Dictatorship_and_Democracy_19181939

Dictatorship and Dem ocracy,1918–1939

above party lines that was resilient, capable of making decisions and protecting German honor. The interwar period was a testing ground for new forms of political rule, all of which made explicit reference to the people.

19.2 Formation of new concepts of control deriving from war experiences

The term ‘people’ was to become a standard formula for the self-understanding of German politics after 1918. In its shades of meaning, it saw the people as a social organism, rather than as an ethnic community. ‘People’ referred to the many. It described the social commitment with which a good community was supposed to be built.3 The Weimar Republic regarded itself as a ‘social people's state’ and almost all party names contained terms such as ‘democratic,’ ‘social,’ or ‘people.’ The notion of the Volksgemeinschaft (people's community), which became widely used during the Weimar period, had an impact far beyond the right-wing parties. This was because the concept of community was added to the notion of Volk. ‘Community’ was, as political scientist Kurt Sontheimer put it, ‘one of the magic words of the Weimar period.’4 All parties from both the right and the left appealed to the community of the German people, to their unity, and to social harmony. The reasons for this were, on the one hand, the memory of the mythically inflated war community (Kriegsgemeinschaft) and, on the other, the inner conflict suffered by Germany, which became apparent in the diverse party landscape of the Weimar Republic, in never-ending political quarrels, and in growing violence. The concept of the Volksgemeinschaft was one of the most powerful terms in this discourse. For a long time, it by no means had solely ethnic or racist connotations. Not only conservative and völkisch, but also socialist and Christian authors employed it. For the Young Socialists (Jungsozialisten), who were influenced by the bündisch Youth Movement, it signified the intertwining of national and social unity. Catholics used the term in connection with the overcoming of confessional divisions, and Gustav Stresemann, who became Chancellor in 1923 and served as foreign secretary from 1923 to 1929, saw national community (p. 425) primarily as a means of calming the atmosphere of class struggle in industrial relations and of achieving cross-party co-operation in foreign policy.5 Social reformers, on the other hand, saw the Volksgemeinschaft as a differentiated system of social and political intervention.6 It was not until 1930 that the term increasingly focused on the ethnic and ultimately the racial community.7

This was one side of the political mentalities that emerged during the war. The other was the new role ascribed to violence as a political means. For Erich Ludendorff, leading figure of the third Army Supreme Command since 1916 and participant in the Beer Hall Putsch in 1923, war was the father of all things. Even the more astute political theorists, such as Carl Schmitt, conceived of politics from the perspective of war. Many political issues were portrayed as ‘vital matters,’ political opponents were labeled as the ‘enemy,’ and there was a sharp separation between ‘us’ and ‘them.’ These labels were born out of war and initially referred to external enemies yet increasingly bled into the sphere of domestic politics. Coming from the political fringes, both on the Left and the Right, they confronted moderate politicians with a conception of politics whose consequences they were unable to cope with. For a long time, the widespread disposition for violence in the interwar period was presumed to have been an immediate result of the brutalization of the soldiers in the war. However, it is now generally accepted that most German soldiers were sick and tired of war, and tended to belong to the vast majority in Weimar who preferred peaceful politics.8 The approximately 400,000 soldiers (out of a total of about 13 million) who were determined to continue the struggle were an exception. As members of the Freikorps (free corps), they continued fighting in the Baltic States and in Upper Silesia. Among them were a striking number of officers who felt humiliated and whose military careers had collapsed—a plight they blamed on the defeat and, to an even greater extent, the peace terms of the Treaty of Versailles. Predominantly, however, it was young people who were willing to participate in the violence. They had not fought in the war, but were told stories of self-sacrifice and heroism time and time again. The myths about the ‘war community’ in the trenches took on a life of their own after the war, and glorified the bravery, determination, and sacrifices of the soldiers. These terms also infected the political discourse of democracy. Even among the democrats themselves, the political sphere in Weimar was, on the one hand, characterized by a desire for community and the perception that political conflicts represented unwelcome discord and disunity. On the other hand, ideas of warlike behavior contaminated even the political arena and led politicians to view the rules of the democratic system as technical issues, rather than matters of principle. This created a dual paradox with regard to parliamentary democracy, a system defined as a society of conflict, but which is supposed to address these conflicts according to regulations and in a peaceful manner. Weimar Democracy was unable to endure conflict and, wherever conflicts were inevitable, they tended to culminate in violence. Germany was, however, not the only war-torn country shaped by violence.9

On 29 October 1918, sailors in Wilhelmshaven revolted against the suicidal intentions of their naval officers who, despite being vastly outnumbered, were planning to set sail for another sea battle in order to restore the navy's honor. The conflagration (p. 426) quickly turned into a revolution. Initially, the rebellion was directed against the war, but it very

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soon evolved into a political revolution spearheaded by the Majority Social Democrats. Workers' and Soldiers' Councils were formed, depriving local rulers and military authorities of their power. A few days later, on 9 November, the Emperor abdicated. In this short period, all options were open. The parties of the reform coalition—the Center Party, the left-wing Liberals and the Social Democrats—demanded immediate elections of a constituent National Assembly and attempted to gain control of the government. The radical left-wing Spartacus League was also active, fighting for a revolution modeled on the Bolshevik example. Philipp Scheidemann, the Social Democratic member of the Reichstag, only just managed to forestall the Communists when he proclaimed the republic from the window of the Reichstag building at midday on 9 November. Nonetheless, Communists and parts of the Workers' Councils tried to force a revolution following the Russian example, whereupon the Social Democratic leaders summoned the aid of the radical right-wing Freikorps who brutally suppressed left-wing workers and their attempts at an uprising. The Social Democrats, and in particular their Secretary of Defense (Reichswehrminister) Gustav Noske, were blamed for the murder of Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, both leaders of the Spartacus League. Noske felt compelled to suppress the rebellion because the Social Democrats strove for parliamentary democracy and opposed the Bolshevik dictatorship, as did the bourgeois parties and the vast majority of the Workers' and Soldiers' Councils.10 Nevertheless, in the final days of the Republic, the Right constantly accused them of being a community of interest with the Communists.

In the elections for the constituent National Assembly in January 1919, the republican parties obtained an overwhelming majority. Almost three-quarters of the electorate voted for the ‘Weimar coalition’ comprised of the Catholic Center Party (Zentrum, Z), the left-wing liberal German Democratic Party (Deutsche Demokratische Partei, DDP) and the Social Democratic Party (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands, SPD). It was the first democratically elected government in the Reich with Social Democratic participation. The consultations over the constitution were relocated to the small town of Weimar in Thuringia, not primarily because it had been the home of Goethe and Schiller, but because here the continuing threat of civil war was less menacing than in Berlin. The meetings took place in the town's theatre, and were characterized by provisional arrangements and poor working conditions. Beyond this, they were further influenced by the ongoing peace negotiations with the Allies. Right from the outset, the burdensome conditions imposed by the Allies put considerable pressure on the constitutional proceedings, forcing concessions in foreign affairs. This pressure was intensified by the threat of invasion if the Germans were to oppose the conditions set by the Allies. Philipp Scheidemann, the Social Democratic Prime Minister (Reichsminister-präsident), refused to sign the Treaty of Versailles and resigned in June 1919. Gustav Bauer became his successor. Only a narrow majority in favor of the peace treaty was achieved in the National Assembly, and even those who voted for the treaty criticized it sharply for its war-guilt clause. From the Social Democrats to the politicians of the far Right, all were opposed to Article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles. In this sense, the first (p. 427) German democracy was characterized from the very beginning by the desire to revise precisely those conditions which had enabled its existence in the first place.

19.3 Dictatorship and democracy in the constitution of the Weimar Republic

Debates on the war, war guilt, and in particular on the question of whether the war could have been ended sooner and with fewer casualties, emerged time and again during the proceedings of the National Assembly. At times they were marked by moments of drama, for instance when Matthias Erzberger, a member of the Center Party, presented official documents proving that the government of the Reich and the Conservatives had spurned numerous opportunities to begin peace negotiations. Apart from these rare situations, the members of the National Assembly were surprisingly cooperative and worked out what could be considered an exemplary constitution by republican and democratic standards.11 It introduced sovereignty of the people and an extremely fair system of proportional representation for the Reichstag elections, and for the first time, women were also entitled to vote. Parties suggested their representatives as candidates and the government was based on the confidence of the majority of the Reichstag.

On the other hand, this constitution contained elements that secured it against what contemporaries called a ‘parliamentary absolutism.’12 One of these elements was the position of the president, who was elected in direct elections just as the members of parliament. The president had extensive constitutional rights even in everyday politics: he assigned the task of forming a government and had the power to dissolve the Reichstag. Due to his long, seven-year term in office, he enjoyed a far greater degree of independence than the chancellor. However, he gained even more power through his right to take ‘emergency measures.’ Article 48 allowed him to govern using the so-called ‘emergency decrees’ (Notverordnungen); that is, to suspend the legislative power of parliament as long as the Reichstag did not actively object. The Social Democratic president Friedrich Ebert frequently used emergency decrees to govern during the early period of the Weimar Republic, which was marked by civil war. However, this method was also used later in

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Weimar's history. Paul von Hindenburg, an old monarchist who was elected president in 1925, also resorted to rule by decree under Article 48 during the final phase of the Weimar Republic. Particularly during the global economic crisis, Article 48 was used not only in the case of national emergency, for which it was originally designed, but also in the context of ordinary economic policy. With the right to implement an emergency decree, the president was predestined to become not only an ersatz-monarch, but also a dictator in times of need, a dictator who was not seriously restricted by legislative or judiciary bodies. He was legitimized directly by the people and, in this respect, was as much an expression of the (p. 428) sovereignty of the people as the Reichstag. This emergency dictator represented the ‘state’ above the ‘parties,’ as well as the organic leader of the people who were supposed to mesh into a unified body under his leadership. Even at the time, many considered this dual embodiment of the sovereignty of the people problematic. What if parliament and the president contradicted each other? Can the sovereign contradict himself? Article 48 granted decisive power to a dictatorship legitimized by plebiscite. In practical terms, the dictatorial presidency—initially a form of emergency rule—gradually evolved into a normal method of exercising power after 1925. This development was justified by the fact that the majority of citizens and political philosophers regarded the president as a leader by plebiscite, and one who was supposed to counterbalance parliament with his charisma. Because parties were suspected of pursuing particular interests instead of the public good, it was the president, rather than the parties, who was thought to embody the unity of the people.

Indeed, the unity of the people was a recurring subject of debate in the Weimar Republic, since its government, elected by majority, was combated by extremists from the political fringes from the beginning.13 As early as January 1920, parts of the Reichswehr under the leadership of General Lüttwitz marched on Berlin and proclaimed Wolfgang Kapp, an EastPrussian agricultural official, as chancellor. There was considerable anxiety in the Reichswehr because the Treaty of Versailles reduced the army to 100,000 men, which meant a tremendous decline in social status for many of the officers who were summarily dismissed. The government escaped the putschists, who were supported by elements of the rightwing parties, and fled first to Dresden, then to Stuttgart. The putsch was, however, stopped in its tracks by a general strike, in which many workers participated, and by the refusal of large parts of the state administration to cooperate with the putschists. A few months later, however, general elections showed that many Germans did not fully support the government, as voting for anti-republican parties suggests. The right-wing DVP and DNVP (Deutschnationale Volkspartei; German National People's Party) emerged as clear winners, doubling their votes. Left-wing fringe parties such as the USPD (Unabhängige Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands; Independent Social Democrat Party of Germany) and the KPD (Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands; Communist Party of Germany), which ran for the first time, even tripled their share of the vote. The Weimar coalition was already outnumbered only a short time after the constitution had come into effect. Parties that opposed parliamentary democracy, meanwhile, gained the majority. At no point during the entire history of the Weimar Republic were the parties that had voted in favor of the Weimar constitution able to obtain an absolute majority.

Right-wing violence continued to be a daily occurrence. The Freikorps were the bedrock of a movement that intended to punish the ‘November criminals’—that is, those who allegedly bore the blame for the defeat in World War I and those who supported the Treaty of Versailles. On 26 August 1921, Matthias Erzberger, a Center Party politician, was shot dead. He had been the architect of a comprehensive system of federal taxation and one of the four signatories of the Treaty of Versailles. A few months later, on 24 June 1922, the German foreign secretary, Walther Rathenau, who (p. 429) had advocated the fulfillment of reparations payments, was murdered.14 In both cases, the assassinations were carried out by Operation Consul, a secret terrorist group comprised of former Freikorps soldiers. ‘The enemy stands on the right,’ proclaimed Chancellor Joseph Wirth (Center Party) in front of the Reichstag. This was a fitting description of the circumstances in terms of the scale of the danger posed by the right; however, it was not quite accurate when looking at the entire political spectrum. The extreme left was in turmoil because the Bolshevik Communist Party in Germany had carefully observed the example of the October Revolution in Russia (1917) and intermittently conducted a putschist policy, albeit with limited success. There were attempted uprisings in Thuringia and Saxony in 1921 and, in March 1923, the militant KPD in Hamburg launched a militarily hopeless rebellion. Objectively speaking, the danger emanating from the left was less than the danger from the right. However, the general strike against the Kapp-Lüttwitz Putsch had demonstrated that it was possible to mobilize the workers. This, in turn, lent credence to the idea that a genuinely successful upheaval had to be based on the people and would come from the Left. In its opposition against political violence, the bourgeoisie primarily focused on left-wing violence. Violence from the Right, on the other hand, enjoyed the sympathy or even the participation of the military; it could always successfully claim to be establishing order, and this also meant it could claim to be acting against the alleged anarchy of the lower classes.

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Within these conflicts, and to an even greater extent during the economic crisis of hyperinflation, when parliamentary structures of decision-making were largely paralyzed, the president often acted as a quasi-dictator. Friedrich Ebert governed by emergency decree between 1920 and 1924, as did his successor Paul von Hindenburg in the crisis from 1930 onwards.15 This followed from the logic of the Weimar constitution and did not mean that Weimar democracy was bankrupt. Political philosophers such as Max Weber and Carl Schmitt also conceived of the political system from the perspective of the state of emergency. In everyday political life, the parliamentary form of government was supposed to be the appropriate instrument of control. In times of crisis, however, dictatorial and quasi-dictatorial means were considered to have greater and more resounding impact. This, in turn, fuelled the exuberant expectations hoisted onto a dictatorial leader at a later stage, namely during the global economic crisis.

19.4 Political expectations and everyday life in Weimar Democracy

Weimar democracy had started with high expectations.16 Germans understood that the Western democracies had won the war and the Central and Eastern European monarchies—such as Russia, Austria-Hungary, and Germany—were, in fact, the defeated states. President Ebert had concluded his opening statement in the Weimar National (p. 430) Assembly by citing Fichte: ‘We seek to build an empire of justice and truth, based on the equality of all beings with a human face.’17 These high expectations were themselves a legacy of the war. Germans perceived the war as an enormous sacrifice, and this was particularly the case for workers and for the bourgeoisie, whose financial position suffered the most from the inflation that followed. All subsequent governments faced the general expectation that these sacrifices be justified; in mundane terms, everyone expected some form of gratification, and greater social and political equality. This placed increasing demands on the state that had a wider jurisdiction during the war than ever before and that now, as a republic, claimed to be a ‘social people's state,’ capable of guaranteeing justice and happiness. The political language reflected this by creating a mood of promise, encouraging citizens to expect the political sphere to deliver everything. The negative expectations, too, were highly exaggerated. There was talk of downfall, of huge dangers and, of a struggle for existence: The high expectations led to an all-or-nothing rhetoric, which systematically overburdened the state. Disappointment was inevitable. Arduous political reality stood in a dialectical relationship with exceedingly high expectations of politics, politicians, and members of parliament, which were bound to be disappointed. An overwhelming desire and intensive search for a genuine leader can be observed throughout the entire Weimar period. On the one hand, this leader was supposed to be a man of the people. On the other, he was expected to be different and special, at a distance from the political classes and thus uncorrupted.18 This search for the leader was promoted primarily by rightwing groups. Initially, they did not search among their own ranks, but rather among the left wing, as they assumed that the left had closer ties to the people, that is, to the workers. Carl Severing and Gustav Noske, both Social Democrats, also attracted the attention of the Right. In this respect, Hitler managed to channel expectations that initially had not been specifically anti-republican. These expectations arose from the much regretted fact that all politics in the republic's everyday life was necessarily routine, procedural, in a certain sense automatic, and heavily influenced by special interests.

The Weimar Republic represented, for the first time in German history, a political system based on political parties.19 Suffrage, which was now extended to citizens of both sexes twenty-one years of age and older, rested on proportional representation. Instead of individual candidates, the electorate voted for lists compiled by the parties for each constituency. As these constituencies were extremely large (there were only thirty-six constituencies in Weimar Germany), the candidates' personal profile was not a criterion for the election. Rather, the parties were responsible for selecting the candidates in an anonymous process. Furthermore, proportional representation ensured that votes would not be wasted as is the case in a winner-take-all system. There was no electoral threshold—that is, no clause stipulating a minimum percentage required for a party to enter parliament—which would prevent the smallest parties from entering the Reichstag. The main intention here was not to ensure parliament's decision-making ability, but to mirror the structure of society as accurately as possible. A fair result for political groups, rather than trust in specific individual politicians, was the basis of this voting system. This reflected the belief that had grown during the war, (p. 431) namely that social collectives—a conglomerate of major groups, gathering in different parties—constituted a people, with social and economic motives overriding political motives when it came to choosing a political party. Therefore, interest groups and occupational groups played a significant role in the composition of candidates. A major issue for all parties was the number of workers' and employers' representatives they nominated as candidates, which in turn depended on the level of activity of special interest groups. Conversely, there was a perception, quite common even among right-wing parties, that a people's party should have some industrial workers among its ranks. Behind these discussions was also a question as to which kind of representation was preferable. Should representatives of the people be outstanding individuals, exceeding

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the average, or should they be more like the people themselves, sharing in their experiences and personal situation? Increasingly, the latter took precedence, and this implied distrust toward professional politicians. As party politicians became increasingly professionalized during the Weimar period, they were forced to counter suspicions that they had no genuine interest in the common good.

Characterized by routines and procedures, democratic life often led to compromises and only rarely presented large political spectacles. People observing politics were easily under the impression that Germany's vital matters were drowning in a sea of technical political procedures, influenced by profiteering and selfishness without any sense of responsibility or of the common good. According to this common view, alienation between the people and the political class was inherent to democracy. Therefore, the public paid great attention to corruption and constantly made scandals of politicians' behavior, accusing them of exploiting the political system for their own benefit. Although the Weimar Republic was not particularly corrupt by international standards—in fact, the opposite was the case—politicians always faced the question of how they themselves benefited from the system.

Apart from its initial chaotic phase, Weimar's political system, nevertheless, functioned and was capable of integration. Even the anti-democratic parties of the far right and the far left participated in elections and in the practical process of decision-making in parliament. After 1923, the parties, including the Communists and the Nazis abstained from violence— at least until the early 1930s. The DNVP in particular, with its broad political spectrum ranging from manifest right-wing extremists to conservative democrats, excelled at anti-republican rhetoric, yet remained open to compromise in many areas.

Although the details of innumerable political issues of the Weimar Republic were highly controversial, most of the parties nevertheless agreed on some basic principles. The Peace of Versailles was perceived as a humiliation and reparations and the losses of territory were to be revised sooner or later. Furthermore, it was agreed that Weimar democracy had to focus on the man in the street, people like workers, pensioners, and small farmers, and that Weimar should therefore be turned into a welfare state. This consensus became most obvious in the fact that the establishment of unemployment insurance—Weimar's most important achievement in terms of social policy—was not introduced by the Social Democrats, as one might expect, but under the aegis of the (p. 432) DNVP. Indeed, references to the ‘people's community’ and the responsibility of the state had the potential to create consensus on a practical level.

The understanding that representatives had of their own role was equally undisputed. They saw the everyday tasks of government as a job for ministerial bureaucracies, rather than parliament. The latter was considered to be responsible for the establishment of guidelines and the formulation of political principles. Ministerial officials took it as a matter of course that they could pre-formulate bills which the members of Parliament then merely had to approve. Civil servants preferred to formulate their regulations as decrees, which did not require parliamentary approval and, in so doing, were able to disregard parliament entirely. Compared with bills, the number of decrees experienced a boom, particularly during times of crisis, as was the case during 1923 and also after 1930. This was a relic of a constitutionalist understanding of government that sought to limit the role of parliament to a mere controlling function that was rather vague. It was, on the other hand, the government (and the bureaucracy alongside it), which was supposed to be in charge of actual political practice. Nonetheless, the Reichstag became much more active after 1924. It not only prevailed over the bureaucracy by outnumbering its decrees, but also over the government by introducing considerably more bills than the latter. This development during the quieter years of the Weimar Republic demonstrated the emancipation of the members of parliament, and the beginnings of a new political mindset that was less passive and reactive than that seen in the era of the monarchy.

The basic consensus, procedural rather than programmatic, regarding the roles of institutions was actually quite surprising given recent German history, marked, as it was, by war, defeat, revolution, and postwar trauma. This consensus clashed, however, with a completely different mood in the mass media and among the parties' grass roots, where the prevalent experience was social fragmentation.20 The mass media, and especially the print media, addressed party followers, rather than the broader public. The system of voluntary associations (Vereine), which had been a pillar of civil society from the 19th century onwards, was divided along ideological lines. Even the sporting arena offered, for instance, separate Catholic and workers' sport clubs, and workers' clubs, in turn, competed at exclusively workers' Olympic games. Economic and ideological lobbying groups from the Reichslandbund (Reich Agrarian League; Germany's largest agrarian association), to the Homeowner Association, to the major industrial lobbies, emphasized the divergent interests of the people. They gained substantial influence because the insufficiently funded parties depended on their financial contributions. This meant that the lobbying groups were not only able to influence individual policies, but

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also the list of candidates. In this sense, the Weimar Republic can be described not only as a party state, but also as a lobby state.21 Contemporaries perceived this form of pluralism as group-led egotism and as damaging to the unity of the people. Moreover, those who were not engaged in these lobbies, such as the Communists or the Nazis, were able to advertise the fact that they were not participating in the fragmentation of the people.

(p. 433) The perception of pluralism, then, was controversial. On the one hand, the people were seen as a conglomerate of major collectives, each attempting to gain influence. On the other hand, the German people suffered from a clash of interests that allegedly disunited it. Initially, only nationalism seemed to effectively transcend these divisions. In referring to terms such as Volksgemeinschaft, German honor, or Schützengrabengemeinschaft (trench community), nationalism promised that the German people would find themselves and that a true German identity would be restored. It offered utopian ideas in terms of social justice and contained elements of a ‘third way,’ which was to avoid the Western European form of class society, as well as the aberration of Bolshevism. Religious ideas of national rebirth, some with anti-Semitic content, also played a role that is not to be underestimated. These ideas tended to interpret the German defeat as a punishment, and by corollary saw Germany's reascent as a sign of providence. In the end, the Weimar Republic included many different types of nationalism, and nationalism was to be found in almost all political camps, even Social Democracy, as became evident in conflicts with the Socialist parties of other nations.

19.5 Democracy in crisis and the ascent of dictatorship

In this respect, the ascent of the Nazi movement, beginning in the second half of the 1920s and accelerating at a breathtaking pace after 1930, echoed mentalities and collective desires in Germany that transcended political camps.22 In the specific German process of coming to terms with the past, German historians have tended to perceive National Socialism as something that came from the outside, with Hitler, Goebbels, and Himmler appearing as political desperados who were otherwise socially marginalized. Yet these men were far from typical for the Nazi movement, and the movement itself was, likewise, not an indication of the ‘panic among the bourgeoisie,’ as the sociologist Theodor Geiger described it with reference to the global economic crisis. Rather, two aspects are to be stressed. For one thing, the ascent of the Nazis began before the global economic crisis and before the crisis of democracy had begun, although it benefited from both. Secondly, the National Socialist movement was neither a movement of outsiders nor of specific strata or classes. It was, instead, a people's party of protest, which could attract members of all social groups, including the workers.23 Contemporaries appreciated the fact that the movement was politically radical, as they perceived this as an indication of its determination to replace the failing political classes and to reunite the people.

In 1920, a veteran of the First World War, Adolf Hitler, had joined a sectarian, radical nationalist group called the ‘Deutsche Arbeiterpartei’ (German Workers' Party). After only a short time he held the party under his sway and renamed it the ‘Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei’ (National Socialist German Workers' (p. 434) Party).24 In the atmosphere of crisis during the early 1920s, the party propagated a right-wing extremist putschism. Influenced by Mussolini's successful ‘march on Rome’ in October 1922, it launched a putsch attempt in Munich in 1923. The putsch was quickly brought to an end by the Bavarian police force and its ringleader, Hitler, was sentenced to Festungshaft (a confinement that excluded forced labor, offered comfortable cells, and allowed visitors almost on a daily basis). Hitler ordered his party to adopt a new and legal course of action. The ersatz-organizations newly founded after the ban of the NSDAP, such as the ‘Deutschvölkische Freiheitspartei’ (German Völkisch Freedom Party), subsequently entered German state parliaments and even the Reichstag. Josef Goebbels, an unemployed literary scholar, who was leader of the district of Berlin (Gauleiter) from 1926 and head of party propaganda from 1930 onward, provided publicity for the party by exploiting the violent conflicts with Communist groups in ‘red Berlin.’ Under the direct control of Hitler as charismatic Führer, the centralist party organization and its wide range of sub-organizations, appealed to young men in particular; the SA (Sturmabteilung; storm troopers) was more than a mere paramilitary organization, offering a home, comradeship, and hot meals in its SA-hostels.25 However, it was not only young men who were interested in war games and brawls. The promise of overcoming the ‘humiliation of Versailles’ and of restoring the German ‘people's community’ also appealed to respected notables, especially in the countryside.26 Here, Nazism did not present itself as a manipulative propaganda movement, as is often maintained, but as a movement that attracted ‘the many,’ funded primarily by admission fees to rallies and merchandizing.27 There was little trace of Josef Goebbels' modern propaganda in the Hessen countryside or the remote Black Forest. People from the countryside were not so much attracted by Hitler, who was a distant figure, but by the promise of overcoming social and political divisions among the German people, and by the movement's offer of community building. National Socialists could benefit from the decline of the system of voluntary associations, as well as that of the liberal milieu, by penetrating the vacuums both had left behind.

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Dictatorship and Dem ocracy,1918–1939

By 1928 the party already had over 100,000 members. One year later it won 900,000 votes in the local Prussian elections. In 1930 Wilhelm Frick was the first National Socialist member of a federal state government when he became interior minister in the state of Thuringia. The party's dramatically improved performance in the Reichstag general elections in 1930 was, therefore, not unexpected, although its scale surprised all observers—the NSDAP won 18.2 percent of the vote and turned from a political splinter party into the second largest party after the Social Democrats. In the elections of July 1932, the Nazis doubled their vote to 37.3 percent, leaving the Social Democrats far behind with 21 percent. Even though it appeared in the November 1932 elections as if the party had exhausted its potential—it won 33 percent of the vote—the NSDAP was still the most successful party in German history, given the speed of its ascent. It benefited mainly from mobilizing those who had been non-voters, those who were generally dissatisfied with Weimar Germany and those who had little enthusiasm for politics. In addition, the Nazis were able to benefit from swing voters from all parties, primarily from the liberal center and from smaller interest parties, although voters also (p. 435) switched from the Social Democrats to the NSDAP on a large scale.28 As intensive research activity since the 1980s has shown, the party drew voters from all strata. Forty percent of its voters were workers, which shows that this group was slightly underrepresented (the proportion of workers in the entire population was 45 percent).29 Compared to the general strata of German society, the Nazi party was a people's party with a middle-class belly (Jürgen Falter), but in absolute terms it was, nonetheless, a workers' party, comprising more workers than any other political party. One has to assume that the ascent of the party was no mishap.

The propaganda that made this success possible was, however, quite ambiguous.30 It consisted of a form of political advertisement that told whomever it addressed what they wanted to hear. National Socialists promised to take care of the business worries of small and medium-sized companies, and assured farmers that they would also deal with their concerns over prices of agricultural products and global competition. To workers, they made promises of high employment and fair salaries, while mothers were promised cheap bread. Nazi propaganda was radically nationalist in character, but that was nothing remarkable for a right-wing party, particularly during the late 1920s.

In the last partially free elections on 5 April 1933, the Nazis were able to win only 44 percent of the vote, despite a large-scale propaganda effort, violent clashes between the SA and its political enemies, and a remarkable mobilization of non-voters—the turnout of nearly 89 percent would not be reached again until the 1970s. This meant that the National Socialists were unable to win over the majority of the German people in free elections, even though they made every effort to do so and had all kinds of advantages. However, if we include the 8 percent won by the DNVP—the coalition

partner of the Nazis which was associated with the right-wing paramilitary organization ‘Stahlhelm’—the result also shows that in spring 1933 there was a clear majority on the right that voted against parliamentary democracy. For a long time, research has used the term ‘seizure of power’ to signify the government takeover by Hitler on 30 January 1933. It was, in fact, a handing over of power, not only on the part of the old elites who brought Hitler into government, but also on the part of the electorate.31 To a large extent, Hitler's dictatorship was based on the approval of the people he governed, a fact which led the historians Karl-Dietrich Erdmann and Hagen Schulze to coin the term ‘surrender of democracy.’

19.6 Weimar democracy in international comparison

When looking at the characteristics of Weimar democracy, the strikingly high level of technical and juridical perfectionism on the part of those who created the Weimar Constitution and the instruments of democratic rule initially becomes apparent. However, these regulations, although intricately balanced, collapsed like a house of cards when the crisis began and determined opponents dismantled the republic. The (p. 436) Weimar case shows that democracy requires not only good laws, but also, and to an even greater extent, a certain willingness to apply these laws in a democratic way. This was not always the case in the Weimar Republic. The reason for this was, as I have tried to demonstrate, not a ‘betrayal’ by the elites, but the realization of a widely shared mindset that preferred the decisiveness of dictatorial control over the compromise achieved by discourse.

For far too long, the Weimar Republic has been judged by the standards of the Atlantic democracies. It has been forgotten that Anglo-American societies, in particular, already had a long history and experience of democratic systems. Even the Third Republic in France could look back on 60 years of history and had survived a world war by the time Hitler took power in Germany. But if instead we focus on the other new democracies founded in Central and Eastern Europe after the First World War, it is rather surprising that the Weimar Republic survived as long as it did. Most of the other states became dictatorships much earlier. Even in those countries that remained democratic in a general sense, quasi-

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Dictatorship and Dem ocracy,1918–1939

dictatorial instruments of control had been introduced, as was the case, for example, in Czechoslovakia. Dictatorship, and specifically the type of dictatorship that referred to the people, was the most successful and most popular form of political rule in the interwar period. Even the Third Republic was on the brink of dictatorship in 1934, and the pace at which Marshal Petain was able to establish the dictatorial Vichy Regime reveals that, even in France, democracy had a hard time. In this respect, the Weimar Republic was no exception. From an American perspective, it might have appeared surprising that the European states did not accept the gift of democracy. Yet, in many countries, resentment towards democracy was, among other reasons, due to the fact that it came from the outside. It was a widespread view, fostered by authoritarian regimes, that democracy did not match the unique character of the nation in question. In Austria in 1933, Engelbert Dollfuß established a clerical Ständestaat (state based on estates), which referred heavily to the Catholic legacy and strongly sympathized with Mussolini, who also acted as the regime's patron. Regardless of Wilson's doctrine of national self-determination, Czechoslovakia was not a nation state, but a multi-ethnic state with a Czechoslovakian majority. Here, an aggressive form of nationalism ruled the country, feeding off the fact that the Czechs had fought for their independence for such a long time. Now, they harassed the German and the Hungarian minority, returning the persecution they had once felt themselves. In Poland, the national hero Jozef Pilsudski overthrew the republic—which had been built in 1921 on the French example—in a 1926 putsch supported by many sides. He established a popular dictatorship that was driven by Polish nationalist and socialist ideas alike. Despite Hitler's disdain for Poland, the German Führer was a pronounced admirer of the left-leaning Polish dictator, whose memoirs were published in German with a preface by Hermann Göring in 1935.32 Such ideas of a distinct national path were also echoed in Germany, where the search for a third way between ‘Western’ democracy and ‘Eastern’ despotism, which would mirror the specific structure of German society, spawned not only ständestaatliche (estate-based) and (p. 437) authoritarian concepts, but also programs, such as Oswald Spengler's ‘Prussian Socialism,’ which emphasized order and justice.

The waves of democratization after the Second World War, the end of the Latin-American and European dictatorships in the 1970s and after, and the end of Eastern European communism have taught us that democracy has to be learned and that this process takes time. Even Spain, Portugal, and Greece, and particularly the former GDR and Hungary, experienced long transitional periods in which the future political direction remained unclear. However, a number of conditions can be identified that applied to these states, but not to the Weimar Republic or, indeed, to other failed democratic states in the interwar period. First, Spain, Portugal, and Hungary met with a favorable international environment willing to admit the new democracies as quickly as possible into institutions of international co-operation. European integration in particular provided an obvious boost to the new democracies. Germany, on the other hand, met with an international environment in 1918 that was dominated by French fears that it's major neighbor would grow too quickly, and by attempts to keep this opponent as small as possible. A second significant aspect is closely related to the first. International integration after the Second World War was interlinked with the promise of prosperity.33 Democracy as a political system clearly gains a lot of support if it promises wealth and prosperity, as was possible in the case of the German ‘economic miracle’ after the Second World War. This was not the case during the crises of the interwar period. Thirdly, and finally, democratic culture implies alternating governments. In Spain, Greece, and Hungary, it seems to have been helpful that parties which had previously sympathized with or had even been hand in glove with the earlier dictators eventually entered government after a few years. This paved the way for integrating opponents of the democratic system into the republic. This model could also be observed in the case of the early Third Republic. In the Weimar republic, on the other hand, it was perceived as almost contrary to the system that the DNVP twice became part of the government. Over the years, the political classes of the Weimar right became increasingly prepared to cooperate with this development.34 Yet the radical supporters of the right-wing parties, alongside an equally radical party press, refused to take part in the process of republicanization and despised their elites for compromising. This takes us back to a crucial point: the sphere of politics was an area ruled by enmity, and this inner enmity—paradoxically combined with an almost pathological desire for community—was shared by all political camps in the republic. In this respect, collective political attitudes hindered the process of inner republicanization.

19.7 Consensus and terror. the nature of Nazi rule 1933–1939

On 30 January 1933, Adolf Hitler was appointed chancellor of a coalition government that was composed of members of previous presidential cabinets that had failed. This (p. 438) government was precisely the type of alliance between fascist mass movements and the conservative bourgeois camp that was already well-proven in Italy.35 By July 1933 all other parties had been abolished and the NSDAP had become a monopoly party. Unions were banned and German Federalism was destroyed in favor of a centralist structure. Basic rights were abolished and 27,000 political prisoners

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Dictatorship and Dem ocracy,1918–1939

were detained in concentration camps. More than a half century later, it is still remarkable how quickly Hitler and the Nazis established a totalitarian rule strikingly different in terms of its extent from all other dictatorial regimes in Europe.36 It took Stalin roughly six years before his position was similarly beyond dispute. Mussolini needed even more time and never fully achieved the degree of unrestricted power that Hitler had been able to gain within half a year. The old elites around Franz von Papen had hoped to ‘encircle’ Hitler in a coalition government, but these hopes soon evaporated. Although initially only two other ministers were National Socialists—Wilhelm Frick as minister of the interior, and Herman Göring as minister without portfolio and also as provisional Prussian minister of the interior—it took Hitler only a short time to dismantle the republic's protective mechanisms. The most important bastion, Prussia, with its effective police force led by Social Democrat Carl Severing, had already fallen victim to a coup in July 1932 and was ruled by a quasidictatorial Reich commissar. In taking over the Reich and the Prussian home office, Hitler had secured access to powerful authorities such as the police force and criminal prosecutors, who would now serve as instruments of terror against political opponents. Yet the administration, the unions, the parliament, diets, parties, and finally the Reichswehr also surrendered across the board shortly thereafter. There is no doubt that fortune and coincidence played an important role in the speed with which Hitler gained power. However, Hitler's tactical skills and his ability to react quickly are not to be underestimated. Already during the course of forming the cabinet, Hitler enforced the dissolution of parliament and the calling of new elections. In their campaign, the Nazis used all the means of power at their disposal, ranging from the visibility bonus held by the incumbent party of government (‘Regierungsbonus’), to their privileged access to means of communication, to the terror tactics of the SA. Deploying SA thugs as an auxiliary police force, Hermann Göring made it known from the start that he would support the use of firearms against political opponents. Then, on 27 February 1933, right in the middle of the election campaign, the Reichstag building was set on fire. Much speculation then arose—and some still exists today—that the Nazis themselves had been behind the arson attack, because the event undoubtedly suited their intentions. However, there is considerable evidence that Marinus van der Lubbe, a Communist from the Netherlands, was indeed the lone perpetrator. Meanwhile, the new incumbents reacted remarkably quickly. As early as the following day they issued a decree ‘for the protection of people and state,’ the so called ‘Reichstag fire decree,’ which suspended political rights and basic liberties ‘until further notice.’ It imposed a state of emergency that remained in place until the end of the Third Reich. The political scientist, Ernst Fraenkel, rightly described this decree as the ‘constitutional charter of the Third Reich.’37 Thus, only four weeks after coming into power, Hitler was able to govern by emergency decree. It was used to terrorize (p. 439) political opponents, to muzzle the media and political institutions, and to manipulate public opinion through a major propaganda campaign. According to Josef Goebbels, the new minister for ‘people's enlightenment and propaganda,’ it was not the task of National Socialism to terrorize the remaining 48 percent of the population who did not stand behind the regime with the help of the 52 percent who did. Quite the opposite; this strong minority was to be turned into loyal followers. Goebbels' directive highlighted a key element in the Nazi technique of rule: the dual character of terror and consensus with which National Socialists penetrated every pore of German society. This penetration, deeper than some scholars have assumed, was only possible because of a certain openness to it within society.

On 23 March 1933 the Reichstag passed the Enabling Act (Ermächtigungsgesetz), which allowed the government to pass laws without requiring the assent of the Reichstag—even laws that were not in accordance with the constitution! Now Hitler did not even have to suspend the Weimar constitution to govern without and against it. President Hindenburg was thus degraded to a political figure with a merely ornamental function, while the chancellor became the sole authority in Germany. All political parties of the Reichstag, apart from the Social Democrats (and the Communists, who were, however, now outlawed), assented to the Enabling Act, which was limited to four years, but was promptly extended each time it expired. Based on this emergency decree, German federalism was abolished one week later by dissolving the remaining German states, where other parties predominantly held power in state parliaments. Within a few months, unions and parties were dissolved; a law from 14 July banned their re-establishment, as well as the formation of new parties and the NSDAP was declared to be the only German party. Thus, discord and self-destruction, which many Germans associated with the party system, had come to an end. The Nazi party was to become a symbol of national unity for all Germans. Indeed, within three months, party membership figures increased from 700,000 to just less than 2.5 million. From 1 May 1933 onward, new members were no longer admitted. Not only was it remarkable that about 95 percent of all members were men—that is, one in ten German males was a member of the Nazi party—but also that the NSDAP was a party of the publically active parts of society: only 5 percent of all party members were pensioners, housewives, or school pupils, although these groups constituted more than 50 percent of the entire population. Every fourth teacher and every sixth self-employed person was a party member, and a third of all Nazi party members belonged to the working class.

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