 2021}}</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Homosexualität und Staatsräson. Männlichkeit, Homophobie und Politik in Deutschland 1900-1945">{{cite book|last=Pretzel|first=Andreas|chapter=Vom Staatsfeind zum Volksfeind. Zur Radikalisierung der Homosexuellenverfolgung im Zusammenwirken von Polizei und Justiz|editor-last=Zur Nieden|editor-first=Susanne|publisher=Campus Verlag|location=Frankfurt/M.|title=Homosexualität und Staatsräson. Männlichkeit, Homophobie und Politik in Deutschland 1900–1945|year=2005|page=236|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HaZwHeBm2lkC&pg=PA236|isbn=978-3-593-37749-0|access-date=14 August 2015|archive-date=12 July 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712025925/https://books.google.com/books?id=HaZwHeBm2lkC&pg=PA236#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| <ref name="holocaustreader">]. ''A Holocaust Reader'' Behrman House, Inc, 1976, p. 31.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="interaction">Ausma Cimdiņa, Jonathan Osmond. ''Power and Culture: Hegemony, Interaction and Dissent''. PLUS-Pisa University Press, 2006.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="international">''The Holocaust Chronicle'', Publications International Ltd, p. 108.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="international27">Robert Anthony Krieg. ''Catholic Theologians in Nazi Germany''. London: Continuum International Publishing Group, 2004. pp. 4–8.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Jack Fischel 1998, p. 5">Jack Fischel. ''The Holocaust''. Westport, CN: Greenwood Press, 1998, p. 5.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Jeffrey S. Gaab 2008, p. 61">Gaab, Jeffrey S., ''Munich: Hofbräuhaus & History: Beer, Culture, & Politics'', 2nd ed. New York: Peter Lang Publishing, Inc, 2008, p. 61.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="JFrage">"THHP Short Essay: What Was the Final Solution?". Holocaust-History.org, July 2004, webpage: {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080204024440/http://www.holocaust-history.org/short-essays/final-solution.shtml |date=4 February 2008 }}: notes that ] used the term in his order of 31 July 1941 to ], chief of the ] (RSHA).</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Jonathan Olsen 1999, p. 62">Jonathan Olsen. ''Nature and Nationalism: Right-wing Ecology and the Politics of Identity in Contemporary Germany''. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1999, p. 62.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Joseph W. Bendersky 2007, p. 96">{{cite book|last=Bendersky|first=Joseph W.|title=A Concise History of Nazi Germany|year=2007|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Inc.|location=Plymouth, England|isbn=978-0-7425-5363-7|page=96}}</ref> | |||
| <ref name="kershaw">]. ''Hitler, 1936–45: Nemesis''. New York: W.W. Norton & Company Inc., 2001, p. 588.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="koenigsberg">Richard A. Koenigsberg. ''Nations have the Right to Kill: Hitler, the Holocaust, and War''. New York: Library of Social Science, 2009, p. 2.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="machtergreifung">Beck, Hermann ''The Fateful Alliance: German Conservatives and Nazis in 1933: The Machtergreifung in a New Light'', Berghahn Books, 2008. {{ISBN|978-1-84545-680-1}}, p. 72.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="machtergreifung5">Beck, Hermann ''The Fateful Alliance: German Conservatives and Nazis in 1933: The Machtergreifung in a New Light'', 2008. pp. 72–75.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="machtergreifung6">Beck, Hermann ''The Fateful Alliance: German Conservatives and Nazis in 1933: The Machtergreifung in a New Light'', 2008, p. 84.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="macmillan">Burleigh, Michael ''The Third Reich: a new history'' Pan MacMillan (2001) p. 75</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Martin Kitchen 2006, p. 205">], ''A History of Modern Germany, 1800–2000'', Malden, MA; Oxford, England; Carlton, Victoria, Australia: Blackwell Publishing, Inc., 2006, p. 205.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Michael Mann 2004, p. 183">Mann, Michael, ''Fascists'', New York City: Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 183.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="millennial">Redles, David ''Nazi End Times; The Third Reich as a Millennial Reich'' in Kinane, Karolyn & Ryan, Michael A. (eds) ''End of Days: Essays on the Apocalypse from Antiquity to Modernity'' McFarland and Co (2009) p. 176.</ref> | |||
| <!-- ref name="minneapolis">Neocleous, Mark. ''Fascism''. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997, p. 23.</ref --> | |||
| <ref name="nicholas">Miranda Carter. George, Nicholas and Wilhelm: Three Royal Cousins and the Road to World War I. Borzoi Book, 2009. 420 pp.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="nicholls159160">David Nicholls. ''Adolf Hitler: A Biographical Companion''. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000. pp. 159–160.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="nicholls236237">David Nicholls. ''Adolf Hitler: A Biographical Companion''. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000. pp. 236–237.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Nina Witoszek 2002. pp. 89-90">Nina Witoszek, Lars Trägårdh. ''Culture and Crisis: The Case of Germany and Sweden''. Berghahn Books, 2002. pp. 89–90.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Oliver H. Woshinsky 2008, p. 156">]. ''Explaining Politics: Culture, Institutions, and Political Behavior''. Oxon; New York: Routledge, 2008, p. 156.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="pathological">{{cite book|author=Hitler, Adolf|title=Hitler's Secret Book|year=1961|publisher=Grove Press|location=New York|isbn=978-0-394-62003-9|oclc=9830111|pages=8–9, 17–18|quote=Sparta must be regarded as the first Völkisch State. The exposure of the sick, weak, deformed children, in short, their destruction, was more decent and in truth a thousand times more humane than the wretched insanity of our day which preserves the most pathological subject.|title-link=Hitler's Secret Book|author-link=Adolf Hitler}}</ref> | |||
| <!-- ref name="payne1995a">] ''A History of Fascism, 1914–45''. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1995.</ref --> | |||
| <ref name="Peter J. Bowler 1989. pp. 304-305">]. ''Evolution: The History of an Idea''. 2nd edition. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1989. pp. 304–305.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Peukert, Detlev 1993 p. 74">], ''The Weimar Republic''. 1st paperback ed. Macmillan, 1993. {{ISBN|978-0-8090-1556-6}}, p. 74.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Peukert, Detlev 1993 pp. 73-74">Peukert, Detlev, ''The Weimar Republic''. Macmillan, 1993. {{ISBN|978-0-8090-1556-6}}, pp. 73–74.</ref> | |||
| <ref name=PostWWIAntisemitism>"Florida Holocaust Museum: Antisemitism – Post World War 1" (history), flholocaustmuseum.org, 2003, webpage: {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081003233617/http://www.flholocaustmuseum.org/history_wing/antisemitism/post_ww1.cfm|date=3 October 2008}}.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="publishers">Glenn D. Walters. ''Lifestyle Theory: Past, Present, and Future''. Nova Publishers, 2006, p. 40.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="publishers30">Bendersky, Joseph W. ''A History of Nazi Germany: 1919–1945''. 2nd ed. Burnham Publishers, 2000. pp. 58–59.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 399">Overy, R.J., ''The Dictators: Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia'', W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2004, p. 399</ref> | |||
| <ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 402">Overy, R.J., ''The Dictators: Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia'', W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2004, p. 402.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="R.J. Overy 2004, p. 403">Overy, R.J., ''The Dictators: Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia'', W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2004, p. 403.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="R.J. Overy 2004. pp. 399-403">Overy, R.J., ''The Dictators: Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia'', W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2004. pp. 399–403.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Robert Anthony Krieg 2004, p. 4">Robert Anthony Krieg. ''Catholic Theologians in Nazi Germany'', 2004, p. 4.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Robert J. Richards 2008. pp. 7-8">]. ''Myth 19 That Darwin and Haeckel were Complicit in Nazi Biology''. The University of Chicago. http://home.uchicago.edu/~rjr6/articles/Myth.pdf {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120912124953/http://home.uchicago.edu/~rjr6/articles/Myth.pdf |date=12 September 2012 }}</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Roger Griffin 2005, p. 85">Roger Griffin. ''Fascism, Totalitarianism and Political Religion''. Oxon; New York: Routledge, 2005, p. 85.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Rudy Koshar 1986, p. 190">Koshar, Rudy. ''Social Life, Local Politics, and Nazism: Marburg, 1880–1935'', University of North Carolina Press, 1986, p. 190.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Simone Gigliotti 2005, p. 14">Simone Gigliotti, Berel Lang. ''The Holocaust: A Reader''. Malden, MA; Oxford; Carlton, Victoria, Australia: Blackwell Publishing, 2005, p. 14.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Social Darwinism in European and American Thought, 1860–1945: nature as model and nature as threat">{{cite book|author=Mike Hawkins|title=Social Darwinism in European and American Thought, 1860–1945: nature as model and nature as threat|year=1997|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-57434-1|oclc=34705047|page=276|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SszNCxSKmgkC&q=Hitler%27s+Secret+Book+sparta&pg=PA276|access-date=18 November 2020|archive-date=12 July 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240712030431/https://books.google.com/books?id=SszNCxSKmgkC&q=Hitler%27s+Secret+Book+sparta&pg=PA276#v=onepage&q=Hitler's%20Secret%20Book%20sparta&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref> | |||
| <ref name="stackelberg">Roderick Stackelberg, Sally Anne Winkle. ''The Nazi Germany Sourcebook: An Anthology of Texts'', 2002, p. 45.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Stanley G. Payne 1995, p. 464">Stanley G. Payne. ''A History of Fascism, 1914–1945'', 1995, p. 464.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="stanley">Stanley G. Payne. ''A History of Fascism, 1914–1945'', 1995, p. 463.</ref> | |||
| <!-- ref name="stormtroopers">Thomas D. Grant. ''Stormtroopers and Crisis in the Nazi Movement: Activism, Ideology and Dissolution''. London; New York: Routledge, 2004. pp. 30–34, 44.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="stormtroopers2">Otis C. Mitchell. ''Hitler's Stormtroopers and the attack on the German Republic'', 1919–1933, Jefferson: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2008, p. 47.</ref --> | |||
| <ref name="Thomas Rohkrämer 2007, p. 130">Rohkrämer, Thomas, "A Single Communal Faith?: The German Right from Conservatism to National Socialism", ''Monographs in German History''. Volume 20, Berghahn Books, 2007, p. 130</ref> | |||
| <ref name="Thomas Weber 2011, p. 251">Weber, Thomas, ''Hitler's First War: Adolf Hitler, the Men of the List Regiment, and the First World War'', Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011, p. 251.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="thosedamnednazis">Goebbels, Joseph; Mjölnir (1932). ''Die verfluchten Hakenkreuzler. Etwas zum Nachdenken''. Munich: ]. English translation: '' {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140810185325/http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/haken32.htm |date=10 August 2014 }}''.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="totalitarianism">Roger Griffin. ''Fascism, Totalitarianism and Political Religion'', 2005, p. 93.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="transaction">Hughes, H. Stuart, ''Oswald Spengler'', New Brunswick, New Jersey: Transaction Publishers, 1992, p. 109.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="understandably">Scholarship for ] 1543 treatise, '']'', exercising influence on Germany's attitude: * Wallmann, Johannes. "The Reception of Luther's Writings on the Jews from the Reformation to the End of the 19th Century", ''Lutheran Quarterly'', n.s. 1 (Spring 1987) 1:72–97. Wallmann writes: "The assertion that Luther's expressions of anti-Jewish sentiment have been of major and persistent influence in the centuries after the Reformation, and that there exists a continuity between Protestant anti-Judaism and modern racially oriented anti-Semitism, is at present wide-spread in the literature; since the Second World War it has understandably become the prevailing opinion." * Michael, Robert. ''Holy Hatred: Christianity, Antisemitism, and the Holocaust''. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006; see chapter 4 "The Germanies from Luther to Hitler", pp. 105–151. * Hillerbrand, Hans J. "Martin Luther," ''Encyclopædia Britannica'', 2007. Hillerbrand writes: "is strident pronouncements against the Jews, especially toward the end of his life, have raised the question of whether Luther significantly encouraged the development of German anti-Semitism. Although many scholars have taken this view, this perspective puts far too much emphasis on Luther and not enough on the larger peculiarities of German history."</ref> | |||
| <!-- ref name="university">Fritzsche, Peter. ''Germans into Nazis''. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="university1">Kele, Max H. ''Nazis and Workers: National Socialist Appeals to German Labor, 1919–1933''. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1972.</ref --> | |||
| <ref name="university14">Denis R. Alexander, Ronald L. Numbers. ''Biology and Ideology from Descartes to Dawkins''. Chicago, Illinois; London: University of Chicago Press, 2010, p. 209.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="university17">Weitz, Eric D., ''Weimar Germany: Promise and Tragedy'', Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2007. pp. 336–337.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="university18">Weitz, Eric D., ''Weimar Germany: Promise and Tragedy'', Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2007, p. 336.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="university19">Stern, Fritz Richard ''The politics of cultural despair: a study in the rise of the Germanic ideology'' University of California Press reprint edition (1974) p. 296</ref> | |||
| <ref name="university21">Stanley G. Payne. ''A History of Fascism, 1914–1945''. Madison: Wisconsin University Press, 1995. pp. 463–464.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="university28">Hayes, Peter. 1987 ''Industry and Ideology IG Farben in the Nazi Era.'' Cambridge University Press.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="university29">Carsten, Francis Ludwig ''The Rise of Fascism'', 2nd ed. University of California Press, 1982, p. 137. Quoting: Hitler, A., ''Sunday Express'', 28 September 1930.</ref> | |||
| <!-- ref name="university3">Eugene Davidson. ''The Unmaking of Adolf Hitler''. First paperback edition. Columbia: Missouri University Press, 2004, p. 117.</ref --> | |||
| <ref name="witoszek">Witoszek, Nina and Lars Trägårdh, ''Culture and Crisis: The Case of Germany and Sweden'', Berghahn Books, 2002, p. 90.</ref> | |||
| <ref name="witoszek10">Nina Witoszek, Lars Trägårdh. ''Culture and Crisis: The Case of Germany and Sweden''. Berghahn Books, 2002, p. 89.</ref> | |||
| }} | |||
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| * {{cite journal|last=Jaworska|first=Sylvia|year=2011|title=Anti-Slavic imagery in German radical nationalist discourse at the turn of the twentieth century: A prelude to Nazi ideology?|journal=]|volume=45|issue=5|pages=435–452|url=http://www.residenztheater.de/sites/default/files/Anti-Slavic_imagery_Patterns_of_Prejudice_Vol_45_Jaworska.pdf|doi=10.1080/0031322x.2011.624762|s2cid=3743556|access-date=22 May 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181022153357/https://www.residenztheater.de/sites/default/files/Anti-Slavic_imagery_Patterns_of_Prejudice_Vol_45_Jaworska.pdf|archive-date=22 October 2018|url-status=dead}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Kershaw|first=Ian|title=Hitler 1889–1936: Hubris|publisher=Penguin|year=1999|isbn=978-0-14-013363-9}} | |||
| * ] (2006) '']''. New York: Continuum. {{isbn|0-8264-9130-8}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Majer |first=Diemut |title="Non-Germans" Under the Third Reich: The Nazi Judicial and Administrative System in Germany and Occupied Eastern Europe with Special Regard to Occupied Poland, 1939–1945|publisher=JHU Press|year=2003|isbn=978-0-8018-6493-3}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Mason|first=Timothy W.|author-link=Timothy Mason|title=Social Policy in the Third Reich|publisher=Berg Publishers| location = Providence, RI |year=1993|isbn=978-0-85496-410-9}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=McNab|first=Chris|title=The Third Reich|publisher=Amber Books Ltd|year=2009|isbn=978-1-906626-51-8}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Miller|first=Barbara|title=Nazi Ideology Before 1933: A Documentation|year=2014|publisher=University of Texas Press|isbn=978-1-4773-0445-7}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Nyomarkay|first=Joseph|year=1967|title=Charisma and Factionalism in the Nazi Party|publisher=Univ Of Minnesota Press|isbn=978-0-8166-0429-6}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Paxton|first=Robert|author-link=Robert O. Paxton|title=The Anatomy of Fascism|publisher=London: Penguin Books Ltd|year=2005|isbn=978-0-14-101432-6}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Peukert|first=Detlev|author-link=Detlev Peukert|title=Inside Nazi Germany: Conformity, Opposition, and Racism in Everyday Life|year=1989|publisher=Yale University Press|location=New Haven|isbn=978-0-300-04480-5}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Plant|first=Richard|year=1988|title=The Pink Triangle: The Nazi War Against Homosexuals|publisher=Owl Books|isbn=0-8050-0600-1}} | |||
| * Redles, David (2005). ''Hitler's Millennial Reich: Apocalyptic Belief and the Search for Salvation''. New York: University Press. {{ISBN|0-8147-7524-1}}. | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Ryback|first=Timothy W.|author-link=Timothy W. Ryback|year=2010|title=Hitler's Private Library: The Books That Shaped His Life|location=New York; Toronto|publisher=Vintage Books|isbn=978-0-307-45526-0}} | |||
| * ] (2003). ''The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919–1945''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. {{isbn|978-0-521-82371-5}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Steinweis|first=Alan|author-link=Alan E. Steinweis|year=2008|title=Studying the Jew: Scholarly Antisemitism in Nazi Germany |location=Cambridge, Massachusetts |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-02761-9}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Tooze|first=Adam|author-link=Adam Tooze|year=2006|title=The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy |location=New York |publisher=Viking |isbn=978-0-670-03826-8}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Tooze|first=Adam|year=2007|title=The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy |location=New York |publisher=Viking |isbn=978-0-670-03826-8}} | |||
| * {{cite book|last=Tooze|first=Adam|year=2008|title=The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy |location=London |publisher=Penguin |isbn=978-0-14-311320-1}} | |||
| {{refend}} | |||
| == External links == | |||
| {{Commons category|National Socialism}} | |||
| * {{Wiktionary-inline|Nazi}} | |||
| * {{wiktionary-inline|Hitlerism}} | |||
| * {{Britannica|405414}} | |||
| * {{Internet Archive author|sname=Nazism}} | |||
| * | |||
| * – slideshow by '']'' | |||
| {{notelist}} | |||
| {{Nazism}} | |||
| {{Navboxes | |||
| |list= | |||
| {{NSDAP}} | |||
| {{Adolf Hitler}} | |||
| {{Fascism}} | |||
| {{antisemitism topics|state=collapsed}} | |||
| {{Political philosophy}} | |||
| {{authoritarian types of rule}} | |||
| }} | |||
| {{Subject bar|portal1=Politics|portal2=Germany|portal3=History}} | |||
| {{Subject bar|commons=y|commons-search=National Socialism|wikt=y|q=y|s=y|s-search=Nazi War Crimes Disclosure Act}} | |||
| {{authority control}} | |||
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Latest revision as of 19:08, 16 January 2025
German fascist ideology "National Socialism" and "Nazi" redirect here. For the party for whom the ideology is named, see Nazi Party. For other uses, see National Socialism (disambiguation) and Nazi (disambiguation). For Nazism after WWII, see Neo-Nazism. "Hitlerism" redirects here. For the political positions held by Hitler personally, see Political views of Adolf Hitler.
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Nazism (/ˈnɑːtsɪzəm, ˈnæt-/ NA(H)T-siz-əm), formally named National Socialism (NS; German: Nationalsozialismus, German: [natsi̯oˈnaːlzotsi̯aˌlɪsmʊs] ), is the far-right totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During Hitler's rise to power in 1930s Europe, it was frequently referred to as Hitler Fascism (German: Hitlerfaschismus) and Hitlerism (German: Hitlerismus). The later related term "neo-Nazism" is applied to other far-right groups with similar ideas which formed after the Second World War and therefore after the Third Reich collapsed.
Nazism is a form of fascism, with disdain for liberal democracy and the parliamentary system. Its beliefs include support for dictatorship, fervent antisemitism, anti-communism, anti-Slavism, anti-Romani sentiment, scientific racism, white supremacy, Nordicism, social Darwinism, homophobia, ableism, and the use of eugenics. The extreme nationalism of the Nazis originated in pan-Germanism and the ethno-nationalist Völkisch movement which had been a prominent aspect of German ultranationalism since the late 19th century. Nazism was strongly influenced by the Freikorps paramilitary groups that emerged after Germany's defeat in World War I, from which came the party's underlying "cult of violence". It subscribed to pseudo-scientific theories of a racial hierarchy, identifying ethnic Germans as part of what the Nazis regarded as an Aryan or Nordic master race. Nazism sought to overcome social divisions and create a homogeneous German society based on racial purity which represented a people's community (Volksgemeinschaft). The Nazis aimed to unite all Germans living in historically German territory, as well as gain additional lands for German expansion under the doctrine of Lebensraum and exclude those whom they deemed either Community Aliens or "inferior" races (Untermenschen).
The term "National Socialism" arose out of attempts to create a nationalist redefinition of socialism, as an alternative to both Marxist international socialism and free-market capitalism. Nazism rejected the Marxist concepts of class conflict and universal equality, opposed cosmopolitan internationalism, and sought to convince all parts of the new German society to subordinate their personal interests to the "common good", accepting political interests as the main priority of economic organisation, which tended to match the general outlook of collectivism or communitarianism rather than economic socialism. The Nazi Party's precursor, the pan-German nationalist and antisemitic German Workers' Party (DAP), was founded on 5 January 1919. By the early 1920s, the party was renamed the National Socialist German Workers' Party in order to appeal to left-wing workers, a renaming that Hitler initially objected to. The National Socialist Program, or "25 Points", was adopted in 1920 and called for a united Greater Germany that would deny citizenship to Jews or those of Jewish descent, while also supporting land reform and the nationalisation of some industries. In Mein Kampf ("My Struggle"), published in 1925–1926, Hitler outlined the antisemitism and anti-communism at the heart of his political philosophy as well as his disdain for representative democracy, over which he proposed the Führerprinzip (leader principle), and his belief in Germany's right to territorial expansion through lebensraum. Hitler's objectives involved the eastward expansion of German territories, German colonization of Eastern Europe, and the promotion of an alliance with Britain and Italy against the Soviet Union.
The Nazi Party won the greatest share of the popular vote in the two Reichstag general elections of 1932, making them the largest party in the legislature by far, albeit still short of an outright majority (37.3% on 31 July 1932 and 33.1% on 6 November 1932). Because none of the parties were willing or able to put together a coalition government, Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany on 30 January 1933 by President Paul von Hindenburg through the support and connivance of traditional conservative nationalists who believed that they could control him and his party. With the use of emergency presidential decrees by Hindenburg and a change in the Weimar Constitution which allowed the Cabinet to rule by direct decree, bypassing both Hindenburg and the Reichstag, the Nazis soon established a one-party state and began the Gleichschaltung.
The Sturmabteilung (SA) and the Schutzstaffel (SS) functioned as the paramilitary organisations of the Nazi Party. Using the SS for the task, Hitler purged the party's more socially and economically radical factions in the mid-1934 Night of the Long Knives, including the leadership of the SA. After the death of President Hindenburg on 2 August 1934, political power was concentrated in Hitler's hands and he became Germany's head of state as well as the head of the government, with the title of Führer und Reichskanzler, meaning "leader and Chancellor of Germany" (see also here). From that point, Hitler was effectively the dictator of Nazi Germany—also known as the Third Reich—under which Jews, political opponents and other "undesirable" elements were marginalised, imprisoned or murdered. During World War II, many millions of people – including around two-thirds of the Jewish population of Europe – were eventually exterminated in a genocide which became known as the Holocaust. Following Germany's defeat in World War II and the discovery of the full extent of the Holocaust, Nazi ideology became universally disgraced. It is widely regarded as evil, with only a few fringe racist groups, usually referred to as neo-Nazis, describing themselves as followers of National Socialism. The use of Nazi symbols is outlawed in many European countries, including Germany and Austria.
Etymology
The full name of the Nazi Party was Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (German for 'National Socialist German Workers' Party') and they officially used the acronym NSDAP. The renaming of the German Worker's Party (DAP) to the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) was partially driven by a desire to draw upon both left-wing and right-wing ideals, with "Socialist" and "Workers'" appealing to the left, and "National" and "German" appealing to the right. The term "nazi" had been in use, before the rise of the NSDAP, as a colloquial and derogatory word for a backwards farmer or peasant. It characterised an awkward and clumsy person, a yokel. In this sense, the word Nazi was a hypocorism of the German male name Igna(t)z (itself a variation of the name Ignatius)—Igna(t)z being a common name at the time in Bavaria, the area from which the NSDAP emerged.
In the 1920s, political opponents of the NSDAP in the German labour movement seized on this. Using the earlier abbreviated term Sozi for Sozialist (German for 'Socialist') as an example, they shortened the NSDAP's name, Nationalsozialistische, to the dismissive "Nazi", in order to associate them with the derogatory use of the aforementioned term. The first use of the term "Nazi" by the National Socialists occurred in 1926 in a publication by Joseph Goebbels called Der Nazi-Sozi . In Goebbels' pamphlet, the word "Nazi" only appears when linked with the word "Sozi" as an abbreviation of "National Socialism".
After the NSDAP's rise to power in the 1930s, the use of the term "Nazi" by itself or in terms such as "Nazi Germany", "Nazi regime", and so on was popularised by German exiles outside the country, but not in Germany. From them, the term spread into other languages and it was eventually brought back into Germany after World War II. The NSDAP briefly adopted the designation "Nazi" in an attempt to reappropriate the term: an example of this is the serie of articles published by Leopold von Mildenstein on the Völkischer Beobachter under the title Ein Nazi fährt nach Palästina in 1934; but it soon gave up this effort and generally avoided using the term while it was in power. In each case, the authors typically referred to themselves as "National Socialists" and their movement as "National Socialism", but never as "Nazis". A compendium of Hitler's conversations from 1941 through 1944 entitled Hitler's Table Talk does not contain the word "Nazi" either. In speeches by Hermann Göring, he never uses the term "Nazi". Hitler Youth leader Melita Maschmann wrote a book about her experience entitled Account Rendered. She did not refer to herself as a "Nazi", even though she was writing well after World War II. In 1933, 581 members of the National Socialist Party answered interview questions put to them by Professor Theodore Abel from Columbia University. They similarly did not refer to themselves as "Nazis".
Position within the political spectrum
The majority of scholars identify Nazism in both theory and practice as a form of far-right politics. Far-right themes in Nazism include the argument that superior people have a right to dominate other people and purge society of supposed inferior elements. Adolf Hitler and other proponents denied that Nazism was either left-wing or right-wing: instead, they officially portrayed Nazism as a syncretic movement. In Mein Kampf, Hitler directly attacked both left-wing and right-wing politics in Germany, saying:
Today our left-wing politicians in particular are constantly insisting that their craven-hearted and obsequious foreign policy necessarily results from the disarmament of Germany, whereas the truth is that this is the policy of traitors ... But the politicians of the Right deserve exactly the same reproach. It was through their miserable cowardice that those ruffians of Jews who came into power in 1918 were able to rob the nation of its arms.
In a speech given in Munich on 12 April 1922, Hitler stated:
There are only two possibilities in Germany; do not imagine that the people will forever go with the middle party, the party of compromises; one day it will turn to those who have most consistently foretold the coming ruin and have sought to dissociate themselves from it. And that party is either the Left: and then God help us! for it will lead us to complete destruction—to Bolshevism, or else it is a party of the Right which at the last, when the people is in utter despair, when it has lost all its spirit and has no longer any faith in anything, is determined for its part ruthlessly to seize the reins of power—that is the beginning of resistance of which I spoke a few minutes ago.
Hitler at times redefined socialism. When George Sylvester Viereck interviewed Hitler in October 1923 for the American Monthly and asked him why he referred to his party as 'socialists' he replied:
Socialism is the science of dealing with the common weal. Communism is not Socialism. Marxism is not Socialism. The Marxians have stolen the term and confused its meaning. I shall take Socialism away from the Socialists. Socialism is an ancient Aryan, Germanic institution. Our German ancestors held certain lands in common. They cultivated the idea of the common weal. Marxism has no right to disguise itself as socialism. Socialism, unlike Marxism, does not repudiate private property. Unlike Marxism, it involves no negation of personality, and unlike Marxism, it is patriotic.
In 1929, Hitler gave a speech to a group of Nazi leaders and simplified 'socialism' to mean, "Socialism! That is an unfortunate word altogether... What does socialism really mean? If people have something to eat and their pleasures, then they have their socialism." When asked in an interview on 27 January 1934 whether he supported the "bourgeois right-wing", Hitler claimed that Nazism was not exclusively for any class and he indicated that it favoured neither the left nor the right, but preserved "pure" elements from both "camps" by stating: "From the camp of bourgeois tradition, it takes national resolve, and from the materialism of the Marxist dogma, living, creative Socialism."
Historians regard the equation of Nazism as "Hitlerism" as too simplistic since the term was used prior to the rise of Hitler and the Nazis. In addition, the different ideologies incorporated into Nazism were already well established in certain parts of German society long before World War I. The Nazis were strongly influenced by the post–World War I far-right in Germany, which held common beliefs such as anti-Marxism, anti-liberalism and antisemitism, along with nationalism, contempt for the Treaty of Versailles and condemnation of the Weimar Republic for signing the armistice in November 1918 which later led it to sign the Treaty of Versailles. A major inspiration for the Nazis were the far-right nationalist Freikorps, paramilitary organisations that engaged in political violence after World War I. Initially, the post–World War I German far-right was dominated by monarchists, but the younger generation, which was associated with völkisch nationalism, was more radical and it did not express any emphasis on the restoration of the German monarchy. This younger generation desired to dismantle the Weimar Republic and create a new radical and strong state based upon a martial ruling ethic that could revive the "Spirit of 1914" which was associated with German national unity (Volksgemeinschaft).
The Nazis, the far-right monarchists, the reactionary German National People's Party (DNVP) and others, such as monarchist officers in the German Army and several prominent industrialists, formed an alliance in opposition to the Weimar Republic on 11 October 1931 in Bad Harzburg, officially known as the "National Front", but commonly referred to as the Harzburg Front. The Nazis stated that the alliance was purely tactical and they continued to have differences with the DNVP. After the elections of July 1932, the alliance broke down when the DNVP lost many of its seats in the Reichstag. The Nazis denounced them as "an insignificant heap of reactionaries". The DNVP responded by denouncing the Nazis for their "socialism", their street violence and the "economic experiments" that would take place if the Nazis ever rose to power. However, amidst an inconclusive political situation in which conservative politicians Franz von Papen and Kurt von Schleicher were unable to form stable governments without the Nazis, Papen proposed to President Hindenburg to appoint Hitler as Chancellor at the head of a government formed primarily of conservatives, with only three Nazi ministers. Hindenburg did so, and contrary to the expectations of Papen and the DNVP, Hitler was soon able to establish a Nazi one-party dictatorship.
Kaiser Wilhelm II, who was pressured to abdicate the throne and flee into exile amidst an attempted communist revolution in Germany, initially supported the Nazi Party. His four sons, including Prince Eitel Friedrich and Prince Oskar, became members of the Nazi Party in hopes that in exchange for their support, the Nazis would permit the restoration of the monarchy. Hitler dismissed the possibility of a restored monarchy, calling it "idiotic." Wilhelm grew to distrust Hitler and was appalled at the Kristallnacht of 9–10 November 1938, stating, "For the first time, I am ashamed to be a German." The former German emperor also denounced the Nazis as a "bunch of shirted gangsters" and "a mob ... led by a thousand liars or fanatics."
There were factions within the Nazi Party, both conservative and radical. The conservative Nazi Hermann Göring urged Hitler to conciliate with capitalists and reactionaries. Other prominent conservative Nazis included Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich. Meanwhile, the radical Nazi Joseph Goebbels opposed capitalism, viewing it as having Jews at its core and he stressed the need for the party to emphasise both a proletarian and a national character. Those views were shared by Otto Strasser, who later left the Nazi Party and formed the Black Front in the belief that Hitler had allegedly betrayed the party's socialist goals by endorsing capitalism.
When the Nazi Party emerged from obscurity to become a major political force after 1929, the conservative faction rapidly gained more influence, as wealthy donors took an interest in the Nazis as a potential bulwark against communism. The Nazi Party had previously been financed almost entirely from membership dues, but after 1929 its leadership began actively seeking donations from German industrialists, and Hitler began holding dozens of fundraising meetings with business leaders. In the midst of the Great Depression, facing the possibility of economic ruin on the one hand and a Communist or Social Democrat government on the other hand, German business increasingly turned to Nazism as offering a way out of the situation, by promising a state-driven economy that would support, rather than attack, existing business interests. By January 1933, the Nazi Party had secured the support of important sectors of German industry, mainly among the steel and coal producers, the insurance business, and the chemical industry.
Large segments of the Nazi Party, particularly among the members of the Sturmabteilung (SA), were committed to the party's official socialist, revolutionary and anti-capitalist positions and expected both a social and an economic revolution when the party gained power in 1933. In the period immediately before the Nazi seizure of power, there were even Social Democrats and Communists who switched sides and became known as "Beefsteak Nazis": brown on the outside and red inside. The leader of the SA, Ernst Röhm, pushed for a "second revolution" (the "first revolution" being the Nazis' seizure of power) that would enact socialist policies. Furthermore, Röhm desired that the SA absorb the much smaller German Army into its ranks under his leadership. Once the Nazis achieved power, Röhm's SA was directed by Hitler to violently suppress the parties of the left, but they also began attacks against individuals deemed to be associated with conservative reaction. Hitler saw Röhm's independent actions as violating and possibly threatening his leadership, as well as jeopardising the regime by alienating the conservative President Paul von Hindenburg and the conservative-oriented German Army. This resulted in Hitler purging Röhm and other radical members of the SA in 1934, in what came to be known as the Night of the Long Knives.
Before he joined the Bavarian Army to fight in World War I, Hitler had lived a bohemian lifestyle as a petty street watercolour artist in Vienna and Munich and he maintained elements of this lifestyle later on, going to bed very late and rising in the afternoon, even after he became Chancellor and then Führer. After the war, his battalion was absorbed by the Bavarian Soviet Republic from 1918 to 1919, where he was elected Deputy Battalion Representative. According to historian Thomas Weber, Hitler attended the funeral of communist Kurt Eisner (a German Jew), wearing a black mourning armband on one arm and a red communist armband on the other, which he took as evidence that Hitler's political beliefs had not yet solidified. In Mein Kampf, Hitler never mentioned any service with the Bavarian Soviet Republic and he stated that he became an antisemite in 1913 during his years in Vienna. This statement has been disputed by the contention that he was not an antisemite at that time, even though it is well established that he read many antisemitic tracts and journals during that time and admired Karl Lueger, the antisemitic mayor of Vienna. Hitler altered his political views in response to the signing of the Treaty of Versailles in June 1919 and it was then that he became an antisemitic, German nationalist.
Hitler expressed opposition to capitalism, regarding it as having Jewish origins and accusing capitalism of holding nations ransom to the interests of a parasitic cosmopolitan rentier class. He also expressed opposition to communism and egalitarian forms of socialism, arguing that inequality and hierarchy are beneficial to the nation. He believed that communism was invented by the Jews to weaken nations by promoting class struggle. After his rise to power, Hitler took a pragmatic position on economics, accepting private property and allowing capitalist private enterprises to exist so long as they adhered to the goals of the Nazi state, but not tolerating enterprises that he saw as being opposed to the national interest.
German business leaders disliked Nazi ideology but came to support Hitler, because they saw the Nazis as a useful ally to promote their interests. Business groups made significant financial contributions to the Nazi Party both before and after the Nazi seizure of power, in the hope that a Nazi dictatorship would eliminate the organised labour movement and the left-wing parties. Hitler actively sought to gain the support of business leaders by arguing that private enterprise is incompatible with democracy.
Although he opposed communist ideology, Hitler publicly praised the Soviet Union's leader Joseph Stalin and Stalinism on numerous occasions. Hitler commended Stalin for seeking to purify the Communist Party of the Soviet Union of Jewish influences, noting Stalin's purging of Jewish communists such as Leon Trotsky, Grigory Zinoviev, Lev Kamenev and Karl Radek. While Hitler had always intended to bring Germany into conflict with the Soviet Union so he could gain Lebensraum ("living space"), he supported a temporary strategic alliance between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union to form a common anti-liberal front so they could defeat liberal democracies, particularly France.
Hitler admired the British Empire and its colonial system as living proof of Germanic superiority over "inferior" races and saw the United Kingdom as Germany's natural ally. He wrote in Mein Kampf: "For a long time to come there will be only two Powers in Europe with which it may be possible for Germany to conclude an alliance. These Powers are Great Britain and Italy."
Origins
See also: Early timeline of NazismThe historical roots of Nazism are to be found in various elements of European political culture which were in circulation in the intellectual capitals of the continent, what Joachim Fest called the "scrapheap of ideas" prevalent at the time. In Hitler and the Collapse of the Weimar Republic, historian Martin Broszat points out that
lmost all essential elements of ... Nazi ideology were to be found in the radical positions of ideological protest movements . These were: a virulent anti-Semitism, a blood-and-soil ideology, the notion of a master race, the idea of territorial acquisition and settlement in the East. These ideas were embedded in a popular nationalism which was vigorously anti-modernist, anti-humanist and pseudo-religious.
Brought together, the result was an anti-intellectual and politically semi-illiterate ideology lacking cohesion, a product of mass culture which allowed its followers emotional attachment and offered a simplified and easily-digestible world-view based on a political mythology for the masses.
Völkisch nationalism
Main article: Völkisch nationalism See also: German Question, German nationalism, Pan-Germanism, Unification of Germany, and Völkisch movement
Adolf Hitler himself along with other members of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, NSDAP) in the Weimar Republic (1918–1933) were greatly influenced by several 19th- and early 20th-century thinkers and proponents of philosophical, onto-epistemic, and theoretical perspectives on ecological anthropology, scientific racism, holistic science, and organicism regarding the constitution of complex systems and theorization of organic-racial societies. In particular, one of the most significant ideological influences on the Nazis was the 19th-century German nationalist philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte, whose works had served as an inspiration to Hitler and other Nazi Party members, and whose ideas were implemented among the philosophical and ideological foundations of Nazi-oriented Völkisch nationalism.
Fichte's works served as an inspiration to Hitler and other Nazi Party members, including Dietrich Eckart and Arnold Fanck. In Speeches to the German Nation (1808), written amid the First French Empire's occupation of Berlin during the Napoleonic Wars, Fichte called for a German national revolution against the French Imperial Army occupiers, making passionate public speeches, arming his students for battle against the French and stressing the need for action by the German nation so it could free itself. Fichte's German nationalism was populist and opposed to traditional elites, spoke of the need for a "People's War" (Volkskrieg) and put forth concepts similar to those which the Nazis adopted. Fichte promoted German exceptionalism and stressed the need for the German nation to purify itself (including purging the German language of French words, a policy that the Nazis undertook upon their rise to power).
Another important figure in pre-Nazi völkisch thinking was Wilhelm Heinrich Riehl, whose work—Land und Leute (Land and People, written between 1857 and 1863)—collectively tied the organic German Volk to its native landscape and nature, a pairing which stood in stark opposition to the mechanical and materialistic civilisation which was then developing as a result of industrialisation. Geographers Friedrich Ratzel and Karl Haushofer borrowed from Riehl's work as did Nazi ideologues Alfred Rosenberg and Paul Schultze-Naumburg, both of whom employed some of Riehl's philosophy in arguing that "each nation-state was an organism that required a particular living space in order to survive". Riehl's influence is overtly discernible in the Blut und Boden (Blood and Soil) philosophy introduced by Oswald Spengler, which the Nazi agriculturalist Walther Darré and other prominent Nazis adopted.
Völkisch nationalism denounced soulless materialism, individualism and secularised urban industrial society, while advocating a "superior" society based on ethnic German "folk" culture and German "blood". It denounced foreigners and foreign ideas and declared that Jews, Freemasons and others were "traitors to the nation" and unworthy of inclusion. Völkisch nationalism saw the world in terms of natural law and romanticism and it viewed societies as organic, extolling the virtues of rural life, condemning the neglect of tradition and the decay of morals, denounced the destruction of the natural environment and condemned "cosmopolitan" cultures such as Jews and Romani.
The first party that attempted to combine nationalism and socialism was the (Austria-Hungary) German Workers' Party, which predominantly aimed to solve the conflict between the Austrian Germans and the Czechs in the multi-ethnic Austrian Empire, then part of Austria-Hungary. In 1896 the German politician Friedrich Naumann formed the National-Social Association which aimed to combine German nationalism and a non-Marxist form of socialism together; the attempt turned out to be futile and the idea of linking nationalism with socialism quickly became equated with antisemites, extreme German nationalists and the völkisch movement in general.
During the era of the German Empire, völkisch nationalism was overshadowed by both Prussian patriotism and the federalist tradition of its various component states. The events of World War I, including the end of the Prussian monarchy in Germany, resulted in a surge of revolutionary völkisch nationalism. The Nazis supported such revolutionary völkisch nationalist policies and they claimed that their ideology was influenced by the leadership and policies of German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, who was instrumental in founding the German Empire. The Nazis declared that they were dedicated to continuing the process of creating a unified German nation state that Bismarck had begun and desired to achieve. While Hitler was supportive of Bismarck's creation of the German Empire, he was critical of Bismarck's moderate domestic policies. On the issue of Bismarck's support of a Kleindeutschland ("Lesser Germany", excluding Austria) versus the Pan-German Großdeutschland ("Greater Germany") which the Nazis advocated, Hitler stated that Bismarck's attainment of Kleindeutschland was the "highest achievement" Bismarck could have achieved "within the limits possible at that time". In Mein Kampf, Hitler presented himself as a "second Bismarck".
During his youth in Austria, Hitler was politically influenced by Austrian Pan-Germanist proponent Georg Ritter von Schönerer, who advocated radical German nationalism, antisemitism, anti-Catholicism, anti-Slavic sentiment and anti-Habsburg views. From von Schönerer and his followers, Hitler adopted for the Nazi movement the Heil greeting, the Führer title and the model of absolute party leadership. Hitler was also impressed by the populist antisemitism and the anti-liberal bourgeois agitation of Karl Lueger, who as the mayor of Vienna during Hitler's time in the city used a rabble-rousing style of oratory that appealed to the wider masses. Unlike von Schönerer, Lueger was not a German nationalist and instead was a pro-Catholic Habsburg supporter and only used German nationalist notions occasionally for his own agenda. Although Hitler praised both Lueger and Schönerer, he criticised the former for not applying a racial doctrine against the Jews and Slavs.
Racial theories and antisemitism
Main article: Nazism and race
The concept of the Aryan race, which the Nazis promoted, stems from racial theories asserting that Europeans are the descendants of Indo-Iranian settlers, people of ancient India and ancient Persia. Proponents of this theory based their assertion on the fact that words in European languages and words in Indo-Iranian languages have similar pronunciations and meanings. Johann Gottfried Herder argued that the Germanic peoples held close racial connections to the ancient Indians and the ancient Persians, who he claimed were advanced peoples that possessed a great capacity for wisdom, nobility, restraint and science. Contemporaries of Herder used the concept of the Aryan race to draw a distinction between what they deemed to be "high and noble" Aryan culture versus that of "parasitic" Semitic culture.
Notions of white supremacy and Aryan racial superiority were combined in the 19th century, with white supremacists maintaining the belief that certain groups of white people were members of an Aryan "master race" that is superior to other races and particularly superior to the Semitic race, which they associated with "cultural sterility". Arthur de Gobineau, a French racial theorist and aristocrat, blamed the fall of the ancien régime in France on racial degeneracy caused by racial intermixing, which he argued had destroyed the purity of the Aryan race, a term which he only reserved for Germanic people. Gobineau's theories, which attracted a strong following in Germany, emphasised the existence of an irreconcilable polarity between Aryan (Germanic) and Jewish cultures.
Aryan mysticism claimed that Christianity originated in Aryan religious traditions, and that Jews had usurped the legend from Aryans. Houston Stewart Chamberlain, an English-born German proponent of racial theory, supported notions of Germanic supremacy and antisemitism in Germany. Chamberlain's work, The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century (1899), praised Germanic peoples for their creativity and idealism while asserting that the Germanic spirit was threatened by a "Jewish" spirit of selfishness and materialism. Chamberlain used his thesis to promote monarchical conservatism while denouncing democracy, liberalism and socialism. The book became popular, especially in Germany. Chamberlain stressed a nation's need to maintain its racial purity in order to prevent its degeneration and argued that racial intermingling with Jews should never be permitted. In 1923, Chamberlain met Hitler, whom he admired as a leader of the rebirth of the free spirit. Madison Grant's work The Passing of the Great Race (1916) advocated Nordicism and proposed that a eugenics program should be implemented in order to preserve the purity of the Nordic race. After reading the book, Hitler called it "my Bible".
In Germany, the belief that Jews were economically exploiting Germans became prominent due to the ascendancy of many wealthy Jews into prominent positions upon the unification of Germany in 1871. From 1871 to the early 20th century, German Jews were overrepresented in Germany's upper and middle classes while they were underrepresented in Germany's lower classes, particularly in the fields of agricultural and industrial labour. German Jewish financiers and bankers played a key role in fostering Germany's economic growth from 1871 to 1913 and they benefited enormously from this boom. In 1908, amongst the twenty-nine wealthiest German families with aggregate fortunes of up to 55 million marks at the time, five were Jewish and the Rothschilds were the second wealthiest German family. The predominance of Jews in Germany's banking, commerce and industry sectors during this time period was very high, even though Jews were estimated to account for only 1% of the population of Germany. The overrepresentation of Jews in these areas fuelled resentment among non-Jewish Germans during periods of economic crisis. The 1873 stock market crash and the ensuing depression resulted in a spate of attacks on alleged Jewish economic dominance in Germany and antisemitism increased. During this time period, in the 1870s, German völkisch nationalism began to adopt antisemitic and racist themes and it was also adopted by a number of radical right political movements.
Radical antisemitism was promoted by prominent advocates of völkisch nationalism, including Eugen Diederichs, Paul de Lagarde and Julius Langbehn. De Lagarde called the Jews a "bacillus, the carriers of decay ... who pollute every national culture ... and destroy all faiths with their materialistic liberalism" and he called for the extermination of the Jews. Langbehn called for a war of annihilation against the Jews, and his genocidal policies were later published by the Nazis and given to soldiers on the front during World War II. One antisemitic ideologue of the period, Friedrich Lange, even used the term "National Socialism" to describe his own anti-capitalist take on the völkisch nationalist template.
Johann Gottlieb Fichte accused Jews in Germany of having been and inevitably of continuing to be a "state within a state" that threatened German national unity. Fichte promoted two options in order to address this, his first one being the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine so the Jews could be impelled to leave Europe. His second option was violence against Jews and he said that the goal of the violence would be "to cut off all their heads in one night, and set new ones on their shoulders, which should not contain a single Jewish idea".
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (1912) is an antisemitic forgery created by the secret service of the Russian Empire, the Okhrana. Many antisemites believed it was real and thus it became widely popular after World War I. The Protocols claimed that there was a secret international Jewish conspiracy to take over the world. Hitler had been introduced to The Protocols by Alfred Rosenberg and from 1920 onwards he focused his attacks by claiming that Judaism and Marxism were directly connected, that Jews and Bolsheviks were one and the same and that Marxism was a Jewish ideology-this became known as "Jewish Bolshevism". Hitler believed that The Protocols were authentic.
During his life in Vienna between 1907 and 1913, Hitler became fervently anti-Slavic. Prior to the Nazi ascension to power, Hitler often blamed moral degradation on Rassenschande ("racial defilement"), a way to assure his followers of his continuing antisemitism, which had been toned down for popular consumption. Prior to the induction of the Nuremberg Race Laws in 1935 by the Nazis, many German nationalists such as Roland Freisler strongly supported laws to ban Rassenschande between Aryans and Jews as racial treason. Even before the laws were officially passed, the Nazis banned sexual relations and marriages between party members and Jews. Party members found guilty of Rassenschande were severely punished; some party members were even sentenced to death.
The Nazis claimed that Bismarck was unable to complete German national unification because Jews had infiltrated the German parliament and they claimed that their abolition of parliament had ended this obstacle to unification. Using the stab-in-the-back myth, the Nazis accused Jews—and other populations who it considered non-German—of possessing extra-national loyalties, thereby exacerbating German antisemitism about the Judenfrage (the Jewish Question), the far-right political canard which was popular when the ethnic völkisch movement and its politics of Romantic nationalism for establishing a Großdeutschland was strong.
Nazism's racial policy positions may have developed from the views of important biologists of the 19th century, including French biologist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, through Ernst Haeckel's idealist version of Lamarckism and the father of genetics, German botanist Gregor Mendel. Haeckel's works were later condemned by the Nazis as inappropriate for "National-Socialist formation and education in the Third Reich". This may have been because of his "monist" atheistic, materialist philosophy, which the Nazis disliked, along with his friendliness to Jews, opposition to militarism and support altruism, with one Nazi official calling for them to be banned. Unlike Darwinian theory, Lamarckian theory officially ranked races in a hierarchy of evolution from apes while Darwinian theory did not grade races in a hierarchy of higher or lower evolution from apes, but simply stated that all humans as a whole had progressed in their evolution from apes. Many Lamarckians viewed "lower" races as having been exposed to debilitating conditions for too long for any significant "improvement" of their condition to take place in the near future. Haeckel used Lamarckian theory to describe the existence of interracial struggle and put races on a hierarchy of evolution, ranging from wholly human to subhuman.
Mendelian inheritance, or Mendelism, was supported by the Nazis, as well as by mainstream eugenicists of the time. The Mendelian theory of inheritance declared that genetic traits and attributes were passed from one generation to another. Eugenicists used Mendelian inheritance theory to demonstrate the transfer of biological illness and impairments from parents to children, including mental disability, whereas others also used Mendelian theory to demonstrate the inheritance of social traits, with racialists claiming a racial nature behind certain general traits such as inventiveness or criminal behaviour.
Use of the American racist model
Hitler and other Nazi legal theorists were inspired by America's institutional racism and saw it as the model to follow. In particular, they saw it as a model for the expansion of territory and the elimination of indigenous inhabitants therefrom, for laws denying full citizenship for African Americans, which they wanted to implement also against Jews, and for racist immigration laws banning some races. In Mein Kampf, Hitler extolled America as the only contemporary example of a country with racist ("völkisch") citizenship statutes in the 1920s, and Nazi lawyers made use of the American models in crafting laws for Nazi Germany. U.S. citizenship laws and anti-miscegenation laws directly inspired the two principal Nuremberg Laws—the Citizenship Law and the Blood Law.
Response to World War I and Italian Fascism
During World War I, German sociologist Johann Plenge spoke of the rise of a "National Socialism" in Germany within what he termed the "ideas of 1914" that were a declaration of war against the "ideas of 1789" (the French Revolution). According to Plenge, the "ideas of 1789" which included the rights of man, democracy, individualism and liberalism were being rejected in favour of "the ideas of 1914" which included the "German values" of duty, discipline, law and order. Plenge believed that ethnic solidarity (Volksgemeinschaft) would replace class division and that "racial comrades" would unite to create a socialist society in the struggle of "proletarian" Germany against "capitalist" Britain. He believed that the "Spirit of 1914" manifested itself in the concept of the "People's League of National Socialism". This National Socialism was a form of state socialism that rejected the "idea of boundless freedom" and promoted an economy that would serve the whole of Germany under the leadership of the state. This National Socialism was opposed to capitalism due to the components that were against "the national interest" of Germany, but insisted that National Socialism would strive for greater efficiency in the economy. Plenge advocated an authoritarian, rational ruling elite to develop National Socialism through a hierarchical technocratic state, and his ideas were part of the basis of Nazism.
Oswald Spengler, a German cultural philosopher, was a major influence on Nazism, although after 1933 he became alienated from Nazism and was later condemned by the Nazis for criticising Adolf Hitler. Spengler's conception of national socialism and a number of his political views were shared by the Nazis and the Conservative Revolutionary movement. Spengler's views were also popular amongst Italian Fascists, including Benito Mussolini.
Spengler's book The Decline of the West (1918), written during the final months of World War I, addressed the supposed decadence of modern European civilisation, which he claimed was caused by atomising and irreligious individualisation and cosmopolitanism. Spengler's major thesis was that a law of historical development of cultures existed involving a cycle of birth, maturity, ageing and death when it reaches its final form of civilisation. Upon reaching the point of civilisation, a culture will lose its creative capacity and succumb to decadence until the emergence of "barbarians" creates a new epoch. Spengler considered the Western world as having succumbed to decadence of intellect, money, cosmopolitan urban life, irreligious life, atomised individualisation and believed that it was at the end of its biological and "spiritual" fertility. He believed that the "young" German nation as an imperial power would inherit the legacy of Ancient Rome, lead a restoration of value in "blood" and instinct, while the ideals of rationalism would be revealed as absurd.
Spengler's notions of "Prussian socialism" as described in his book Preussentum und Sozialismus ("Prussiandom and Socialism", 1919), influenced Nazism and the Conservative Revolutionary movement. Spengler wrote: "The meaning of socialism is that life is controlled not by the opposition between rich and poor, but by the rank that achievement and talent bestow. That is our freedom, freedom from the economic despotism of the individual". Spengler adopted the anti-English ideas addressed by Plenge and Sombart during World War I that condemned English liberalism and English parliamentarianism while advocating a national socialism that was free from Marxism and that would connect the individual to the state through corporatist organisation. Spengler claimed that socialistic Prussian characteristics existed across Germany, including creativity, discipline, concern for the greater good, productivity and self-sacrifice. He prescribed war as a necessity by saying: "War is the eternal form of higher human existence and states exist for war: they are the expression of the will to war".
Spengler's definition of socialism did not advocate a change to property relations. He denounced Marxism for seeking to train the proletariat to "expropriate the expropriator", the capitalist and then to let them live a life of leisure on this expropriation. He claimed that "Marxism is the capitalism of the working class" and not true socialism. According to Spengler, true socialism would be in the form of corporatism, stating that "local corporate bodies organised according to the importance of each occupation to the people as a whole; higher representation in stages up to a supreme council of the state; mandates revocable at any time; no organised parties, no professional politicians, no periodic elections".
Wilhelm Stapel, an antisemitic German intellectual, used Spengler's thesis on the cultural confrontation between Jews as whom Spengler described as a Magian people versus Europeans as a Faustian people. Stapel described Jews as a landless nomadic people in pursuit of an international culture whereby they can integrate into Western civilisation. As such, Stapel claims that Jews have been attracted to "international" versions of socialism, pacifism or capitalism because as a landless people the Jews have transgressed various national cultural boundaries.
For all of Spengler's influence on the movement, he was opposed to its antisemitism. He wrote in his personal papers "ow much envy of the capability of other people in view of one's lack of it lies hidden in anti-Semitism!" as well as "hen one would rather destroy business and scholarship than see Jews in them, one is an ideologue, i.e., a danger for the nation. Idiotic."
Arthur Moeller van den Bruck was initially the dominant figure of the Conservative Revolutionaries influenced Nazism. He rejected reactionary conservatism while proposing a new state that he coined the "Third Reich", which would unite all classes under authoritarian rule. Van den Bruck advocated a combination of the nationalism of the right and the socialism of the left.
Fascism was a major influence on Nazism. The seizure of power by Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini in the March on Rome in 1922 drew admiration by Hitler, who less than a month later had begun to model himself and the Nazi Party upon Mussolini and the Fascists. Hitler presented the Nazis as a form of German fascism. In November 1923, the Nazis attempted a "March on Berlin" modelled after the March on Rome, which resulted in the failed Beer Hall Putsch in Munich.
Hitler spoke of Nazism being indebted to the success of Fascism's rise to power in Italy. In a private conversation in 1941, Hitler said that "the brown shirt would probably not have existed without the black shirt", the "brown shirt" referring to the Nazi militia and the "black shirt" referring to the Fascist militia. He also said in regards to the 1920s: "If Mussolini had been outdistanced by Marxism, I don't know whether we could have succeeded in holding out. At that period National Socialism was a very fragile growth".
Other Nazis—especially those at the time associated with the party's more radical wing such as Gregor Strasser, Joseph Goebbels and Heinrich Himmler—rejected Italian Fascism, accusing it of being too conservative or capitalist. Alfred Rosenberg condemned Italian Fascism for being racially confused and having influences from philosemitism. Strasser criticised the policy of Führerprinzip as being created by Mussolini and considered its presence in Nazism as a foreign imported idea. Throughout the relationship between Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, a number of lower-ranking Nazis scornfully viewed fascism as a conservative movement that lacked a full revolutionary potential.
Ideology and programme
In his book The Hitler State (Der Staat Hitlers), historian Martin Broszat writes:
...National Socialism was not primarily an ideological and programmatic, but a charismatic movement, whose ideology was incorporated in the Führer, Hitler, and which would have lost all its power to integrate without him. ... he abstract, utopian and vague National Socialistic ideology only achieved what reality and certainty it had through the medium of Hitler.
Thus, any explication of the ideology of Nazism must be descriptive, as it was not generated primarily from first principles, but was the result of numerous factors, including Hitler's strongly-held personal views, some parts of the 25-point plan, the general goals of the völkische and nationalist movements, and the conflicts between Nazi Party functionaries who battled "to win over to their respective interpretations of ." Once the Party had been purged of divergent influences such as Strasserism, Hitler was accepted by the Party's leadership as the "supreme authority to rule on ideological matters".
Nazi ideology was based on a bio-geo-political "Weltanschauung" (worldview), advocating territorial expansionism to cultivate what it viewed as a "purified and homogeneous Aryan population." Nazi regime's policies were shaped by the integration of biopolitics and geopolitics within the Hitlerian worldview, amalgamating spatial theory, practice, and imagination with biopolitics. In Hitlerism, the concepts of space and race were not separate but existed in tension, forming a distinct bio-geo-political framework at the core of the Nazi project. This ideology viewed German territorial conquests and extermination of those ethnic groups it dehumanised as "untermensch" as part of a biopolitical process to establish an ideal German community.
Nationalism and racialism
Further information: Nazism and race and Racial policy of Nazi GermanyNazism emphasised German nationalism, including both irredentism and expansionism. Nazism held racial theories based upon a belief in the existence of an Aryan master race that was superior to all other races. The Nazis emphasised the existence of racial conflict between the Aryan race and others—particularly Jews, whom the Nazis viewed as a mixed race that had infiltrated multiple societies and was responsible for exploitation and repression of the Aryan race. The Nazis also categorised Slavs as Untermensch (sub-human).
Wolfgang Bialas argues that the Nazis' sense of morality could be described as a form of procedural virtue ethics, as it demanded unconditional obedience to absolute virtues with the attitude of social engineering and replaced common sense intuitions with an ideological catalogue of virtues and commands. The ideal Nazi new man was to be race-conscious and an ideologically dedicated warrior who would commit actions for the sake of the German race while at the same time convinced he was doing the right thing and acting morally. The Nazis believed an individual could only develop their capabilities and individual characteristics within the framework of the individual's racial membership; the race one belonged to determined whether or not one was worthy of moral care. The Christian concept of self-denial was to be replaced with the idea of self-assertion towards those deemed inferior. Natural selection and the struggle for existence were declared by the Nazis to be the most divine laws; peoples and individuals deemed inferior were said to be incapable of surviving without those deemed superior, yet by doing so they imposed a burden on the superior. Natural selection was deemed to favour the strong over the weak and the Nazis deemed that protecting those declared inferior was preventing nature from taking its course; those incapable of asserting themselves were viewed as doomed to annihilation, with the right to life being granted only to those who could survive on their own.
Irredentism and expansionism
Further information: Lebensraum
At the core of the Nazi ideology was the bio-geo-political project to acquire Lebensraum ("living space") through territorial conquests. The German Nazi Party supported German irredentist claims to Austria, Alsace-Lorraine, the region of Sudetenland, and the territory known since 1919 as the Polish Corridor. A major policy of the German Nazi Party was Lebensraum for the German nation based on claims that Germany after World War I was facing an overpopulation crisis and that expansion was needed to end the country's overpopulation within existing confined territory, and provide resources necessary to its people's well-being. Since the 1920s, the Nazi Party publicly promoted the expansion of Germany into territories held by the Soviet Union.
In Mein Kampf, Hitler stated that Lebensraum would be acquired in Eastern Europe, especially Russia. In his early years as the Nazi leader, Hitler had claimed that he would be willing to accept friendly relations with Russia on the tactical condition that Russia agree to return to the borders established by the German–Russian peace agreement of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk signed by Grigori Sokolnikov of the Russian Soviet Republic in 1918 which gave large territories held by Russia to German control in exchange for peace. In 1921, Hitler had commended the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk as opening the possibility for restoration of relations between Germany and Russia by saying:
Through the peace with Russia the sustenance of Germany as well as the provision of work were to have been secured by the acquisition of land and soil, by access to raw materials, and by friendly relations between the two lands.
— Adolf Hitler
From 1921 to 1922, Hitler evoked rhetoric of both the achievement of Lebensraum involving the acceptance of a territorially reduced Russia as well as supporting Russian nationalists in overthrowing the Bolsheviks and establishing a new White Russian government. Hitler's attitudes changed by the end of 1922, in which he then supported an alliance of Germany with Britain to destroy Russia. Hitler later declared how far he intended to expand Germany into Russia:
Hitler's doctrine of LebensraumAsia, what a disquieting reservoir of men! The safety of Europe will not be assured until we have driven Asia back behind the Urals. No organized Russian state must be allowed to exist west of that line.
— Adolf Hitler
— Adolf Hitler, — ("Mein Kampf", Volume 2, Chapter 14: "Germany's policy in Eastern Europe")"For the future of the German nation the 1914 frontiers are of no significance. They did not serve to protect us in the past, nor do they offer any guarantee for our defence in the future. With these frontiers the German people cannot maintain themselves as a compact unit, nor can they be assured of their maintenance. ... Against all this we, National Socialists, must stick firmly to the aim that we have set for our foreign policy; namely, that the German people must be assured the territorial area which is necessary for it to exist on this earth. ... The right to territory may become a duty when a great nation seems destined to go under unless its territory be extended. And that is particularly true when the nation in question is not some little group of negro people but the Germanic mother of all the life which has given cultural shape to the modern world."
Policy for Lebensraum planned mass expansion of Germany's borders to eastwards of the Ural Mountains. Hitler planned for the "surplus" Russian population living west of the Urals to be deported to the east of the Urals.
Historian Adam Tooze explains that Hitler believed that lebensraum was vital to securing American-style consumer affluence for the German people. In this light, Tooze argues that the view that the regime faced a "guns or butter" contrast is mistaken. While it is true that resources were diverted from civilian consumption to military production, Tooze explains that at a strategic level "guns were ultimately viewed as a means to obtaining more butter".
While the Nazi pre-occupation with agrarian living and food production are often seen as a sign of their backwardness, Tooze explains this was in fact a major driving issue in European society for at least the last two centuries. The issue of how European societies should respond to the new global economy in food was one of the major issues facing Europe in the early 20th century. Agrarian life in Europe (except perhaps with the exception of Britain) was incredibly common—in the early 1930s, over 9 million Germans (almost a third of the work force) were still working in agriculture and many people not working in agriculture still had small allotments or otherwise grew their own food. Tooze estimates that just over half the German population in the 1930s was living in towns and villages with populations under 20,000 people. Many people in cities still had memories of rural-urban migration—Tooze thus explains that the Nazis obsessions with agrarianism were not an atavistic gloss on a modern industrial nation but a consequence of the fact that Nazism (as both an ideology and as a movement) was the product of a society still in economic transition.
The Nazis obsession with food production was a consequence of the First World War. While Europe was able to avert famine with international imports, blockades brought the issue of food security back into European politics, the Allied blockade of Germany in and after World War I did not cause an outright famine but chronic malnutrition did kill an estimated 600,000 people in Germany and Austria. The economic crises of the interwar period meant that most Germans had memories of acute hunger. Thus Tooze concludes that the Nazis obsession with acquiring land was not a case of "turning back the clock" but more a refusal to accept that the result of the distribution of land, resources and population, which had resulted from the imperialist wars of the 18th and 19th centuries, should be accepted as final. While the victors of the First World War had either suitable agricultural land to population ratios or large empires (or both), allowing them to declare the issue of living space closed, the Nazis, knowing Germany lacked either of these, refused to accept that Germany's place in the world was to be a medium-sized workshop dependent upon imported food.
According to Goebbels, the conquest of Lebensraum was intended as an initial step towards the final goal of Nazi ideology, which was the establishment of complete German global hegemony. Rudolf Hess relayed to Walter Hewel Hitler's belief that world peace could only be acquired "when one power, the racially best one, has attained uncontested supremacy". When this control would be achieved, this power could then set up for itself a world police and assure itself "the necessary living space. The lower races will have to restrict themselves accordingly".
Racial theories
In its racial categorisation, Nazism viewed what it called the Aryan race as the master race of the world—a race that was superior to all other races. It viewed Aryans as being in racial conflict with a mixed race people, the Jews, whom the Nazis identified as a dangerous enemy of the Aryans. It also viewed a number of other peoples as dangerous to the well-being of the Aryan race. In order to preserve the perceived racial purity of the Aryan race, a set of race laws was introduced in 1935 which came to be known as the Nuremberg Laws. At first these laws only prevented sexual relations and marriages between Germans and Jews, but they were later extended to the "Gypsies, Negroes, and their bastard offspring", who were described by the Nazis as people of "alien blood". Such relations between Aryans (cf. Aryan certificate) and non-Aryans were now punishable under the race laws as Rassenschande or "race defilement". After the war began, the race defilement law was extended to include all foreigners (non-Germans). At the bottom of the racial scale of non-Aryans were Jews, Romanis, Slavs and blacks. To maintain the "purity and strength" of the Aryan race, the Nazis eventually sought to exterminate Jews, Romani, Slavs and the physically and mentally disabled. Other groups deemed "degenerate" and "asocial" who were not targeted for extermination, but were subjected to exclusionary treatment by the Nazi state, included homosexuals, blacks, Jehovah's Witnesses and political opponents. One of Hitler's ambitions at the start of the war was to exterminate, expel or enslave most or all Slavs from Central and Eastern Europe in order to acquire living space for German settlers.
A Nazi-era school textbook for German students entitled Heredity and Racial Biology for Students written by Jakob Graf described to students the Nazi conception of the Aryan race in a section titled "The Aryan: The Creative Force in Human History". Graf claimed that the original Aryans developed from Nordic peoples who invaded Ancient India and launched the initial development of Aryan culture there that later spread to ancient Persia and he claimed that the Aryan presence in Persia was what was responsible for its development into an empire. He claimed that ancient Greek culture was developed by Nordic peoples due to paintings of the time which showed Greeks who were tall, light-skinned, light-eyed, blond-haired people. He said that the Roman Empire was developed by the Italics who were related to the Celts who were also a Nordic people. He believed that the vanishing of the Nordic component of the populations in Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome led to their downfall. The Renaissance was claimed to have developed in the Western Roman Empire because of the Migration Period that brought new Nordic blood to the Empire's lands, such as the presence of Nordic blood in the Lombards (referred to as Longobards in the book); that remnants of the Visigoths were responsible for the creation of the Spanish Empire; and that the heritage of the Franks, Goths and Germanic peoples in France was what was responsible for its rise as a major power. He claimed that the rise of the Russian Empire was due to its leadership by people of Norman descent. He described the rise of Anglo-Saxon societies in North America, South Africa and Australia as being the result of the Nordic heritage of Anglo-Saxons. He concluded these points by saying: "Everywhere Nordic creative power has built mighty empires with high-minded ideas, and to this very day Aryan languages and cultural values are spread over a large part of the world, though the creative Nordic blood has long since vanished in many places".
In Nazi Germany, the idea of creating a master race resulted in efforts to "purify" the Deutsche Volk through eugenics and its culmination was the compulsory sterilisation or the involuntary euthanasia of physically or mentally disabled people. After World War II, the euthanasia programme was named Action T4. The ideological justification for euthanasia was Hitler's view of Sparta (11th century – 195 BC) as the original völkisch state and he praised Sparta's dispassionate destruction of congenitally deformed infants in order to maintain racial purity. Some non-Aryans enlisted in Nazi organisations like the Hitler Youth and the Wehrmacht, including Germans of African descent and Jewish descent. The Nazis began to implement "racial hygiene" policies as soon as they came to power. The July 1933 "Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring" prescribed compulsory sterilisation for people with a range of conditions which were thought to be hereditary, such as schizophrenia, epilepsy, Huntington's chorea and "imbecility". Sterilization was also mandated for chronic alcoholism and other forms of social deviance. An estimated 360,000 people were sterilised under this law between 1933 and 1939. Although some Nazis suggested that the programme should be extended to people with physical disabilities, such ideas had to be expressed carefully, given the fact that some Nazis had physical disabilities, one example being one of the most powerful figures of the regime, Joseph Goebbels, who had a deformed right leg.
Nazi racial theorist Hans F. K. Günther argued that European peoples were divided into five races: Nordic, Mediterranean, Dinaric, Alpine and East Baltic. Günther applied a Nordicist conception in order to justify his belief that Nordics were the highest in the racial hierarchy. In his book Rassenkunde des deutschen Volkes (1922) ("Racial Science of the German People"), Günther recognised Germans as being composed of all five races, but emphasised the strong Nordic heritage among them. Hitler read Rassenkunde des deutschen Volkes, which influenced his racial policy. Gunther believed that Slavs belonged to an "Eastern race" and he warned against Germans mixing with them. The Nazis described Jews as being a racially mixed group of primarily Near Eastern and Oriental racial types. Because such racial groups were concentrated outside Europe, the Nazis claimed that Jews were "racially alien" to all European peoples and that they did not have deep racial roots in Europe.
Günther emphasised Jews' Near Eastern racial heritage. Günther identified the mass conversion of the Khazars to Judaism in the 8th century as creating the two major branches of the Jewish people: those of primarily Near Eastern racial heritage became the Ashkenazi Jews (that he called Eastern Jews) while those of primarily Oriental racial heritage became the Sephardi Jews (that he called Southern Jews). Günther claimed that the Near Eastern type was composed of commercially spirited and artful traders, and that the type held strong psychological manipulation skills which aided them in trade. He claimed that the Near Eastern race had been "bred not so much for the conquest and exploitation of nature as it had been for the conquest and exploitation of people". Günther believed that European peoples had a racially motivated aversion to peoples of Near Eastern racial origin and their traits, and as evidence of this he showed multiple examples of depictions of satanic figures with Near Eastern physiognomies in European art.
Hitler's conception of the Aryan Herrenvolk ("Aryan master race") excluded the vast majority of Slavs from Central and Eastern Europe (i.e. Poles, Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, etc.). They were regarded as a race of men not inclined to a higher form of civilisation, which was under an instinctive force that reverted them back to nature. The Nazis also regarded the Slavs as having dangerous Jewish and Asiatic, meaning Mongol, influences. Because of this, the Nazis declared Slavs to be Untermenschen ("subhumans").
Nazi anthropologists attempted to scientifically prove the historical admixture of the Slavs who lived further East and leading Nazi racial theorist Hans Günther regarded the Slavs as being primarily Nordic centuries ago but he believed that they had mixed with non-Nordic types over time. Exceptions were made for a small percentage of Slavs who the Nazis saw as descended from German settlers and therefore fit to be Germanised and considered part of the Aryan master race. Hitler described Slavs as "a mass of born slaves who feel the need for a master". Himmler classified Slavs as "bestial untermenschen" and Jews as the "decisive leader of the Untermenschen". These ideas were fervently advocated through Nazi propaganda, which had a massive impact on the indoctrination of the German population. "Der Untermenschen", a racist brochure published by the SS in 1942, has been regarded as one of the most infamous pieces of Nazi anti-Slavic propaganda.
The Nazi notion of Slavs as inferior served as a legitimisation of their desire to create Lebensraum for Germans and other Germanic people in eastern Europe, where millions of Germans and other Germanic settlers would be moved into once those territories were conquered, while the original Slavic inhabitants were to be annihilated, removed or enslaved. Nazi Germany's policy changed towards Slavs in response to military manpower shortages, forcing it to allow Slavs to serve in its armed forces within the occupied territories in spite of the fact that they were considered "subhuman".
Hitler declared that racial conflict against Jews was necessary in order to save Germany from suffering under them and he dismissed concerns that the conflict with them was inhumane and unjust:
We may be inhumane, but if we rescue Germany we have achieved the greatest deed in the world. We may work injustice, but if we rescue Germany then we have removed the greatest injustice in the world. We may be immoral, but if our people is rescued we have opened the way for morality.
Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels frequently employed antisemitic rhetoric to underline this view: "The Jew is the enemy and the destroyer of the purity of blood, the conscious destroyer of our race."
Social class
National Socialist politics was based on competition and struggle as its organising principle, and the Nazis believed that "human life consisted of eternal struggle and competition and derived its meaning from struggle and competition." The Nazis saw this eternal struggle in military terms, and advocated a society organised like an army in order to achieve success. They promoted the idea of a national-racial "people's community" (Volksgemeinschaft) in order to accomplish "the efficient prosecution of the struggle against other peoples and states." Like an army, the Volksgemeinschaft was meant to consist of a hierarchy of ranks or classes of people, some commanding and others obeying, all working together for a common goal. This concept was rooted in the writings of 19th century völkisch authors who glorified medieval German society, viewing it as a "community rooted in the land and bound together by custom and tradition," in which there was neither class conflict nor selfish individualism. The Nazis concept of the volksgemeinschaft appealed to many, as it was seen as it seemed at once to affirm a commitment to a new type of society for the modern age yet also offer protection from the tensions and insecurities of modernisation. It would balance individual achievement with group solidarity and cooperation with competition. Stripped of its ideological overtones, the Nazi vision of modernisation without internal conflict and a political community that offered both security and opportunity was so potent a vision of the future that many Germans were willing to overlook its racist and anti-Semitic essence.
Nazism rejected the Marxist concept of class conflict, and it praised both German capitalists and German workers as essential to the Volksgemeinschaft. In the Volksgemeinschaft, social classes would continue to exist, but there would be no class conflict between them. Hitler said that "the capitalists have worked their way to the top through their capacity, and as the basis of this selection, which again only proves their higher race, they have a right to lead." German business leaders co-operated with the Nazis during their rise to power and received substantial benefits from the Nazi state after it was established, including high profits and state-sanctioned monopolies and cartels. Large celebrations and symbolism were used extensively to encourage those engaged in physical labour on behalf of Germany, with leading National Socialists often praising the "honour of labour", which fostered a sense of community (Gemeinschaft) for the German people and promoted solidarity towards the Nazi cause. To win workers away from Marxism, Nazi propaganda sometimes presented its expansionist foreign policy goals as a "class struggle between nations." Bonfires were made of school children's differently coloured caps as symbolic of the unity of different social classes.
In 1922, Hitler disparaged other nationalist and racialist political parties as disconnected from the mass populace, especially lower and working-class young people:
The racialists were not capable of drawing the practical conclusions from correct theoretical judgements, especially in the Jewish Question. In this way, the German racialist movement developed a similar pattern to that of the 1880s and 1890s. As in those days, its leadership gradually fell into the hands of highly honourable, but fantastically naïve men of learning, professors, district counsellors, schoolmasters, and lawyers—in short a bourgeois, idealistic, and refined class. It lacked the warm breath of the nation's youthful vigour.
Nevertheless, the Nazi Party's voter base consisted mainly of farmers and the middle class, including groups such as Weimar government officials, school teachers, doctors, clerks, self-employed businessmen, salesmen, retired officers, engineers, and students. Their demands included lower taxes, higher prices for food, restrictions on department stores and consumer co-operatives, and reductions in social services and wages. The need to maintain the support of these groups made it difficult for the Nazis to appeal to the working class, since the working class often had opposite demands.
From 1928 onward, the Nazi Party's growth into a large national political movement was dependent on middle class support, and on the public perception that it "promised to side with the middle classes and to confront the economic and political power of the working class." The financial collapse of the white collar middle-class of the 1920s figures much in their strong support of Nazism. Although the Nazis continued to make appeals to "the German worker", historian Timothy Mason concludes that "Hitler had nothing but slogans to offer the working class." Historians Conan Fischer and Detlef Mühlberger argue that while the Nazis were primarily rooted in the lower middle class, they were able to appeal to all classes in society and that while workers were generally underrepresented, they were still a substantial source of support for the Nazis. H.L. Ansbacher argues that the working-class soldiers had the most faith in Hitler out of any occupational group in Germany.
The Nazis also established a norm that every worker should be semi-skilled, which was not simply rhetorical; the number of men leaving school to enter the work force as unskilled labourers fell from 200,000 in 1934 to 30,000 in 1939. For many working-class families, the 1930s and 1940s were a time of social mobility; not in the sense of moving into the middle class but rather moving within the blue-collar skill hierarchy. Overall, the experience of workers varied considerably under Nazism. Workers' wages did not increase much during Nazi rule, as the government feared wage-price inflation and thus wage growth was limited. Prices for food and clothing rose, though costs for heating, rent and light decreased. Skilled workers were in shortage from 1936 onward, meaning that workers who engaged in vocational training could look forward to considerably higher wages. Benefits provided by the Labour Front were generally positively received, even if workers did not always buy in to propaganda about the volksgemeinschaft. Workers welcomed opportunities for employment after the harsh years of the Great Depression, creating a common belief that the Nazis had removed the insecurity of unemployment. Workers who remained discontented risked the Gestapo's informants. Ultimately, the Nazis faced a conflict between their rearmament program, which by necessity would require material sacrifices from workers (longer hours and a lower standard of living), versus a need to maintain the confidence of the working class in the regime. Hitler was sympathetic to the view that stressed taking further measures for rearmament but he did not fully implement the measures required for it in order to avoid alienating the working class.
While the Nazis had substantial support amongst the middle-class, they often attacked traditional middle-class values and Hitler personally held great contempt for them. This was because the traditional image of the middle class was one that was obsessed with personal status, material attainment and quiet, comfortable living, which was in opposition to the Nazism's ideal of a New Man. The Nazis' New Man was envisioned as a heroic figure who rejected a materialistic and private life for a public life and a pervasive sense of duty, willing to sacrifice everything for the nation. Despite the Nazis' contempt for these values, they were still able to secure millions of middle-class votes. Hermann Beck argues that while some members of the middle-class dismissed this as mere rhetoric, many others in some ways agreed with the Nazis—the defeat of 1918 and the failures of the Weimar period caused many middle-class Germans to question their own identity, thinking their traditional values to be anachronisms and agreeing with the Nazis that these values were no longer viable. While this rhetoric would become less frequent after 1933 due to the increased emphasis on the volksgemeinschaft, it and its ideas would never truly disappear until the overthrow of the regime. The Nazis instead emphasised that the middle-class must become staatsbürger, a publicly active and involved citizen, rather than a selfish, materialistic spießbürger, who was only interested in private life.
Sex and gender
Further information: Women in Nazi Germany
Nazi ideology advocated excluding women from political involvement and confining them to the spheres of "Kinder, Küche, Kirche" (Children, Kitchen, Church). Many women enthusiastically supported the regime, but formed their own internal hierarchies. Hitler's own opinion on the matter of women in Nazi Germany was that while other eras of German history had experienced the development and liberation of the female mind, the National Socialist goal was essentially singular in that it wished for them to produce a child. Based on this theme, Hitler once remarked about women that "with every child that she brings into the world, she fights her battle for the nation. The man stands up for the Volk, exactly as the woman stands up for the family". Proto-natalist programs in Nazi Germany offered favourable loans and grants to newlyweds and encouraged them to give birth to offspring by providing them with additional incentives. Contraception was discouraged for racially valuable women in Nazi Germany and abortion was forbidden by strict legal mandates, including prison sentences for women who sought them as well as prison sentences for doctors who performed them, whereas abortion for racially "undesirable" persons was encouraged.
While unmarried until the very end of the regime, Hitler often made excuses about his busy life hindering any chance for marriage. Among National Socialist ideologues, marriage was valued not for moral considerations but because it provided an optimal breeding environment. Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler reportedly told a confidant that when he established the Lebensborn program, an organisation that would dramatically increase the birth rate of "Aryan" children through extramarital relations between women classified as racially pure and their male equals, he had only the purest male "conception assistants" in mind.
Since the Nazis extended the Rassenschande ("race defilement") law to all foreigners at the beginning of the war, pamphlets were issued to German women which ordered them to avoid sexual relations with foreign workers who were brought to Germany and the pamphlets also ordered German women to view these same foreign workers as a danger to their blood. Although the law was applicable to both genders, German women were punished more severely for having sexual relations with foreign forced labourers in Germany. The Nazis issued the Polish decrees on 8 March 1940 which contained regulations concerning the Polish forced labourers (Zivilarbeiter) who were brought to Germany during World War II. One of the regulations stated that any Pole "who has sexual relations with a German man or woman, or approaches them in any other improper manner, will be punished by death". After the decrees were enacted, Himmler stated:
Fellow Germans who engage in sexual relations with male or female civil workers of the Polish nationality, commit other immoral acts or engage in love affairs shall be arrested immediately.
The Nazis later issued similar regulations against the Eastern Workers (Ost-Arbeiter), including the imposition of the death penalty if they engaged in sexual relations with German persons. Heydrich issued a decree on 20 February 1942 which declared that sexual intercourse between a German woman and a Russian worker or prisoner of war would result in the Russian man being punished with the death penalty. Another decree issued by Himmler on 7 December 1942 stated that any "unauthorised sexual intercourse" would result in the death penalty. Because the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour did not permit capital punishment for race defilement, special courts were convened in order to allow the death penalty to be imposed in some cases. German women accused of race defilement were marched through the streets with their head shaven and placards detailing their crimes were placed around their necks and those convicted of race defilement were sent to concentration camps. When Himmler reportedly asked Hitler what the punishment should be for German girls and German women who were found guilty of race defilement with prisoners of war (POWs), he ordered that "every POW who has relations with a German girl or a German would be shot" and the German woman should be publicly humiliated by "having her hair shorn and being sent to a concentration camp".
The League of German Girls was particularly regarded as instructing girls to avoid race defilement, which was treated with particular importance for young females. Transgender people had a variety of experiences depending on whether they were considered "Aryan" or capable of useful work. Several historians have noted that transgender people were targeted by the Nazis through legislation and were sent to concentration camps.
Opposition to homosexuality
Further information: Persecution of homosexuals in Nazi Germany
After the Night of the Long Knives, Hitler promoted Himmler and the SS, who then zealously suppressed homosexuality by saying: "We must exterminate these people root and branch ... the homosexual must be eliminated". In 1936, Himmler established the "Reichszentrale zur Bekämpfung der Homosexualität und Abtreibung" ("Reich Central Office for the Combating of Homosexuality and Abortion"). The Nazi regime incarcerated some 100,000 homosexuals during the 1930s. As concentration camp prisoners, homosexual men were forced to wear pink triangle badges. Nazi ideology still viewed German men who were gay as a part of the Aryan master race, but the Nazi regime attempted to force them into sexual and social conformity. Homosexuals were viewed as failing in their duty to procreate and reproduce for the Aryan nation. Gay men who would not change or feign a change in their sexual orientation were sent to concentration camps under the "Extermination Through Work" campaign.
Religion
Main article: Religion in Nazi Germany Further information: Catholic Church and Nazi Germany, German Christians (movement), German Faith Movement, Kreuz und Adler, Positive Christianity, Religious aspects of Nazism, Anti-Masonry § Nazi Germany and occupied Europe, and Religious views of Adolf Hitler
The Nazi Party Programme of 1920 guaranteed freedom for all religious denominations which were not hostile to the State and it also endorsed Positive Christianity in order to combat "the Jewish-materialist spirit". Positive Christianity was a modified version of Christianity which emphasised racial purity and nationalism. The Nazis were aided by theologians such as Ernst Bergmann. In his work Die 25 Thesen der Deutschreligion (Twenty-five Points of the German Religion), Bergmann held the view that the Old Testament of the Bible was inaccurate along with portions of the New Testament, claimed that Jesus was not a Jew but was instead of Aryan origin and he also claimed that Adolf Hitler was the new messiah.
Hitler denounced the Old Testament as "Satan's Bible" and using components of the New Testament he attempted to prove that Jesus was both an Aryan and an antisemite by citing passages such as John 8:44 where he noted that Jesus is yelling at "the Jews", as well as saying to them "your father is the devil" and the Cleansing of the Temple, which describes Jesus' whipping of the "Children of the Devil". Hitler claimed that the New Testament included distortions by Paul the Apostle, who Hitler described as a "mass-murderer turned saint". In their propaganda, the Nazis used the writings of Martin Luther, the Protestant Reformer. They publicly displayed an original edition of Luther's On the Jews and their Lies during the annual Nuremberg rallies.
The Nazis were initially very hostile to Catholics because most Catholics supported the German Centre Party. Catholics opposed the Nazis' promotion of compulsory sterilisation of those whom they deemed inferior and the Catholic Church forbade its members to vote for the Nazis. In 1933, extensive Nazi violence occurred against Catholics due to their association with the Centre Party and their opposition to the Nazi regime's sterilisation laws. The Nazis demanded that Catholics declare their loyalty to the German state. In their propaganda, the Nazis used elements of Germany's Catholic history, in particular the German Catholic Teutonic Knights and their campaigns in Eastern Europe. The Nazis identified them as "sentinels" in the East against "Slavic chaos", though beyond that symbolism, the influence of the Teutonic Knights on Nazism was limited. Hitler also admitted that the Nazis' night rallies were inspired by the Catholic rituals which he had witnessed during his Catholic upbringing. The Nazis did seek official reconciliation with the Catholic Church and they endorsed the creation of the pro-Nazi Catholic Kreuz und Adler, an organisation which advocated a form of national Catholicism that would reconcile the Catholic Church's beliefs with Nazism. On 20 July 1933, a concordat (Reichskonkordat) was signed between Nazi Germany and the Catholic Church, which in exchange for acceptance of the Catholic Church in Germany required German Catholics to be loyal to the German state. The Catholic Church then ended its ban on members supporting the Nazi Party.
During the Second World War and the fanaticization of National Socialism, priests and nuns increasingly came into the focus of the Gestapo and the SS. In the concentration camps, separate priestly blocks were formed and any church resistance was strictly persecuted. The monastery sister Maria Restituta Kafka was sentenced to death by the People's Court and executed only for a harmless song critical of the regime. Polish priests came en masse to the Auschwitz concentration camp. Catholic resistance groups like those around Roman Karl Scholz were persecuted uncompromisingly. While the Catholic resistance was often anti-war and passive, there are also examples of actively combating National Socialism. The group around the priest Heinrich Maier approached the American secret service and provided them with plans and location sketches of for V-2 rockets, Tiger tanks, Messerschmitt Bf 109 and Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet and their production sites so that they could successfully bomb the factories. After the war, their history was often forgotten, also because they acted against the express instructions of their church authorities.
Historian Michael Burleigh claims that Nazism used Christianity for political purposes, but such use required that "fundamental tenets were stripped out, but the remaining diffuse religious emotionality had its uses". Burleigh claims that Nazism's conception of spirituality was "self-consciously pagan and primitive". Historian Roger Griffin rejects the claim that Nazism was primarily pagan, noting that although there were some influential neo-paganists in the Nazi Party, such as Heinrich Himmler and Alfred Rosenberg, they represented a minority and their views did not influence Nazi ideology beyond its use for symbolism. It is noted that Hitler denounced Germanic paganism in Mein Kampf and condemned Rosenberg's and Himmler's paganism as "nonsense".
Economics
Main article: Economy of Nazi Germany Further information: Economics of fascism
The Nazis came to power in the midst of Great Depression, when the unemployment rate at that point in time was close to 30%. Generally speaking, Nazi theorists and politicians blamed Germany's previous economic failures on political causes like the influence of Marxism on the workforce, the sinister and exploitative machinations of what they called international Jewry and the vindictiveness of the western political leaders' war reparation demands. Instead of traditional economic incentives, the Nazis offered solutions of a political nature, such as the elimination of organised trade unions, rearmament (in contravention of the Versailles Treaty) and biological politics. Various work programs designed to establish full-employment for the German population were instituted once the Nazis seized full national power. Hitler encouraged nationally supported projects like the construction of the Autobahn highway system, the introduction of an affordable people's car (Volkswagen) and later the Nazis bolstered the economy through the business and employment generated by military rearmament. The Nazis benefited early in the regime's existence from the first post-Depression economic upswing, and this combined with their public works projects, job-procurement program and subsidised home repair program reduced unemployment by as much as 40 per cent in one year. This development tempered the unfavourable psychological climate caused by the earlier economic crisis and encouraged Germans to march in step with the regime.
The economic policies of the Nazis were in many respects a continuation of the policies of the German National People's Party, a national-conservative party and the Nazis' coalition partner. While other Western capitalist countries strove for increased state ownership of industry during the same period, the Nazis transferred public ownership into the private sector and handed over some public services to private organizations, mostly affiliated with the Nazi Party. It was an intentional policy with multiple objectives rather than ideologically driven and was used as a tool to enhance support for the Nazi government and the party. According to historian Richard Overy, the Nazi war economy was a mixed economy that combined free markets with central planning and described the economy as being somewhere in between the command economy of the Soviet Union and the capitalist system of the United States.
The Nazi government continued the economic policies introduced by the government of Kurt von Schleicher in 1932 to combat the effects of the Depression. Upon being appointed Chancellor in 1933, Hitler appointed Hjalmar Schacht, a former member of the German Democratic Party, as President of the Reichsbank in 1933 and Minister of Economics in 1934. Hitler promised measures to increase employment, protect the German currency, and promote recovery from the Great Depression. These included an agrarian settlement program, labour service, and a guarantee to maintain health care and pensions. However, these policies and programs, which included a large public works programs supported by deficit spending such as the construction of the Autobahn network to stimulate the economy and reduce unemployment, were inherited and planned to be undertaken by the Weimar Republic during conservative Paul von Hindenburg's presidency and which the Nazis appropriated as their own after coming to power. Above all, Hitler's priority was rearmament and the buildup of the German military in preparation for an eventual war to conquer Lebensraum in the East. The policies of Schacht created a scheme for deficit financing, in which capital projects were paid for with the issuance of promissory notes called Mefo bills, which could be traded by companies with each other. This was particularly useful in allowing Germany to rearm because the Mefo bills were not Reichsmarks and did not appear in the federal budget, so they helped conceal rearmament. At the beginning of his rule, Hitler said that "the future of Germany depends exclusively and only on the reconstruction of the Wehrmacht. All other tasks must cede precedence to the task of rearmament." This policy was implemented immediately, with military expenditures quickly growing far larger than the civilian work-creation programs. As early as June 1933, military spending for the year was budgeted to be three times larger than the spending on all civilian work-creation measures in 1932 and 1933 combined. Nazi Germany increased its military spending faster than any other state in peacetime, with the share of military spending rising from 1 per cent to 10 per cent of national income in the first two years of the regime alone. Eventually, it reached as high as 75 per cent by 1944.
In spite of their rhetoric condemning big business prior to their rise to power, the Nazis quickly entered into a partnership with German business from as early as February 1933. That month, after being appointed Chancellor but before gaining dictatorial powers, Hitler made a personal appeal to German business leaders to help fund the Nazi Party for the crucial months that were to follow. He argued that they should support him in establishing a dictatorship because "private enterprise cannot be maintained in the age of democracy" and because democracy would allegedly lead to communism. He promised to destroy the German left and the trade unions, without any mention of anti-Jewish policies or foreign conquests. In the following weeks, the Nazi Party received contributions from seventeen different business groups, with the largest coming from IG Farben and Deutsche Bank. Historian Adam Tooze writes that the leaders of German business were therefore "willing partners in the destruction of political pluralism in Germany". In exchange, owners and managers of German businesses were granted unprecedented powers to control their workforce, collective bargaining was abolished and wages were frozen at a relatively low level. Business profits also rose very rapidly, as did corporate investment. In addition, the Nazis privatised public properties and public services, only increasing economic state control through regulations. Hitler believed that private ownership was useful in that it encouraged creative competition and technical innovation, but insisted that it had to conform to national interests and be "productive" rather than "parasitical". Private property rights were conditional upon following the economic priorities set by the Nazi leadership, with high profits as a reward for firms who followed them and the threat of nationalisation being used against those who did not. Under Nazi economics, free competition and self-regulating markets diminished, but Hitler's social Darwinist beliefs made him retain business competition and private property as economic engines.
The Nazis were hostile to the idea of social welfare in principle, upholding instead the social Darwinist concept that the weak and feeble should perish. They condemned the welfare system of the Weimar Republic as well as private charity, accusing them of supporting people regarded as racially inferior and weak, who should have been weeded out in the process of natural selection. Nevertheless, faced with the mass unemployment and poverty of the Great Depression, the Nazis found it necessary to set up charitable institutions to help racially-pure Germans in order to maintain popular support, while arguing that this represented "racial self-help" and not indiscriminate charity or universal social welfare. Nazi programs such as the Winter Relief of the German People and the broader National Socialist People's Welfare (NSV) were organised as quasi-private institutions, officially relying on private donations from Germans to help others of their race, although in practice those who refused to donate could face severe consequences. Unlike the social welfare institutions of the Weimar Republic and the Christian charities, the NSV distributed assistance on explicitly racial grounds. It provided support only to those who were "racially sound, capable of and willing to work, politically reliable, and willing and able to reproduce". Non-Aryans were excluded, as well as the "work-shy", "asocials" and the "hereditarily ill". Successful efforts were made to get middle-class women involved in social work assisting large families, and the Winter Relief campaigns acted as a ritual to generate public sympathy.
Agrarian policies were also important to the Nazis since they corresponded not just to the economy but to their geopolitical conception of Lebensraum as well. For Hitler, the acquisition of land and soil was requisite in moulding the German economy. To tie farmers to their land, selling agricultural land was prohibited. Farm ownership remained private, but business monopoly rights were granted to marketing boards to control production and prices with a quota system. The Hereditary Farm Law of 1933 established a cartel structure under a government body known as the Reichsnährstand (RNST) which determined "everything from what seeds and fertilizers were used to how land was inherited". Hitler primarily viewed the German economy as an instrument of power and believed the economy was not about creating wealth and technical progress so as to improve the quality of life for a nation's citizenry, but rather that economic success was paramount for providing the means and material foundations necessary for military conquest. While economic progress generated by National Socialist programs had its role in appeasing the German people, the Nazis and Hitler in particular did not believe that economic solutions alone were sufficient to thrust Germany onto the stage as a world power. The Nazis thus sought to secure a general economic revival accompanied by massive military spending for rearmament, especially later through the implementation of the Four Year Plan, which consolidated their rule and firmly secured a command relationship between the German arms industry and the National Socialist government. Between 1933 and 1939, military expenditures were upwards of 82 billion Reichsmarks and represented 23 per cent of Germany's gross national product as the Nazis mobilised their people and economy for war.
Anti-communism
The Nazis claimed that communism was dangerous to the well-being of nations because of its intention to dissolve private property, its support of class conflict, its aggression against the middle class, its hostility towards small business and its atheism. Nazism rejected class conflict-based socialism and economic egalitarianism, favouring instead a stratified economy with social classes based on merit and talent, retaining private property and the creation of national solidarity that transcends class distinction. During the late 1930s and the 1940s, anti-communist regimes and groups that supported Nazism included the Falange in Francoist Spain, the Vichy regime and the 33rd Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS Charlemagne (1st French) in France and the British Union of Fascists under Oswald Mosley.
In Mein Kampf, Hitler stated his desire to "make war upon the Marxist principle that all men are equal". He believed that "the notion of equality was a sin against nature." Nazism upheld the "natural inequality of men," including inequality between races and also within each race. The Nazi state aimed to advance those individuals with special talents or intelligence, so they could rule over the masses. Nazi ideology relied on elitism and the Führerprinzip (leadership principle), arguing that elite minorities should assume leadership roles over the majority, and that the elite minority should itself be organised according to a "hierarchy of talent", with a single leader—the Führer—at the top. The Führerprinzip held that each member of the hierarchy owed absolute obedience to those above him and should hold absolute power over those below him.
During the 1920s, Hitler urged disparate Nazi factions to unite in opposition to Jewish Bolshevism. Hitler asserted that the "three vices" of "Jewish Marxism" were democracy, pacifism and internationalism. The Communist movement, the trade unions, the Social Democratic Party and the left-wing press were all considered to be Jewish-controlled and part of the "international Jewish conspiracy" to weaken the German nation by promoting internal disunity through class struggle. The Nazis also believed that the Jews had instigated the Bolshevik revolution in Russia and that Communists had stabbed Germany in the back and caused it to lose the First World War. They further argued that modern cultural trends of the 1920s (such as jazz music and cubist art) represented "cultural Bolshevism" and were part of a political assault aimed at the spiritual degeneration of the German Volk. Joseph Goebbels published a pamphlet titled The Nazi-Sozi which gave brief points of how Nazism differed from Marxism. In 1930, Hitler said: "Our adopted term 'Socialist' has nothing to do with Marxist Socialism. Marxism is anti-property; true Socialism is not".
The Communist Party of Germany (KPD) was the largest Communist Party in the world outside of the Soviet Union, until it was destroyed by the Nazis in 1933. In the 1920s and early 1930s, Communists and Nazis often fought each other directly in street violence, with the Nazi paramilitary organisations being opposed by the Communist Red Front and Anti-Fascist Action. After the beginning of the Great Depression, both Communists and Nazis saw their share of the vote increase. While the Nazis were willing to form alliances with other parties of the right, the Communists refused to form an alliance with the Social Democratic Party of Germany, the largest party of the left. After the Nazis came to power, they quickly banned the Communist Party under the allegation that it was preparing for revolution and that it had caused the Reichstag fire. Four thousand KPD officials were arrested in February 1933, and by the end of the year 130,000 communists had been sent to Nazi concentration camps.
Views of capitalism
See also: List of companies involved in the HolocaustThe Nazis argued that free-market capitalism damages nations due to international finance and the worldwide economic dominance of disloyal big business, which they considered to be the product of Jewish influences. Nazi propaganda posters in working class districts emphasised anti-capitalism, such as one that said: "The maintenance of a rotten industrial system has nothing to do with nationalism. I can love Germany and hate capitalism".
Both in public and in private Hitler opposed free-market capitalism because it "could not be trusted to put national interests first", arguing that it holds nations ransom in the interests of a parasitic cosmopolitan rentier class. He believed that international free trade would lead to global domination by the British Empire and the United States, which he believed were controlled by Jewish bankers in Wall Street and the City of London. In particular, Hitler saw the United States as a major future rival and feared that the globalization after World War I would allow North America to displace Europe as the world's most powerful continent. Hitler's anxiety over the economic rise of the United States was a major theme in his unpublished Zweites Buch. He even hoped for a time that Britain could be swayed into an alliance with Germany on the basis of a shared economic rivalry with the United States. Hitler desired an economy that would direct resources "in ways that matched the many national goals of the regime" such as the buildup of the military, building programs for cities and roads, and economic self-sufficiency. Hitler also distrusted free-market capitalism for being unreliable due to its egotism and preferred a state-directed economy that maintains private property and competition but subordinates them to the interests of the Volk and Nation.
Hitler told a party leader in 1934: "The economic system of our day is the creation of the Jews". Hitler said to Benito Mussolini that capitalism had "run its course". Hitler also said that the business bourgeoisie "know nothing except their profit. 'Fatherland' is only a word for them." Hitler was personally disgusted with the ruling bourgeois elites of Germany during the period of the Weimar Republic, whom he referred to as "cowardly shits".
In Mein Kampf, Hitler effectively supported mercantilism in the belief that economic resources from their respective territories should be seized by force, as he believed that the policy of Lebensraum would provide Germany with such economically valuable territories. He argued that the United States and the United Kingdom only benefitted from free trade because they had already conquered substantial internal markets through British colonial conquests and American westward expansion. Hitler argued that the only means to maintain economic security was to have direct control over resources rather than being forced to rely on world trade. Hitler claimed that war to gain such resources was the only means to surpass the failing capitalist economic system.
In practice, however, the Nazis merely opposed one type of capitalism, namely 19th-century free-market capitalism and the laissez-faire model, which they nonetheless applied to the social sphere in the form of social Darwinism. Some have described Nazi Germany as an example of corporatism, authoritarian capitalism, or totalitarian capitalism. While claiming to strive for autarky in propaganda, the Nazis crushed existing movements towards self-sufficiency and established extensive capital connections in efforts to ready for expansionist war and genocide in alliance with traditional business and commerce elites. In spite of their anti-capitalist rhetoric in opposition to big business, the Nazis allied with German business as soon as they got in power by appealing to the fear of communism and promising to destroy the German left and trade unions, eventually purging both more radical and reactionary elements from the party in 1934.
Joseph Goebbels, who would later go on to become the Nazi Propaganda Minister, was strongly opposed to both capitalism and communism, viewing them as the "two great pillars of materialism" that were "part of the international Jewish conspiracy for world domination". Nevertheless, he wrote in his diary in 1925 that if he were forced to choose between them, "in the final analysis, it would be better for us to go down with Bolshevism than live in eternal slavery under capitalism". Goebbels also linked his antisemitism to his anti-capitalism, stating in a 1929 pamphlet that "we see, in the Hebrews, the incarnation of capitalism, the misuse of the nation's goods".
Within the Nazi Party, the faction associated with anti-capitalist beliefs was the SA, a paramilitary wing led by Ernst Röhm. The SA had a complicated relationship with the rest of the party, giving both Röhm himself and local SA leaders significant autonomy. Different local leaders would even promote different political ideas in their units, including "nationalistic, socialistic, anti-Semitic, racist, völkisch, or conservative ideas." There was tension between the SA and Hitler, especially from 1930 onward, as Hitler's "increasingly close association with big industrial interests and traditional rightist forces" caused many in the SA to distrust him. The SA regarded Hitler's seizure of power in 1933 as a "first revolution" against the left, and some voices within the ranks began arguing for a "second revolution" against the right. After engaging in violence against the left in 1933, Röhm's SA also began attacks against individuals deemed to be associated with conservative reaction. Hitler saw Röhm's independent actions as violating and possibly threatening his leadership, as well as jeopardising the regime by alienating the conservative President Paul von Hindenburg and the conservative-oriented German Army. This resulted in Hitler purging Röhm and other radical members of the SA in 1934, during the Night of the Long Knives.
Totalitarianism
See also: Totalitarianism
Under Nazism, with its emphasis on the nation, individualism was denounced and instead importance was placed upon Germans belonging to the German Volk and "people's community" (Volksgemeinschaft). Hitler declared that "every activity and every need of every individual will be regulated by the collectivity represented by the party" and that "there are no longer any free realms in which the individual belongs to himself".
One of the core objectives of the Nazi party was the establishment of a totalitarian state which indoctrinated the German population with ultra-nationalist ideas and violently enforced its ideological worldview upon the society. Heinrich Himmler justified the establishment of a repressive police state, in which the security forces could exercise power arbitrarily, by claiming that national security and order should take precedence over the needs of the individual. In his speech delivered at the inauguration of the Nazi Reich Chamber of Culture on 15 November 1933, Joseph Goebbels stated:
"The revolution we have carried out is a total one. It has embraced all areas of public life and transformed them from below. It has completely changed and recast the relationship of people to each other, to the State, and to life itself. It was in fact the breakthrough of a fresh world-view, which had fought for power in opposition for fourteen years to provide the basis for the German people to develop a new relationship with the State. What has been happening since 30 January is only the visible expression of this revolutionary process."
According to the famous philosopher and political theorist, Hannah Arendt, the allure of Nazism as a totalitarian ideology (with its attendant mobilisation of the German population) resided within the construct of helping that society deal with the cognitive dissonance resultant from the tragic interruption of the First World War and the economic and material suffering consequent to the Depression and brought to order the revolutionary unrest occurring all around them. Instead of the plurality that existed in democratic or parliamentary states, Nazism as a totalitarian system promulgated "clear" solutions to the historical problems faced by Germany, levied support by de-legitimizing the former government of Weimar and provided a politico-biological pathway to a better future, one free from the uncertainty of the past. It was the atomised and disaffected masses that Hitler and the party elite pointed in a particular direction and using clever propaganda to make them into ideological adherents, exploited in bringing Nazism to life.
While the ideologues of Nazism, much like those of Stalinism, abhorred democratic or parliamentary governance as practised in the United States or Britain, their differences are substantial. An epistemic crisis occurs when one tries to synthesize and contrast Nazism and Stalinism as two-sides of the same coin with their similarly tyrannical leaders, state-controlled economies and repressive police structures. Namely, while they share a common thematic political construction, they are entirely inimical to one another in their worldviews and when more carefully analysed against one another on a one-to-one level, an "irreconcilable asymmetry" results.
Carl Schmitt, a Nazi legal theorist and member of Prussian State Council, characterized the "Führerprinzip" as the ideological foundation of Nazi Germany's "total state". In his book "Staat, Bewegung, Volk " (1933), Schmitt wrote:
"National Socialism does not think in abstractions and clichés. It is the enemy of all normative and functionalist ways of proceeding. It supports and cultivates every authentic substance of the people wherever it encounters it, in the countryside, in ethnic groups or classes. It has created the hereditary farm law; saved the peasantry; purged the Civil Service of alien elements and thus re-stored it as a class. It has the courage to treat unequally what is unequal and enforce necessary differentiations."
Classification: Reactionary or Revolutionary
Although Nazism is often seen as a reactionary movement, it did not seek a return of Germany to the pre-Weimar monarchy, but instead looked much further back to a mythic halcyon Germany which never existed. It has also been seen—as it was by the German-American scholar Franz Leopold Neumann—as the result of a crisis of capitalism which manifested as a "totalitarian monopoly capitalism". In this view Nazism is a mass movement of the middle class which was in opposition to a mass movement of workers in socialism and its extreme form, Communism. Historian Karl Dietrich Bracher argues:
Such an interpretation runs the risk of misjudging the revolutionary component of National Socialism, which cannot be dismissed as being simply reactionary. Rather, from the very outset, and particularly as it developed into the SS state, National Socialism aimed at a transformation of state and society.
About Hitler's and the Nazi Party's political positions, Bracher further claims:
were of a revolutionary nature: destruction of existing political and social structures and their supporting elites; profound disdain for civic order, for human and moral values, for Hapsburg and Hohenzollern, for liberal and Marxist ideas. The middle class and middle-class values, bourgeois nationalism and capitalism, the professionals, the intelligentsia and the upper class were dealt the sharpest rebuff. These were the groups which had to be uprooted .
See the condemnations of Nazism made by Kaiser Wilhelm II of the House of Hohenzollern and Otto von Hapsburg of the House of Hapsburg in the next section.
Similarly, historian Modris Eksteins argued:
Contrary to many interpretations of Nazism, which tend to view it as a reactionary movement, as, in the words of Thomas Mann, an "explosion of antiquarianism", intent on turning Germany into a pastoral folk community of thatched cottages and happy peasants, the general thrust of the movement, despite archaisms, was futuristic. Nazism was a headlong plunge into the future, towards a "brave new world." Of course it used to advantage residual conservative and utopian longings, paid respect to these romantic visions, and picked its ideological trappings from the German past. but its goals were, by its own lights, distinctly progressive. It was not a double-faced Janus whose aspects were equally attentive to the past and the future, nor was it a modern Proteus, the god of metamorphosis, who duplicates pre-existing forms. The intention of the movement was to create a new type of human being from whom would spring a new morality, a new social system, and eventually a new international order. That was, in fact, the intention of all the fascist movements. After a visit to Italy and a meeting with Mussolini, Oswald Mosley wrote that fascism "has produced not only a new system of government, but also a new type of man, who differs from politicians of the old world as men from another planet." Hitler talked in these terms endlessly. National Socialism was more than a political movement, he said; it was more than a faith; it was a desire to create mankind anew.
British historian Ian Kershaw, in his history of Europe in the first half of the 20th century, To Hell and Back, says about Nazism, Italian Fascism and Bolshevism:
They were different forms of a completely new, modern type of dictatorship—the complete antithesis to liberal democracy. They were all revolutionary, if by that term we understand a major political upheaval driven by the utopian aim of changing society fundamentally. They were not content simply to use repression as a means of control, but sought to mobilize behind an exclusive ideology to "educate" people into becoming committed believers, to claim them soul as well as body. Each of the regimes was, therefore, dynamic in ways that "conventional" authoritarianism was not.
Despite such tactical breaks necessitated by pragmatic concerns, which were typical for Hitler during his rise to power and in the early years of his regime, those who see Hitler as a revolutionary argue that he never ceased being a revolutionary dedicated to the radical transformation of Germany, especially when it concerned racial matters. In his monograph, Hitler: Study of a Revolutionary?, Martyn Housden concludes:
compiled a most extensive set of revolutionary goals (calling for radical social and political change); he mobilized a revolutionary following so extensive and powerful that many of his aims were achieved; he established and ran a dictatorial revolutionary state; and he disseminated his ideas abroad through a revolutionary foreign policy and war. In short, he defined and controlled the National Socialist revolution in all its phases.
There were aspects of Nazism which were undoubtedly reactionary, such as their attitude toward the role of women in society, which was completely traditionalist, calling for the return of women to the home as wives, mothers and homemakers, although ironically this ideological policy was undermined in reality by the growing labour shortages and need for more workers caused by men leaving the workforce for military service. The number of working women actually increased from 4.24 million in 1933 to 4.52 million in 1936 and 5.2 million in 1938, despite active discouragement and legal barriers put in place by the Nazi regime. Another reactionary aspect of Nazism was in their arts policy, which stemmed from Hitler's rejection of all forms of "degenerate" modern art, music and architecture.
Historian Martin Broszat describes Nazism as having:
...a peculiar hybrid, half-reactionary, half-revolutionary relationship to established society, to the political system and tradition. ... ideology was almost like a backwards-looking Utopia. It derived from romantic pictures and clichés of the past, from warlike-heroic, patriarchal or absolutist ages, social and political systems, which, however, were translated into the popular and avant-garde, into the fighting slogans of totalitarian nationalism. The élitist notion of aristocratic nobility became the völkische 'nobility of blood' of the 'master race', the princely 'theory of divine right' gave way to the popular national Führer; the obedient submission to the active national 'following'.
Contemporary events and views
After the failure of the Beer Hall Putsch in 1923, and his subsequent trial and imprisonment, Hitler decided that the way for the Nazi Party to achieve power was not through insurrection, but through legal and quasi-legal means. This did not sit well with the brown-shirted stormtroopers of the SA, especially those in Berlin, who chafed under the restrictions that Hitler placed on them, and their subordination to the party. This resulted in the Stennes Revolt of 1930–31, after which Hitler made himself the Supreme Commander of the SA and brought Ernst Röhm back to be their Chief of Staff and keep them in line. The quashing of the SA's revolutionary fervor convinced many businessmen and military leaders that the Nazis had put aside their insurrectionist past, and that Hitler could be a reliable partner.
After the Nazis' "Seizure of Power" in 1933, Röhm and the Brown Shirts were not content for the party to simply carry the reins of power. Instead, they pressed for a continuation of the "National Socialist revolution" to bring about sweeping social changes, which Hitler, primarily for tactical reasons, was not willing to do at that time. He was instead focused on rebuilding the military and reorienting the economy to provide the rearmament necessary for invasion of the countries to the east of Germany, especially Poland and Russia, to get the Lebensraum ("living space") he believed was necessary to the survival of the Aryan race. For this, he needed the co-operation of not only the military, but also the vital organs of capitalism, the banks and big businesses, which he would be unlikely to get if Germany's social and economic structure was being radically overhauled. Röhm's public proclamation that the SA would not allow the "German Revolution" to be halted or undermined caused Hitler to announce that "The revolution is not a permanent condition." The unwillingness of Röhm and the SA to cease their agitation for a "Second Revolution", and the unwarranted fear of a "Röhm putsch" to accomplish it, were factors behind Hitler's purging of the SA leadership in the Night of the Long Knives in the summer of 1934.
Kaiser Wilhelm II, the last German Emperor, was appalled at the Kristallnacht of 9–10 November 1938, stating "For the first time, I am ashamed to be a German":
There's a man alone, without family, without children, without God ... He builds legions, but he doesn't build a nation. A nation is created by families, a religion, traditions: it is made up out of the hearts of mothers, the wisdom of fathers, the joy and the exuberance of children ... For a few months I was inclined to believe in National Socialism. I thought of it as a necessary fever. And I was gratified to see that there were, associated with it for a time, some of the wisest and most outstanding Germans. But these, one by one, he has got rid of or even killed ... He has left nothing but a bunch of shirted gangsters! This man could bring home victories to our people each year, without bringing them either glory or danger. But of our Germany, which was a nation of poets and musicians, of artists and soldiers, he has made a nation of hysterics and hermits, engulfed in a mob and led by a thousand liars or fanatics.
— Wilhelm on Hitler, December 1938
Otto von Hapsburg, the last Crown Prince of Austria-Hungary, denounced Nazism, stating:
I absolutely reject Fascism for Austria ... This un-Austrian movement promises everything to everyone, but really intends the most ruthless subjugation of the Austrian people ... The people of Austria will never tolerate that our beautiful fatherland should become an exploited colony, and that the Austrian should become a man of second category.
Following the German annexation of Austria, Otto was sentenced to death by the Nazi regime; Rudolf Hess ordered that Otto was to be executed immediately if caught. As ordered by Adolf Hitler, his personal property and that of the House of Habsburg were confiscated. It was not returned after the war. The so-called "Habsburg Law", which had previously been repealed, was reintroduced by the Nazis.
Post-war Nazism
Main article: Neo-NazismFollowing Nazi Germany's defeat in World War II and the end of the Holocaust, overt expressions of support for Nazi ideas were prohibited in Germany and other European countries. Nonetheless, movements which self-identify as National Socialist or which are described as adhering to Nazism continue to exist on the fringes of politics in many Western societies. Usually espousing a white supremacist ideology, many deliberately adopt the symbols of Nazi Germany.
See also
- Art in Nazi Germany
- Consequences of Nazism
- Economy of Nazi Germany
- Glossary of Nazi Germany
- List of books about Nazi Germany
- List of nicknames and pseudonyms of Nazis
- List of Nazi ideologues
- List of Nazi Party leaders and officials
- Nazi architecture
- Nazi occultism
- Nazi racial theories
- Nazi salute
- Nazism and cinema
- Nazism and the Wehrmacht
- Political views of Adolf Hitler
- Racial policy of Nazi Germany
- Religion in Nazi Germany
- Religious aspects of Nazism
- Strasserism
- Women in Nazi Germany
References
Notes
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Nazism attempted to reconcile conservative, nationalist ideology with a socially radical doctrine.
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- ^ Bendersky 1985, p. 50.
- ^ Tooze 2006, p. 101. Cite error: The named reference "FOOTNOTETooze2006101" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
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When Hans Shemm in 1935 declared National Socialism to be "politically applied biology," things began to look up, not only for holism, but for the life sciences in general. After all, if the good National Socialist citizen was now seen as the man or woman who understood and revered what were called "Life's laws," then it seemed clear that the life scientists had a major role to play in defining a National Socialist educational program that would transmit the essence of these laws to every family in every village in the country. So much seemed familiar: the calls among the National Socialists to return to authentic "German" values and "ways of knowing," to "overcome" the materialism and mechanism of the "West" and the "Jewish-international lie" of scientific objectivity; the use of traditional volkisch tropes that spoke of the German people (Volk) as a mystical, pseudobiological whole and the state as an "organism" in which the individual was subsumed in the whole ("You are nothing, your Volk is everything"); the condemnation of Jews as an alien force representing chaos, mechanism, and inauthenticity. Hitler himself had even used the stock imagery of conservative holism in Mein Kampf when he spoke of the democratic state as "a dead mechanism which only lays claim to existence for its own sake" and contrasted this with his vision of statehood for Germany in which "there must be formed a living organism with the exclusive aim of serving a higher idea."
- ^ Deichmann, Ute (2020). "Science and political ideology: The example of Nazi Germany". Mètode Science Studies Journal. 10 (Science and Nazism. The unconfessed collaboration of scientists with National Socialism). Universitat de València: 129–137. doi:10.7203/metode.10.13657. hdl:10550/89369. ISSN 2174-9221. S2CID 203335127. Archived from the original on 1 March 2022. Retrieved 2 March 2022.
Although in their basic framework Nazi anti-Semitic and racist ideology and policies were not grounded in science, scientists not only supported them in various ways, but also took advantage of them, for example by using the new possibilities of unethical experimentation in humans that these ideologies provided. Scientists' complicity with Nazi ideology and politics does, however, not mean that all sciences in Nazi Germany were ideologically tainted. I argue, rather, that despite the fact that some areas of science continued at high levels, science in Nazi Germany was most negatively affected not by the imposition of Nazi ideology on the conduct of science but by the enactment of legal measures that ensured the expulsion of Jewish scientists. The anti-Semitism of young faculty and students was particularly virulent. Moreover, I show that scientists supported Nazi ideologies and policies not only through so-called reductionist science such as eugenics and race-hygiene, but also by promoting organicist and holistic ideologies of the racial state. The ideology of leading Nazi party ideologues was strongly influenced by the Volkish movement which, in the wake of the writings of philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte and other nineteenth century authors, promoted the idea of Volk (people) as an organic unity. They did not base their virulent anti-Semitism and racism on anthropological concepts.
- Anker, Peder (2021). "The Politics of Holism, Ecology, and Human Rights". Imperial Ecology: Environmental Order in the British Empire, 1895–1945. Cambridge, Massachusetts and London: Harvard University Press. p. 157. doi:10.4159/9780674020221-008. ISBN 978-0-674-02022-1. S2CID 142173094.
The paradoxical character of the politics of holism is the theme of this chapter, which focuses on the mutually shaping relationship between John William Bews, John Phillips, and the South African politician Jan Christian Smuts. Smuts was a promoter of international peace and understanding through the League of Nations, but also a defender of racial suppression and white supremacy in his own country. His politics, I will argue, were fully consistent with his holistic philosophy of science. Smuts was guided by the efforts of ecologists such as Bews and Phillips, who provided him with a day-to-day update of the latest advances in scientific knowledge of natural laws governing Homo sapiens. A substantial part of this chapter will thus return to their research on human ecology to explore the mutual field of inspiration linking them and Smuts. Two aspects of this human ecological research were particularly important: the human gradualism or ecological "succession" of human personalities researched by Bews, and the concept of an ecological biotic community explored by Phillips. Smuts transformed this research into a policy of racial gradualism that respected local ways of life in different (biotic) communities, a policy he tried to morally sanctify and promote as author of the famous 1945 Preamble of the United Nation Charter about human rights.
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Common Roots: Holism Before and During the Interwar Years: This chapter cannot explore in detail the complex entanglements between these different notions of holism, or how they reflect Germany's troubled path towards modernity. My starting point, instead, is the interwar years. By then, holism had become an important resource for people across Europe, the US and beyond—but once again specifically in Germany—for dealing with what Max Weber, in 1918, had famously analysed as a widely felt disenchantment with the modern world. The very word 'holism' (as opposed to ideas or practices designated as such today), as well as related words like 'emergence' or 'organicism', date from this time. It was coined in 1926 by Jan Smuts to describe a perceived tendency of evolutionary processes towards the formation of wholes, granting these wholes a special onto-epistemic significance that parts lack. This was cultural holism now underpinned by evolutionary science and deployed by Smuts not only as a tool for grasping the coming into being of the world but also as an ideological justification for the development of Apartheid in South Africa. In Weimar Germany and then under Nazism, holistic science became a mainstream academic endeavour, once more intermingling cultural politics and serious scientific research. Holistic perspectives also became popular in the interwar years among academics and the wider public throughout the UK and US. In France, it was associated with vitalist philosophies and the emergence of neo-Hippocratic thinking in medicine, manifesting the unease many people felt about the shifts that biomedicine was undergoing at the time.
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- The Nazi concept of Lebensraum has connections with this idea, with German farmers being rooted to their soil, needing more of it for the expansion of the German Volk—whereas the Jew is precisely the opposite, nomadic and urban by nature. See: Roderick Stackelberg, The Routledge Companion to Nazi Germany (New York: Routledge, 2007), p. 259.
- Additional evidence of Riehl's legacy can be seen in the Riehl Prize, Die Volkskunde als Wissenschaft (Folklore as Science) which was awarded in 1935 by the Nazis. See: George L. Mosse, The Crisis of German Ideology: Intellectual Origins of the Third Reich (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1964), p. 23. Applicants for the Riehl prize had stipulations that included only being of Aryan blood, and no evidence of membership in any Marxist parties or any organisation that stood against National Socialism. See: Hermann Stroback, "Folklore and Fascism before and around 1933," in The Nazification of an Academic Discipline: Folklore in the Third Reich, edited by James R Dow and Hannjost Lixfeld (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994), pp. 62–63.
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Sparta must be regarded as the first Völkisch State. The exposure of the sick, weak, deformed children, in short, their destruction, was more decent and in truth a thousand times more humane than the wretched insanity of our day which preserves the most pathological subject.
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External links
- [REDACTED] The dictionary definition of Nazi at Wiktionary
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- Nazism at the Encyclopædia Britannica
- Works by or about Nazism at the Internet Archive
- Hitler's National Socialist Party platform
- Exhibit on Hitler and the Germans – slideshow by The New York Times
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