Nazism
Nazism, formally named National Socialism, is the far-right totalitarian ideology associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in Germany. During Hitler's rise to power, it was frequently called Hitlerism. Nazism is a form of fascism, with an emphasis on pseudo-scientific theories of a racial hierarchy, identifying ethnic Germans as part of an alleged Nordic Aryan master race. The term "neo-Nazism" is applied to far-right groups formed after World War II with a similar ideology.
Nazism opposes liberal democracy and the parliamentary system. It advocates dictatorship, fervent antisemitism, anti-communism, anti-Slavism, anti-Romani sentiment, scientific racism, anti-Chinese sentiment, white supremacy, Nordicism, social Darwinism, homophobia, ableism, and eugenics. The Nazis sought to overcome social divisions and create a homogeneous German society based on racial purity. They aimed to unite all Germans living in historically German territory, gain lands for expansion under the doctrine of Lebensraum, and exclude those deemed either Community Aliens or "inferior" races.
The term "National Socialism" arose from attempts to create a nationalist alternative to Marxist socialism and free-market capitalism. Nazism rejected Marxist concepts of class conflict and universal equality, opposed cosmopolitan internationalism, and sought to convince the social classes in German society to subordinate their interests to the "common good". The Nazi Party's precursor, the German Workers' Party, was founded in 1919. In 1920, the party was renamed the National Socialist German Workers' Party to appeal to left-wing workers, a renaming Hitler initially opposed. In Mein Kampf, Hitler outlined his antisemitism, anti-communism, and opposition to representative democracy, proposing instead the Führerprinzip. Hitler's objectives involved eastward expansion of German territories, colonization of Eastern Europe, and an alliance with Britain and Italy against the Soviet Union.
The Nazi Party became the largest party in the German parliament in the elections of 1932, but it did not have a majority. Because other parties were unable or unwilling to form a coalition government, Hitler was appointed Chancellor in January 1933 by President Paul von Hindenburg, with the support of conservative nationalists who believed they could control Hitler. Using the Reichstag Fire Decree and the Enabling Act, the Nazis established a one-party state and began the Gleichschaltung. The Sturmabteilung and the Schutzstaffel functioned as the party's paramilitary organisations. Hitler purged the party's more radical factions in the 1934 Night of the Long Knives, and later that year assumed the title of Führer und Reichskanzler. He was now the dictator of Nazi Germany, under which Jews, political opponents and other "undesirable" elements were marginalised, imprisoned or murdered. During World War II, millionsincluding two-thirds of Europe's Jewish populationwere exterminated in a genocide known as the Holocaust. After Germany's defeat and the discovery of the full extent of the Holocaust, Nazi ideology became widely regarded as evil. Only a few fringe racist groups, usually called neo-Nazis, describe themselves as its followers. Use of Nazi symbols is illegal in many European countries, including Germany and Austria.
Etymology
The full name of the Nazi Party was and they officially used the acronym NSDAP. The renaming of the German Workers' Party to the National Socialist German Workers' Party was partially driven by a desire to use both left- and right-wing terminology, 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, clumsy person, a yokel. It was a hypocorism of the German male name Ignaz, which was common in Bavaria, where the NSDAP originated.
In the 1920s, labour movement opponents of the NSDAP seized on this, and shortened the party's name, Nationalsozialistische, to the dismissive "Nazi", to associate the NSDAP with the derogatory use of this term. This was inspired by the earlier use of the abbreviation Sozi for. The first use of the term "Nazi" by the National Socialists themselves occurred in 1926 in a publication by Joseph Goebbels called Der Nazi-Sozi . There, the term "Nazi-Sozi" is used as an abbreviation of "National Socialism".
After the NSDAP's rise to power in the 1930s, the term "Nazi" by itself, or "Nazi Germany", "Nazi regime", etc, were popularised by German exiles, but not used in Germany. The terms spread into other languages and were brought back to Germany after World War II. The NSDAP briefly adopted "Nazi" in an attempt to reappropriate it, for example in articles published in the Nazi newspaper Völkischer Beobachter under the title Ein Nazi fährt nach Palästina in 1934. But the Nazis soon gave up and avoided using the term while in power. They typically referred to themselves as "National Socialists" and their movement as "National Socialism". A compendium of Hitler's conversations in 1941-44 entitled Hitler's Table Talk does not contain the word "Nazi". In speeches by Hermann Göring, he never used "Nazi". Hitler Youth leader Melita Maschmann wrote a book about her experience entitled Account Rendered, where she did not refer to herself as a "Nazi", even though writing well after World War II. In 1933, 581 members of the NSDAP answered interview questions by Professor Theodore Abel, and 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, and purge society of supposed inferior elements. Adolf Hitler and other proponents denied that Nazism was left or right, and instead portrayed it as syncretic, combining elements from across the political spectrum. In Mein Kampf, Hitler 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 1922 speech, Hitler stated:
...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...
Hitler at times redefined socialism. In a speech he gave on 28 July 1922, he said:
Similarly, when George Sylvester Viereck interviewed him in 1923 for the American Monthly and asked why he referred to his party as 'socialists' he replied:
In 1929, Hitler gave a speech to 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 in 1934 whether he supported the "bourgeois right-wing", Hitler claimed Nazism was not exclusively for any class and indicated 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, as the term was used prior to the rise of Hitler and the Nazis. Ideologies incorporated into Nazism were already well established in parts of German society long before World War I. The Nazis were strongly influenced by the post–World War I far-right, 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 1918 and later the treaty. An 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 far-right was dominated by monarchists, but the younger generation, associated with völkisch nationalism, was more radical and did not express any emphasis on restoration of the 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 national unity.
The Nazis, the far-right monarchists, the reactionary German National People's Party and others, such as monarchist army officers and several prominent industrialists, formed an alliance in opposition to the Weimar Republic in October 1931, in Bad Harzburg, officially known as the "National Front", but referred to as the Harzburg Front. The Nazis stated the alliance was purely tactical and continued to have differences with the DNVP. After the elections of July 1932, the alliance broke down when the DNVP lost many seats in the Reichstag. The Nazis denounced them as "an insignificant heap of reactionaries". The DNVP responded by denouncing the Nazis for their "socialism", street violence and the "economic experiments" that would take place if the Nazis gained power. However, amidst an inconclusive situation in which conservative politicians Franz von Papen and Kurt von Schleicher were unable to form 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 Hitler was able to establish a Nazi one-party dictatorship.
Kaiser Wilhelm II, who had been forced to abdicate amidst an attempted communist revolution in Germany, initially supported the Nazis. His sons became members of the Party hoping that in exchange, the Nazis would permit restoration of the monarchy. Hitler dismissed the possibility, calling it "idiotic." Wilhelm grew to distrust Hitler and was appalled at the Kristallnacht of 1938. The former emperor 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 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 national character. Those views were shared by Otto Strasser, who later left the Party and formed the Black Front in the belief Hitler had betrayed the party's socialist goals by endorsing capitalism.
When the Nazi Party emerged from obscurity to become a 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 Party had previously been financed from membership dues, but after 1929 its leadership sought donations from industrialists, and Hitler began holding many fundraising meetings with business leaders. In the midst of the Great Depression, facing economic ruin and the possibility of a Communist or Social Democrat government, business turned to Nazism as a way out, as it promised to support, rather than attack, business interests. By January 1933, the Party had secured the support of important sectors of industry, mainly among steel and coal producers, insurance, and the chemical industry.
Large segments of the Party, particularly among the members of the Sturmabteilung, were committed to the party's official socialist, revolutionary and anti-capitalist positions and expected a social and economic revolution when the party gained power in 1933. Just before the 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" that would enact socialist policies. Röhm also 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 attacked individuals associated with conservative reaction. Hitler saw Röhm's independent actions as violating and threatening his leadership, as well as jeopardising the regime by alienating conservative President Hindenburg and the conservative-oriented German Army. This resulted in Hitler purging Röhm and other radical members of the SA in 1934, in 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 street watercolour artist in Vienna and Munich. He maintained elements of this lifestyle, going to bed late and rising in the afternoon, even after he became Chancellor and Führer. 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, wearing a black mourning armband on one arm and a red communist armband on the other, which he took as evidence that Hitler's politics had not yet solidified. In Mein Kampf, Hitler never mentioned any service with the Bavarian Soviet Republic and stated that he became an antisemite in 1913, whilst in Vienna. This has been disputed by the contention that he was not an antisemite then, even though he read many antisemitic tracts and journals 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 1919 and became an antisemitic nationalist.
Hitler expressed opposition to capitalism, regarding it as having Jewish origins and holding nations ransom to 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 communism was invented by Jews to weaken nations by promoting class struggle. After seizing power, Hitler took a pragmatic position on economics, accepting private property and allowing capitalist private enterprises, so long as they adhered to the goals of the Nazi state, but not tolerating enterprises he saw as opposed to the national interest.
German business leaders disliked Nazi ideology but came to support Hitler, because they saw the Nazis as an ally to promote their interests. Business groups made significant financial contributions to the Nazi Party before and after the Nazi seizure of power, hoping that a Nazi dictatorship would eliminate the organised labour movement and 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. 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. While Hitler always intended to bring Germany into conflict with the Soviet Union to gain Lebensraum, he supported a temporary strategic alliance between them, to form an anti-liberal front to defeat liberal democracies, particularly France.
Hitler admired the British Empire and its colonial system as 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."