The Depression and the Nazis

How did the Depression Help the Nazis?

After reading pages 191-194, do you agree with Goebbels' view that people rallied to support Hitler for positive reasons - or do you think that Gordon Craig (bottom, pg. 193"negative cohesion") was right that people supported the Nazis out of fear and disillusionment? 

Work through questions 1 - 3 to help you make up your mind. 

1. Look carefully at Sources 3-7 and 9. For each source, write two sentences explaning whether you think it is evidence that: 

• Supports the view of Goebbels
• Supports the view of Craig
• Could be used to support either interpretation

Source 3: This Source, I think is supporting the "negative cohesion" because it shows that when unemployment is rising exponentially, so does the Nazi Party votes in the Reichstag, which means that when there are poor conditions and people are not happy, the Nazi Party gains power because of its views against the Weimar Republic and SPD and KPD Parties, which means that people are sharing a common enemy. 

Source 4: This quote supports the view of Goebbels because it shows the point of view of an elderly person agreeing with the order and discipline of the Storm troopers (associated with the Nazi Party), which is an Nazi ideology, so therefore a positive way of agreeing with the Nazi policies and standpoints. Basically she says that order in times of chaos and poverty is hope for the future and good to see. 

Source 5: This poster supports Craig's point of view because the propaganda of the Nazi Party revolved around blaming others for Germany's misfortune, and so going against the Treaty of Versailles gives Germans something or someone to blame, and therefore people unite over a common dislike or hatred, such as a Treaty. 

Source 6: This picture shows the immense suport for the Nazi Party, which doesn't prove much for either side of the argument, so therefore it is neutral. This picture is a representation of the Nazi followers, but we as a view cannot determine the reasoning behind the support.

Source 7: This poster supports the Craig point of view because it is yet another propaganda poster disagreeing with Communist ways, and therefore giving the Communists a bad facade and giving the Nazi Policies more support. This is negative cohesion because it is showing how terrible Communist Policies are, and if Communist policies are that bad, then Nazi Policies must not be that bad. 

Source 9: This propaganda poster both agrees with Goebbels and agrees with Craig because it describes the positive policy in which the Nazi's stand for, but then it compares the positive of the Nazi Party, to the negative policies of the other leading political parties.  This supports Goebbels because it shows how people love Nazi policies in a positive way, but then uses the negative cohesion of corruption and lying to the people (other parties) as a back up.

2. Now work through the text and other sources on pages 191-94. Make a list of examples and evidence that seem to support either viewpoint.

Negative Cohesion

-Economic Crisis (Depression) and unemployment helped Hitler and the Nazi Party use negative cohesion to find common enemies and blame opponents such as the Treaty of Versailles, "November Criminals" Communist Revolutions and Jews to find a common ground with the people and to give them something to blame for their suffering.

-With all of these circumstances in chaos in the Weimar Germany time period, Hitler started to question Weimar Governmental authority, and thought Germany needed a stronger leader.. 

-Nazi Party's 25 Points were very appealing to those in most despair, such as the elderly, the unemployed and the middle class. 

-Democratic Weimar Government was indecisive and could not agree on anything to make the German economy any better. 

-Using the failure and fear of other circumstances and parties to give false promises to the people and make them believe that things would get better if the Nazi's were brought to power. 

-Hitler didn't like the Government having thirty political parties and instead should just have one party to get everything done that needs to be done. 

-Some people thought HItler to be creepy and tending to yell a lot even at the most simplistic statements, the more educated and wealthy peoples recognized that Hitler wasn't exactly the most stable mental person.

-Hitler made a Communist Red Fighting League, like the Storm troopers, but instead used to destroy the Communist rebellion. 

3. Decide how far you agree with each of the following three statements and give them a score on a scale of 1-5. And then, write a short paragraph explaining your score for each statement.

a. Very few people fully supported the Nazis (Score =2     ) Explanation:
As soon as the Depression hit Weimar Germany, Hitler became a demagogue and promised false changes and traditional views to the democratic Weimar Germany. He used the panic and poverty of the times to bring down other political parties and point out their flaws while he promised good recognizable policies that resembled the Kaiser. This gave the Nazi Party lots of publicity and therefore they had a lot of supporters.

b. The Key factor was the economic depression. Without it, the Nazis would have remained a minority fringe party. (Score = 5    ) Explanation:
 As it turns out, when the Weimar Republic was prosperous and successful under Stresemann and before the depression radical political parties were not nearly as popular as the democratic Weimar Republic government. Then, just as the Depression hit, Hitler used the hard times as a catalyst for his policies and undermining of other parties because many German's were unhappy with the governmental decisions. Then, it shows that as the Depression starts to get better, radical groups popularity drops dramatically. 

c. The politicians of the Weimar Republic were mainly responsible for the rise of the Nazis 

(Score = 2     ) Explanation: 

No, I find this not true because they were doing things correctly, it was the Democratic system that the Weimar Government was built under that was flawed and therefore gave way to accusations such as this. Proportional Representation prevented politicians from all parties in the Reichstag from accomplishing anything and then Article 48 had to be used often to compensate. Also, the Weimar Politicians were called "November Criminals" and falsely accused of Stabbing the German Army in the Back, which was all Nazi Propaganda.