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The Death of Democracy: Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic
Come poté un governo democratico permettere ad Adolf Hitler di conquistare la Germania? Affermare che Hitler fu regolarmente eletto è troppo semplice. Il Führer non avrebbe mai potuto ottenere il potere se i politici di punta non avessero risposto a un’ondata di insurrezioni populiste cercando di cooptarlo; una strategia che invece li schiacciò in un angolo, dal quale l’unica via d’uscita fu quella di accogliere i nazisti in Parlamento. Benjamin Carter Hett mette a nudo la catastrofica sicurezza dei politici conservatori, convinti che i nazisti li avrebbero senza dubbio sostenuti, non capendo invece che i loro sforzi li stavano in realtà consegnando nelle mani di Hitler, a cui affidarono di fatto gli strumenti per trasformare la Germania in una feroce dittatura. L’autore è uno studioso di spicco della Germania del Ventesimo secolo e un narratore di talento, e nel ritrarre questi politici inetti mostra quanto fragile possa essere la democrazia quando chi è al potere non la rispetta.
296 pages, Kindle Edition
First published April 3, 2018
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7851 people want to read
About the author
Benjamin Carter Hett
9 books112 followersBenjamin Carter Hett, a former trial lawyer and professor of history at Hunter College and the Graduate Center, City University of New York, is the author of Death in the Tiergarten and Crossing Hitler, winner of the Fraenkel Prize.
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May 5, 2024
The book examines how the democratic Weimar Republic failed and the Nazis wielded power.
The Treaty of Versailles and its alleged harshness came to be a source of bitter resentment to German nationalists and many ordinary Germans in the 1920s. The author notes that the fact that most Germans considered the treaty - the borders it had drawn, and the reparations it had imposed - to be unjust didn’t necessarily make it so. Perception is, however, what matters here.
Apart from the feeling of betrayal caused by the Versailles Treaty, there were two myths about the First World War that contributed to the downfall of Weimar democracy and eventually helped Hitler to get Germans on his side.
One, “the myth of 1914,” concerned the war’s beginning. The other, the myth of the “stab in the back,” was about its ending in revolution and defeat. These myths existed in a dialectical relationship to each other: unity versus division, patriotism versus treason, victory versus defeat, right versus left, August versus November.
The “stab in the back” myth was first formulated in early 1919. It claimed that betrayal and cowardice at home and not the objective factors (military defeat along with the economic power of Great Britain, the United States and France) had brought Germany's defeat. The military commanders Hindenburg and Ludendorff exploited this far-fetched narrative to shift the blame onto others and shield themselves from accusations.
The author probes into the political divisions of the 1920s and the early 1930s. The Weimar Republic saw thirteen chancellors and twenty-one different administrations in just over fourteen years. Such political volatility was perceived as the political instability and weakness of the democratic government. The Nazis played on this. Hitler knew how to present himself as the strong man who would save the divided nation. He promised strength and unity.
It is hardly possible to ignore the frightening comparison with the situation in Russia in the last 20 years or so. Putin used Russian resentment after the collapse of the Soviet Union to dismantle fragile democracy and consolidate power.
The experience of the Great War gave an added boost to the embrace of irrationality. Nothing about the war made much sense.
The Nazis profited from this fascination with irrationality, which was not specifically German. They benefited from a general climate of loss of belief. It led many people to accept unreasonable statements which would otherwise have been considered unmitigated gall.
As a contemporary observer pointed out, since there were no positive answers to any social problems, Nazism could only be against everything, even against inconsistent things: it was antiliberal and anticonservative, antireligious and anti-atheist, anticapitalist and antisocialist, and most of all antisemitic.
The right-wing elites wanted an exclusively conservative government and feared Communist uprising and civil war. On top of that, they despised democracy and considered it a 'weak' form of government. Hitler, for his part, knew that he would not be able to achieve his goals without the support of the establishment and the army.
The intransigence of Germany’s political parties, especially the right-wingers, and several years of miscalculation by Hindenburg, Schleicher, Brüning, and Papen, had thrown German politics into a full-blown crisis. The Nazis knew they could not come to power against the establishment. But neither could the establishment go on without the Nazis.
Thus, the political deadlock, which could have been avoided, directly played into Hitler's hands.
The Reichstag fire (February 27, 1933) became the crucial event that helped Hitler’s regime to strengthen control over the country. The importance of the Reichstag fire rests mostly in how the Nazis responded to it.
The Reichstag Fire Decree became the legal foundation for Hitler’s twelve-year dictatorship.
This decree allowed the government to crack down on its opponents, arresting thousands of people.
The Treaty of Versailles and its alleged harshness came to be a source of bitter resentment to German nationalists and many ordinary Germans in the 1920s. The author notes that the fact that most Germans considered the treaty - the borders it had drawn, and the reparations it had imposed - to be unjust didn’t necessarily make it so. Perception is, however, what matters here.
Apart from the feeling of betrayal caused by the Versailles Treaty, there were two myths about the First World War that contributed to the downfall of Weimar democracy and eventually helped Hitler to get Germans on his side.
One, “the myth of 1914,” concerned the war’s beginning. The other, the myth of the “stab in the back,” was about its ending in revolution and defeat. These myths existed in a dialectical relationship to each other: unity versus division, patriotism versus treason, victory versus defeat, right versus left, August versus November.
The “stab in the back” myth was first formulated in early 1919. It claimed that betrayal and cowardice at home and not the objective factors (military defeat along with the economic power of Great Britain, the United States and France) had brought Germany's defeat. The military commanders Hindenburg and Ludendorff exploited this far-fetched narrative to shift the blame onto others and shield themselves from accusations.
The author probes into the political divisions of the 1920s and the early 1930s. The Weimar Republic saw thirteen chancellors and twenty-one different administrations in just over fourteen years. Such political volatility was perceived as the political instability and weakness of the democratic government. The Nazis played on this. Hitler knew how to present himself as the strong man who would save the divided nation. He promised strength and unity.
It is hardly possible to ignore the frightening comparison with the situation in Russia in the last 20 years or so. Putin used Russian resentment after the collapse of the Soviet Union to dismantle fragile democracy and consolidate power.
The experience of the Great War gave an added boost to the embrace of irrationality. Nothing about the war made much sense.
The Nazis profited from this fascination with irrationality, which was not specifically German. They benefited from a general climate of loss of belief. It led many people to accept unreasonable statements which would otherwise have been considered unmitigated gall.
As a contemporary observer pointed out, since there were no positive answers to any social problems, Nazism could only be against everything, even against inconsistent things: it was antiliberal and anticonservative, antireligious and anti-atheist, anticapitalist and antisocialist, and most of all antisemitic.
The right-wing elites wanted an exclusively conservative government and feared Communist uprising and civil war. On top of that, they despised democracy and considered it a 'weak' form of government. Hitler, for his part, knew that he would not be able to achieve his goals without the support of the establishment and the army.
The intransigence of Germany’s political parties, especially the right-wingers, and several years of miscalculation by Hindenburg, Schleicher, Brüning, and Papen, had thrown German politics into a full-blown crisis. The Nazis knew they could not come to power against the establishment. But neither could the establishment go on without the Nazis.
Thus, the political deadlock, which could have been avoided, directly played into Hitler's hands.
The Reichstag fire (February 27, 1933) became the crucial event that helped Hitler’s regime to strengthen control over the country. The importance of the Reichstag fire rests mostly in how the Nazis responded to it.
The Reichstag Fire Decree became the legal foundation for Hitler’s twelve-year dictatorship.
This decree allowed the government to crack down on its opponents, arresting thousands of people.
August 1, 2018
This is required reading for anyone who fears the events occurring in our country today. I always thought the comparisons between the current administration and Nazi Germany were hyperbole, but it is shocking how certain actions and behaviors today parallel those in the days of the Weimar Republic, which is the period in Germany between the end of World War I, and the Nazi Party and Hitler’s seizure of power in 1933.
One of the many interesting points Hett makes is that Hitler was an unremarkable figure, who never rose above the rank of private during his time in the army. So why did “this man, of all people...rise to such unprecedented power?” Hitler had the “rare ability to captivate a crowd with his voice.” He had “uncanny intuition,” with the “ability to read what people felt and wanted to hear, and to predict what they would do next. He was a skilled actor who could modify his behavior to fit the moment and the audience.”
It is interesting to see the rise of what we know as “fake news,” during this time, how people rejected facts that did not appeal to them, and how they got caught up in conspiracy theories after Germany’s defeat in World War I. “The key to understanding why many Germans supported [Hitler] lies in the Nazis’ rejection of a rational, factual world,” Hett explains, and that, “...among the Weimar Republic‘s more fatal defects was that millions of its people deeply believed things that were verifiably untrue.”
Hitler seized upon these ideas in his memoir, Mein Kampf, addressing dishonesty in political messages: the less honest and bigger the lie, the better. He felt that, “Ordinary people couldn’t understand [sophisticated messages] and wouldn’t bother to try. To sink into the minds of average people, a message had to be simple. It had to be emotional—hatred worked well—not intellectual. And it had to be endlessly repeated.” These thoughts are eerily similar to what is happening in politics today.
Hitler appealed to his followers’ working-class roots and their disdain for intellectualism, anything similar to globalization, and the political elite. Hett explains that, “The cynical dishonesty of the Nazis’ propaganda received a significant boost from the cult of irrationality that drove their followers: the contempt for, indeed the revolution against, Enlightenment standards of rationality.”
Another principle guiding Hitler’s quest for power was the idea of loyalty, and after Hindenburg’s death, when he was sworn in as chancellor, “All members of the armed forces and all civil servants were obliged to swear an oath of loyalty to him personally.” Remarkably prescient, given the incidents surrounding James Comey’s firing, and what is seemingly a requirement for working in the West Wing today. The parallels here are just so striking and chilling.
Many lessons are to be learned here, one of which is that, “What a nation believes about its past is at least as important as what that past actually was.” This isn’t easiest of reads, but it is very interesting, and I learned a lot about this period of German history. May books such as this serve us to never forget the past failings of a country that mistakenly put their faith toward ill-begotten principles. As Hett states, “We who come later have one advantage over them: we have their example before us.”
One of the many interesting points Hett makes is that Hitler was an unremarkable figure, who never rose above the rank of private during his time in the army. So why did “this man, of all people...rise to such unprecedented power?” Hitler had the “rare ability to captivate a crowd with his voice.” He had “uncanny intuition,” with the “ability to read what people felt and wanted to hear, and to predict what they would do next. He was a skilled actor who could modify his behavior to fit the moment and the audience.”
It is interesting to see the rise of what we know as “fake news,” during this time, how people rejected facts that did not appeal to them, and how they got caught up in conspiracy theories after Germany’s defeat in World War I. “The key to understanding why many Germans supported [Hitler] lies in the Nazis’ rejection of a rational, factual world,” Hett explains, and that, “...among the Weimar Republic‘s more fatal defects was that millions of its people deeply believed things that were verifiably untrue.”
Hitler seized upon these ideas in his memoir, Mein Kampf, addressing dishonesty in political messages: the less honest and bigger the lie, the better. He felt that, “Ordinary people couldn’t understand [sophisticated messages] and wouldn’t bother to try. To sink into the minds of average people, a message had to be simple. It had to be emotional—hatred worked well—not intellectual. And it had to be endlessly repeated.” These thoughts are eerily similar to what is happening in politics today.
Hitler appealed to his followers’ working-class roots and their disdain for intellectualism, anything similar to globalization, and the political elite. Hett explains that, “The cynical dishonesty of the Nazis’ propaganda received a significant boost from the cult of irrationality that drove their followers: the contempt for, indeed the revolution against, Enlightenment standards of rationality.”
Another principle guiding Hitler’s quest for power was the idea of loyalty, and after Hindenburg’s death, when he was sworn in as chancellor, “All members of the armed forces and all civil servants were obliged to swear an oath of loyalty to him personally.” Remarkably prescient, given the incidents surrounding James Comey’s firing, and what is seemingly a requirement for working in the West Wing today. The parallels here are just so striking and chilling.
Many lessons are to be learned here, one of which is that, “What a nation believes about its past is at least as important as what that past actually was.” This isn’t easiest of reads, but it is very interesting, and I learned a lot about this period of German history. May books such as this serve us to never forget the past failings of a country that mistakenly put their faith toward ill-begotten principles. As Hett states, “We who come later have one advantage over them: we have their example before us.”
April 25, 2021
This is a thought-provoking book which follows the political situation of Germany immediately after the end of WWI. The Kaiser has abdicated and fled to Holland and the military and various political groups are left with the task of remaking the government into a form which is acceptable to them, the people, and the demands of the Versailles Treaty.....in other words, starting from scratch.
The book begins with the Reichstag fire which was the turning point that truly changed the course of events toward Hitler's rise and works backward to the establishment of the Weimer Republic in 1919. The internal conflicts among the various political parties/military resulted in a constant flux of leadership and laws while Hitler sat in the background watching and waiting. He insinuated himself into a small group of powerful men who had the ear of Hindenburg, President of the Republic. Although not powerful himself, Hitler's oratorical gifts had caught the eye of these men and they believed that they could control him to their advantage.
This is a very complete history of how and why Hitler came to power and it is an intriguing review of the problems roiling in Germany that made it possible. The author ends the book with a very poignant statement......Few Germans could imagine Treblinka or Auschwitzd or the death marches in the final months of WWII. It is hard to blame them for not foreseeing the unthinkable.....we who come later have one advantage over them: we have their example before us.
Highly recommended to the student of Hitler's rise to power or to any history buff.
The book begins with the Reichstag fire which was the turning point that truly changed the course of events toward Hitler's rise and works backward to the establishment of the Weimer Republic in 1919. The internal conflicts among the various political parties/military resulted in a constant flux of leadership and laws while Hitler sat in the background watching and waiting. He insinuated himself into a small group of powerful men who had the ear of Hindenburg, President of the Republic. Although not powerful himself, Hitler's oratorical gifts had caught the eye of these men and they believed that they could control him to their advantage.
This is a very complete history of how and why Hitler came to power and it is an intriguing review of the problems roiling in Germany that made it possible. The author ends the book with a very poignant statement......Few Germans could imagine Treblinka or Auschwitzd or the death marches in the final months of WWII. It is hard to blame them for not foreseeing the unthinkable.....we who come later have one advantage over them: we have their example before us.
Highly recommended to the student of Hitler's rise to power or to any history buff.
October 27, 2018
The Death of Democracy: Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic by Benjamin Carter Hett, is an account of the slow demise of democracy in Weimar Germany throughout the post-WWI and pre-WWII era. The book begins by examining two myths in German history - one of the November 1914 spirit of unification in Germany, as the state began preparations for war. The second is the stab in the back myth, which examined Germany's loss in WWI and the eventual revolution that would overthrow the German Empire and bring in Weimar democracy. These two myths were fundamental catalysts for both the collapse of Weimar democracy, and the eventual rise of the Nazi Party. The myths were utilized by German Nationalist politicians and intellectuals who were unhappy with the Weimar system. Individuals like Reich's President Paul von Hindenburg, and intellectual Edgar Julius Jung, as well as numerous other politicians and thinkers who would characterize the age, often looked at the Weimar Republic with distaste. These figures would be instrumental in both creating the intellectual framework for the Nazi's rise, and creating the political situations necessary for their seizure of power.
Hett has written a book that examines the death of democracy leading up to the Nazi seizure of power in the early 1930's. The book examines many areas of the Weimar Republic. An examination of the polarization of politics, as competing political parties in the Reichstag, such as the Social Democrats (SPD), German Nationalists, and the Center Party (Catholic) competed for influence and caused massive political turmoil. As this went on, paramilitary wings of these organizations fought pitched battles in the streets. The Nazi Stormtroopers would vie for control of areas against the SPD Reichsbanner and the Communist Red Front Fighters League. Veteran organizations associated with the Nationalist Party, the Steel Helmets, were also involved. These groups were violent, and engaged in street battles, assassinations, and casual violence. This polarization of politics caused turmoil in the Reichstag, as compromise was difficult, and an increasing number of parties, from the Nationalists and Nazi's, to the Communists, began to gain a larger percentage of votes, and were ultimately committed to the destruction of parliamentary democracy in Germany.
Key figures are also discussed. Many of the key players, like Hindenburg, Papen, Jung, Schleicher and of course Hitler, play a prominent role in this turbulent time in German history. What is known about why they acted as they did, and the outcome of their actions is examined. For a time, their was a play off between Centrist, SPD, Nazi, Nationalist and Communist forces in Germany, and the outcome was unclear. Shifting political alliances, attempts to keep democracy working, and attempts to seize authoritarian power, all swirled throughout German politics. Parties like the SPD and Center Party sought to keep democracy working. The German Nationalists sought more authoritarian executive control to keep the Communists at bay. The Communist's and Nazi's looked to destroy democracy and usher in their own brands of Utopian politics. Eventually, a coalition of the right formed, including Nationalists, Centrists and Nazi's, that kept the SPD and Communists out of decision making. Eventually, this coalition would pave the way for a Nazi seizure of power, as Hitler first demanded the Chancellorship of Germany, and then began to crack down on democratic forces. This would eventually culminate in the Night of the Long Knives, as the Nazi brass destroyed political opposition in both their own camp, and the rest of the country. Many of the key figures, such as Jung and Schleicher, were murdered this night.
Hett has written a stirring account of this fractious time period. He looks at weaknesses in both the Weimar Republic itself, and key figures to write the story of the collapse of democracy in Germany in the 1930's. This book is well researched, entertaining, and fascinating. I would highly recommend it to those interested in this time period, as well as those looking for a good analysis of democratic collapse. A wonderful book.
Hett has written a book that examines the death of democracy leading up to the Nazi seizure of power in the early 1930's. The book examines many areas of the Weimar Republic. An examination of the polarization of politics, as competing political parties in the Reichstag, such as the Social Democrats (SPD), German Nationalists, and the Center Party (Catholic) competed for influence and caused massive political turmoil. As this went on, paramilitary wings of these organizations fought pitched battles in the streets. The Nazi Stormtroopers would vie for control of areas against the SPD Reichsbanner and the Communist Red Front Fighters League. Veteran organizations associated with the Nationalist Party, the Steel Helmets, were also involved. These groups were violent, and engaged in street battles, assassinations, and casual violence. This polarization of politics caused turmoil in the Reichstag, as compromise was difficult, and an increasing number of parties, from the Nationalists and Nazi's, to the Communists, began to gain a larger percentage of votes, and were ultimately committed to the destruction of parliamentary democracy in Germany.
Key figures are also discussed. Many of the key players, like Hindenburg, Papen, Jung, Schleicher and of course Hitler, play a prominent role in this turbulent time in German history. What is known about why they acted as they did, and the outcome of their actions is examined. For a time, their was a play off between Centrist, SPD, Nazi, Nationalist and Communist forces in Germany, and the outcome was unclear. Shifting political alliances, attempts to keep democracy working, and attempts to seize authoritarian power, all swirled throughout German politics. Parties like the SPD and Center Party sought to keep democracy working. The German Nationalists sought more authoritarian executive control to keep the Communists at bay. The Communist's and Nazi's looked to destroy democracy and usher in their own brands of Utopian politics. Eventually, a coalition of the right formed, including Nationalists, Centrists and Nazi's, that kept the SPD and Communists out of decision making. Eventually, this coalition would pave the way for a Nazi seizure of power, as Hitler first demanded the Chancellorship of Germany, and then began to crack down on democratic forces. This would eventually culminate in the Night of the Long Knives, as the Nazi brass destroyed political opposition in both their own camp, and the rest of the country. Many of the key figures, such as Jung and Schleicher, were murdered this night.
Hett has written a stirring account of this fractious time period. He looks at weaknesses in both the Weimar Republic itself, and key figures to write the story of the collapse of democracy in Germany in the 1930's. This book is well researched, entertaining, and fascinating. I would highly recommend it to those interested in this time period, as well as those looking for a good analysis of democratic collapse. A wonderful book.
May 3, 2021
4.5 Stars
Most books, movies or tv shows about World War II revolve around Hitler and the genocide of 6 million Jewish people. And they mostly tell it from an American or British viewpoint. We dont often get the German viewpoint and we dont often get any information about Germany before the rise of Hitler and the Nazis.
The Death of Democracy is about how political shortsightedness and cowardice led to the rise of the Nazis and eventually Hitler. The German people are often looked down on by the rest of the Western World because we in the west just can't believe that the Germans would allow Hitler to happen. But I can say as an American that your country can easily be taken over by an extremist group even if the majority of people don't approve. The Nazi party never had more than 43% approval. The German people as a whole didn't agree with the Nazis but they were too slow in trying to get rid of them.
These are just a few of the factors that led to the fall of democracy in Germany:
• Big business weaken labor unions
• Abolishing state mandated wages(minimum wage)
• German defeat during WWI
• More and more money being spent on police and the army
• Bad trade deals
• Growing numbers of immigrants entering Germany
• A growing Jewish middle class
• The belief that the media and political leaders couldn't be trusted
• The economic and military rise of The United States
Hitler and the Nazis didn't create these problems but they did seize of them and the gave working class Germans someone to blame...Jewish People.
This book did an amazing job of explaining how Germany went from a thriving progressive society to a Nazi hellscape in just 15 years. Benjamin Carter Hett did a great job of making complicated political decisions simple to understand. I would have given this book 5 stars but I thought it was just a little too short.
A must read!
Most books, movies or tv shows about World War II revolve around Hitler and the genocide of 6 million Jewish people. And they mostly tell it from an American or British viewpoint. We dont often get the German viewpoint and we dont often get any information about Germany before the rise of Hitler and the Nazis.
The Death of Democracy is about how political shortsightedness and cowardice led to the rise of the Nazis and eventually Hitler. The German people are often looked down on by the rest of the Western World because we in the west just can't believe that the Germans would allow Hitler to happen. But I can say as an American that your country can easily be taken over by an extremist group even if the majority of people don't approve. The Nazi party never had more than 43% approval. The German people as a whole didn't agree with the Nazis but they were too slow in trying to get rid of them.
These are just a few of the factors that led to the fall of democracy in Germany:
• Big business weaken labor unions
• Abolishing state mandated wages(minimum wage)
• German defeat during WWI
• More and more money being spent on police and the army
• Bad trade deals
• Growing numbers of immigrants entering Germany
• A growing Jewish middle class
• The belief that the media and political leaders couldn't be trusted
• The economic and military rise of The United States
Hitler and the Nazis didn't create these problems but they did seize of them and the gave working class Germans someone to blame...Jewish People.
This book did an amazing job of explaining how Germany went from a thriving progressive society to a Nazi hellscape in just 15 years. Benjamin Carter Hett did a great job of making complicated political decisions simple to understand. I would have given this book 5 stars but I thought it was just a little too short.
A must read!
February 17, 2022
It could/will happen again.
This book zooms in on the political brinksmanship and statecraft that brought the Nazi party and Hitler into power. If you don't know a lot of the key German political players of that time, you'll find yourself a little lost like myself. I'm not knowledgeable about this topic but I still found this to be a worth while read. Hett catalogues the carefully planned and executed steps that the Nazi party followed to finally take power. It was a combination of a nation suffering from national trauma, embarrassment, hyperinflation, urban/intellectual resentment and anti-Semitism scapegoating.
The Nazi party, while it started as a minority voice, seized on the rural distrust of social elites and leveraged that into their political messaging. While the Nazis were clearly anti Social Democrats and the Communist party, they seemed to embrace whatever populist sentiment would give them a bigger and bigger share of the voting block. And the Weimar Republic was a democracy. It was a democracy that was slowly dismantled over about 12 years in a very deliberate and seductive way. The Nazi's were ultimately a party of nihilism. Whatever the status quo was, the Nazi party would vilify it, condemn the alternative and offer only itself as the solution.
The chilling comparison with American politics in the year 2022 are beyond obvious. The exact social conditions of distrust and extremism paired with a brittle and calcified democratic system with a governing body captured by special corporate interests--it is absolutely a set up for right wing authoritarianism. And I'm afraid it will get worse before it gets better. Hitler and the Nazis didn't just swiftly seize power, they patiently waited with a strangle hold on a democratic process that turned to ashes from the fire of distrust, violence and hatred which was their gospel.
Be warned.
This book zooms in on the political brinksmanship and statecraft that brought the Nazi party and Hitler into power. If you don't know a lot of the key German political players of that time, you'll find yourself a little lost like myself. I'm not knowledgeable about this topic but I still found this to be a worth while read. Hett catalogues the carefully planned and executed steps that the Nazi party followed to finally take power. It was a combination of a nation suffering from national trauma, embarrassment, hyperinflation, urban/intellectual resentment and anti-Semitism scapegoating.
The Nazi party, while it started as a minority voice, seized on the rural distrust of social elites and leveraged that into their political messaging. While the Nazis were clearly anti Social Democrats and the Communist party, they seemed to embrace whatever populist sentiment would give them a bigger and bigger share of the voting block. And the Weimar Republic was a democracy. It was a democracy that was slowly dismantled over about 12 years in a very deliberate and seductive way. The Nazi's were ultimately a party of nihilism. Whatever the status quo was, the Nazi party would vilify it, condemn the alternative and offer only itself as the solution.
The chilling comparison with American politics in the year 2022 are beyond obvious. The exact social conditions of distrust and extremism paired with a brittle and calcified democratic system with a governing body captured by special corporate interests--it is absolutely a set up for right wing authoritarianism. And I'm afraid it will get worse before it gets better. Hitler and the Nazis didn't just swiftly seize power, they patiently waited with a strangle hold on a democratic process that turned to ashes from the fire of distrust, violence and hatred which was their gospel.
Be warned.
January 5, 2025
This book was an obvious choice owing to both my longstanding interest in the factors that led to the Nazis taking control of Germany in January 1933 and an acute sense of peril for American democracy in January 2025 – imperfect though it already is.
Hett recounts the politics of Weimar Germany, especially in its last years, leading to the ascendancy of Hitler and the establishment of his dictatorship. I learned a great deal about the complex political maneuverings of Hitler and those who feared what he would do to Germany. The latter included some leaders in other far-right parties. I did not know, for example, of Hindenburg’s strong reluctance about allowing Hitler to become Chancellor. Before he ultimately relented, he was making several behind the scene efforts to keep Hitler from leadership. However, he was not ready to risk any damage to his own reputation – which of course, ironically, he certainly did for posterity – nor to reach out to more left-wing democratic elements. While I’m glad that Hett provides this story with such granularity, I confess that the many characters and their political machinations were at times more than I was fully able to follow.
Hett stays close to his topic. With perhaps the exception of his last sentence, he does not directly allude to any similarities or differences between the last days of the Weimar republic and our own current American political condition. Yet the parallels and discrepancies are apparent for any interested reader. Hett has provided a work that can both deepen our understanding of the past and be useful in the days ahead.
Hett recounts the politics of Weimar Germany, especially in its last years, leading to the ascendancy of Hitler and the establishment of his dictatorship. I learned a great deal about the complex political maneuverings of Hitler and those who feared what he would do to Germany. The latter included some leaders in other far-right parties. I did not know, for example, of Hindenburg’s strong reluctance about allowing Hitler to become Chancellor. Before he ultimately relented, he was making several behind the scene efforts to keep Hitler from leadership. However, he was not ready to risk any damage to his own reputation – which of course, ironically, he certainly did for posterity – nor to reach out to more left-wing democratic elements. While I’m glad that Hett provides this story with such granularity, I confess that the many characters and their political machinations were at times more than I was fully able to follow.
Hett stays close to his topic. With perhaps the exception of his last sentence, he does not directly allude to any similarities or differences between the last days of the Weimar republic and our own current American political condition. Yet the parallels and discrepancies are apparent for any interested reader. Hett has provided a work that can both deepen our understanding of the past and be useful in the days ahead.
July 18, 2018
How democracy died in Germany is the subject of a penetrating new historical study of the Weimar Republic and the political turmoil that wracked the nation in the early years of the Great Depression. Hunter College history professor Benjamin Carter Hett brings new evidence to light that exposes old myths and reassesses the roles of the politicians and military officers who were prominent in German politics in the 1920s and early 1930s.
As Hett notes, "the end of the Cold War brought major advances in what we know about the Nazi era." The picture he paints on the basis of recently opened East German and Soviet archives is far more nuanced than many American readers might have imagined. And it becomes clear that any analogy to contemporary US politics looks facile. Democracy may well be dying in the United States today. But its death throes are not taking anything like the course they took in Weimar Germany.
Hett groups the many political parties in the Weimar Republic into three "confessionals" (taking a term from religion to connote shared values and beliefs):
** the socialist camp (Social Democrats, Communists);
** the Catholic camp (Center Party, Bavarian People's Party); and
** the Protestant middle-class camp (German Nationals, German Democratic Party, German People's Party, Nazis).
"The crucial point" here, Hett explains, "is that for all the top-level political instability in the Weimar Republic—thirteen chancellors and twenty-one different administrations in just over fourteen years—these camps remained stable from 1919 to 1933." Individual parties saw dramatic ups and downs in popular support over this period, but it was only after 1933 that the Nazis broke out of the Protestant middle-class camp and captured more than one-third of the vote.
Hett's carefully researched account yields other surprises. For example:
** As is well known, Germany's financial relationship with its neighbors and the United States was the key to its position in Europe. Hett notes that "financial arrangements in interwar Europe were really about security and, in particular, keeping Germany in line. So long as Germany was constrained by reparations and the gold standard, it could not threaten its neighbors." But when the Depression forced England and then other countries off the gold standard, and the leaders of the Weimar Republic had already successfully negotiated dramatic reductions and postponements in reparations, the country was free to reassert itself once Hitler came to power in 1933.
** "A persistent myth has it that the Treaty of Versailles was excessively harsh, and that its harshness explains the rage that gave rise to the Nazis. Actually, the treaty was the mildest of the post-First World War settlements . . . Certainly, almost all Germans perceived the treaty to be unjust, which didn't necessarily make it so."
There is abundant evidence in The Death of Democracy that conditions in Weimar Germany were not substantially similar to those in the United States today. The world was in a deep depression, with millions out of work and many on the verge of starvation. Germany's parliamentary system guaranteed a level of instability that lent itself to the possibility of a coup such as Adolf Hitler's in 1933. Above all, the level of violence in German society hovered just below that of civil war. In the country's cities, pitched battles between Nazi Stormtroopers and Communist activists were common. And the Nazis' deep-seated anti-Semitism manifested in violent outbursts that preceded Hitler's accession to the chancellor's office.
Sadly, however, there is one fundamental way that today's Right-Wing Republicans mirror the Nazis: a total lack of respect for truth. In the Guardian (July 14, 2018), Michiko Kakutani quotes Hannah Arendt in drawing this analogy: "The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction (ie the reality of experience) and the distinction between true and false (ie the standards of thought) no longer exist.” Kakutani notes that Donald Trump "made 2,140 false or misleading claims during his first year in office–an average of 5.9 a day." The behavior of many other leading Republicans is hardly much better, if only because they steadfastly refuse to counter or even acknowledge this unceasing barrage of lies. This is, indeed, how democracy dies.
Benjamin Carter is also the author of a previous, closely related book, Burning the Reichstag: An Investigation into the Third Reich’s Enduring Mystery.
As Hett notes, "the end of the Cold War brought major advances in what we know about the Nazi era." The picture he paints on the basis of recently opened East German and Soviet archives is far more nuanced than many American readers might have imagined. And it becomes clear that any analogy to contemporary US politics looks facile. Democracy may well be dying in the United States today. But its death throes are not taking anything like the course they took in Weimar Germany.
Hett groups the many political parties in the Weimar Republic into three "confessionals" (taking a term from religion to connote shared values and beliefs):
** the socialist camp (Social Democrats, Communists);
** the Catholic camp (Center Party, Bavarian People's Party); and
** the Protestant middle-class camp (German Nationals, German Democratic Party, German People's Party, Nazis).
"The crucial point" here, Hett explains, "is that for all the top-level political instability in the Weimar Republic—thirteen chancellors and twenty-one different administrations in just over fourteen years—these camps remained stable from 1919 to 1933." Individual parties saw dramatic ups and downs in popular support over this period, but it was only after 1933 that the Nazis broke out of the Protestant middle-class camp and captured more than one-third of the vote.
Hett's carefully researched account yields other surprises. For example:
** As is well known, Germany's financial relationship with its neighbors and the United States was the key to its position in Europe. Hett notes that "financial arrangements in interwar Europe were really about security and, in particular, keeping Germany in line. So long as Germany was constrained by reparations and the gold standard, it could not threaten its neighbors." But when the Depression forced England and then other countries off the gold standard, and the leaders of the Weimar Republic had already successfully negotiated dramatic reductions and postponements in reparations, the country was free to reassert itself once Hitler came to power in 1933.
** "A persistent myth has it that the Treaty of Versailles was excessively harsh, and that its harshness explains the rage that gave rise to the Nazis. Actually, the treaty was the mildest of the post-First World War settlements . . . Certainly, almost all Germans perceived the treaty to be unjust, which didn't necessarily make it so."
There is abundant evidence in The Death of Democracy that conditions in Weimar Germany were not substantially similar to those in the United States today. The world was in a deep depression, with millions out of work and many on the verge of starvation. Germany's parliamentary system guaranteed a level of instability that lent itself to the possibility of a coup such as Adolf Hitler's in 1933. Above all, the level of violence in German society hovered just below that of civil war. In the country's cities, pitched battles between Nazi Stormtroopers and Communist activists were common. And the Nazis' deep-seated anti-Semitism manifested in violent outbursts that preceded Hitler's accession to the chancellor's office.
Sadly, however, there is one fundamental way that today's Right-Wing Republicans mirror the Nazis: a total lack of respect for truth. In the Guardian (July 14, 2018), Michiko Kakutani quotes Hannah Arendt in drawing this analogy: "The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction (ie the reality of experience) and the distinction between true and false (ie the standards of thought) no longer exist.” Kakutani notes that Donald Trump "made 2,140 false or misleading claims during his first year in office–an average of 5.9 a day." The behavior of many other leading Republicans is hardly much better, if only because they steadfastly refuse to counter or even acknowledge this unceasing barrage of lies. This is, indeed, how democracy dies.
Benjamin Carter is also the author of a previous, closely related book, Burning the Reichstag: An Investigation into the Third Reich’s Enduring Mystery.
July 19, 2021
3,5/5
Hett má za sebou dve výborné knihy (Death in Tiergarten, 2004, čo je jeho prerobená dizertačka z Harvardu z r. 2001, a Crossing Hitler z r. 2008 o právnikovi Hansovi Littenovi, ktorého „znovuobjavil“ a vrátil do všeobecného povedomia, z ktorého sa Litten tak nejak nezaslúžene vytratil). Tretiu knihu, Burning the Reichstag, vydal v r. 2014 - no a tá je problematická. Hett neurobil úplne dobrú prácu pri analýze sekundárnej literatúry a niektoré dôležité práce vynechal alebo nezohľadnil, viaceré výpovede svedkov neanalyzoval dostatočne kriticky atď. Komplikovaný problém, skrátka Hett (s najväčšou pravdepodobnosťou) chybne tvrdil, že požiar v Reichstagu malo na svedomí viacero mužov, nie len van der Lubbe, a že to celé bolo vymyslené a vykonané na príkaz Göringa a Goebbelsa, ktorí poslali Reichstag podpáliť jednotkám SA. A tie sa tam dokonca podľa Hetta mali dostať tajnou chodbou z Göringovej rezidencie. A aby sme nezabudli, týchto členov SA potom mali údajne zavraždiť aby sa zbavili svedkov, a tým pádom nemáme dôkazy. Že to smrdí konšpiračnou teóriou? No.. Asi najlepšie zhrnutie všetkých dôvodov, prečo sa Hett mýlil pozri v knihe Richarda Evansa The Hitler Conpiracies, Penguin 2020, s. 101 – 114. V tejto knihe (Ako umiera demokracia) svoje závery síce neopravil, ku cti mu ale slúži aspoň to, že upozornil na to, že situácia nie je jasná a historici sa v tom nezhodujú (no ok teda) a definitívnym odpovediam sa diplomaticky vyhol. Nie je to ideál, ale aspoň tvrdohlavo netrval na svojom a dajme tomu že dokázal reflektovať kritiku (ktorej sa mu ušlo až až) - čo tiež nie je vec, ktorá sa podarí každému.
V tejto jeho, ak dobre počítam štvrtej samostatnej knihe (pri nejakých bol aj zostavovateľ) je nemálo vecí nedotiahnutých dokonca a možno až príliš zjednodušených – napr. na s. 74 píše o fotografii a videozázname z pohrebu Kurta Eisnera (1919), na ktorých je Hitler, čo ma dokazovať jeho sympatie k socializmu z obdobia tesne po 1. svetovej vojne. Tieot zábery skutočne existujú a dlhú dobu nedali zopár historikom spávať. Čo Hett ale nezmieni je, že sa to dá vysvetliť aj inak, než Hitlerovým socializmom. Napríklad mohlo ísť o platenú funkciu, keď bol Hitler z nedostatku peňazí donútený privyrobiť si ako profesionálny plačúci na pohrebe – v tom období to nebolo úplne nezvyčajné. Prípadne mohlo ísť jednoducho o to, že na pohreb šla celá Hitlerova jednotka (väčšina volila socialistov) a Hitler, o pár mesiacov už platený „špión“ Reichswehru, tam mohol byť jednoducho preto, lebo to vyžadovala situácia – buď aby ho kolegovia neodhalili či neprestali rešpektovať, alebo tam bol priamo na príkaz svojich nadriadených z armády. Tak či onak, možností je viac, Hett ponúkne čitateľovi len jednu, ako keby to bolo definitívne. Podobných vecí je v knihe viac.
Čo sa zjednodušení, prípadne nedostatočne vysvetlených záležitostí týka, aj tých je tam možno až príliš. „Liberál“ v medzivojnovom období znamená čosi veľmi odlišné od toho, čo si pod pojmom „liberál“ predstavujeme dnes – Hett to ale nevysvetlí a narába s týmito termínmi ako by šlo o identické veci (znova, podobných príkladov by sme našli viac). Na s. 239 napríklad píše, že príčinou vraždy Horsta Wessela bol jeho konflikt s domácou o nájomné, čo síce vlastne je pravda, no je to šialene zjednodušené.
Celkovo sa mi zdalo, že naratív knihy je prispôsobený americkému čitateľovi, čo ale asi len ťažko môže byť výčitkou, zároveň sa ale Hett miestami až príliš snažil navodiť atmosféru, že história sa opakuje a z knihy cítiť závan inštrumentalizácie histórie pre potreby súčasnej doby (aka Trump = Hitler). A s tým treba narábať veľmi opatrne (sám by som vedel rozprávať).
Napriek tomu všetkému Ako umiera demokracia nie je zlá kniha. Naopak. Z toho čo je na slovenskom knižnom trhu dostupné určite patrí medzi to lepšie a viem si predstaviť, že by som ju za istých okolností aj odporučil na čítanie. Hett ma viditeľne talent na písanie a miestami je kniha priam strhujúca. Mne sa ju podarilo prečítať za dva večery, osobne sa mi celkom pozdával aj netradičný príbehový úvod do každej kapitoly. Čo je ale omnoho dôležitejšie, naozaj komplikovanú politickú situáciu weimarskej republiky tesne pred jej smrťou a spleť intríg Schleichera, Hugenberga, von Papena a Hindeburga sa podarilo Hettovi vysvetliť dobre, podrobne, z odborného hľadiska na vysokej úrovni no zároveň veľmi pútavo. A to chce celkom spisovateľský kumšt a riadnu znalosť vtedajšej situácie. 3 hviezdičky sú na tu knihu málo, no 4 by boli veľa. Alebo takto - ak to hodnotíme ako odbornú knihu, 3/5, ak ako popularizačnú 4/5
Hett má za sebou dve výborné knihy (Death in Tiergarten, 2004, čo je jeho prerobená dizertačka z Harvardu z r. 2001, a Crossing Hitler z r. 2008 o právnikovi Hansovi Littenovi, ktorého „znovuobjavil“ a vrátil do všeobecného povedomia, z ktorého sa Litten tak nejak nezaslúžene vytratil). Tretiu knihu, Burning the Reichstag, vydal v r. 2014 - no a tá je problematická. Hett neurobil úplne dobrú prácu pri analýze sekundárnej literatúry a niektoré dôležité práce vynechal alebo nezohľadnil, viaceré výpovede svedkov neanalyzoval dostatočne kriticky atď. Komplikovaný problém, skrátka Hett (s najväčšou pravdepodobnosťou) chybne tvrdil, že požiar v Reichstagu malo na svedomí viacero mužov, nie len van der Lubbe, a že to celé bolo vymyslené a vykonané na príkaz Göringa a Goebbelsa, ktorí poslali Reichstag podpáliť jednotkám SA. A tie sa tam dokonca podľa Hetta mali dostať tajnou chodbou z Göringovej rezidencie. A aby sme nezabudli, týchto členov SA potom mali údajne zavraždiť aby sa zbavili svedkov, a tým pádom nemáme dôkazy. Že to smrdí konšpiračnou teóriou? No.. Asi najlepšie zhrnutie všetkých dôvodov, prečo sa Hett mýlil pozri v knihe Richarda Evansa The Hitler Conpiracies, Penguin 2020, s. 101 – 114. V tejto knihe (Ako umiera demokracia) svoje závery síce neopravil, ku cti mu ale slúži aspoň to, že upozornil na to, že situácia nie je jasná a historici sa v tom nezhodujú (no ok teda) a definitívnym odpovediam sa diplomaticky vyhol. Nie je to ideál, ale aspoň tvrdohlavo netrval na svojom a dajme tomu že dokázal reflektovať kritiku (ktorej sa mu ušlo až až) - čo tiež nie je vec, ktorá sa podarí každému.
V tejto jeho, ak dobre počítam štvrtej samostatnej knihe (pri nejakých bol aj zostavovateľ) je nemálo vecí nedotiahnutých dokonca a možno až príliš zjednodušených – napr. na s. 74 píše o fotografii a videozázname z pohrebu Kurta Eisnera (1919), na ktorých je Hitler, čo ma dokazovať jeho sympatie k socializmu z obdobia tesne po 1. svetovej vojne. Tieot zábery skutočne existujú a dlhú dobu nedali zopár historikom spávať. Čo Hett ale nezmieni je, že sa to dá vysvetliť aj inak, než Hitlerovým socializmom. Napríklad mohlo ísť o platenú funkciu, keď bol Hitler z nedostatku peňazí donútený privyrobiť si ako profesionálny plačúci na pohrebe – v tom období to nebolo úplne nezvyčajné. Prípadne mohlo ísť jednoducho o to, že na pohreb šla celá Hitlerova jednotka (väčšina volila socialistov) a Hitler, o pár mesiacov už platený „špión“ Reichswehru, tam mohol byť jednoducho preto, lebo to vyžadovala situácia – buď aby ho kolegovia neodhalili či neprestali rešpektovať, alebo tam bol priamo na príkaz svojich nadriadených z armády. Tak či onak, možností je viac, Hett ponúkne čitateľovi len jednu, ako keby to bolo definitívne. Podobných vecí je v knihe viac.
Čo sa zjednodušení, prípadne nedostatočne vysvetlených záležitostí týka, aj tých je tam možno až príliš. „Liberál“ v medzivojnovom období znamená čosi veľmi odlišné od toho, čo si pod pojmom „liberál“ predstavujeme dnes – Hett to ale nevysvetlí a narába s týmito termínmi ako by šlo o identické veci (znova, podobných príkladov by sme našli viac). Na s. 239 napríklad píše, že príčinou vraždy Horsta Wessela bol jeho konflikt s domácou o nájomné, čo síce vlastne je pravda, no je to šialene zjednodušené.
Celkovo sa mi zdalo, že naratív knihy je prispôsobený americkému čitateľovi, čo ale asi len ťažko môže byť výčitkou, zároveň sa ale Hett miestami až príliš snažil navodiť atmosféru, že história sa opakuje a z knihy cítiť závan inštrumentalizácie histórie pre potreby súčasnej doby (aka Trump = Hitler). A s tým treba narábať veľmi opatrne (sám by som vedel rozprávať).
Napriek tomu všetkému Ako umiera demokracia nie je zlá kniha. Naopak. Z toho čo je na slovenskom knižnom trhu dostupné určite patrí medzi to lepšie a viem si predstaviť, že by som ju za istých okolností aj odporučil na čítanie. Hett ma viditeľne talent na písanie a miestami je kniha priam strhujúca. Mne sa ju podarilo prečítať za dva večery, osobne sa mi celkom pozdával aj netradičný príbehový úvod do každej kapitoly. Čo je ale omnoho dôležitejšie, naozaj komplikovanú politickú situáciu weimarskej republiky tesne pred jej smrťou a spleť intríg Schleichera, Hugenberga, von Papena a Hindeburga sa podarilo Hettovi vysvetliť dobre, podrobne, z odborného hľadiska na vysokej úrovni no zároveň veľmi pútavo. A to chce celkom spisovateľský kumšt a riadnu znalosť vtedajšej situácie. 3 hviezdičky sú na tu knihu málo, no 4 by boli veľa. Alebo takto - ak to hodnotíme ako odbornú knihu, 3/5, ak ako popularizačnú 4/5
June 20, 2024
This is an excellent and remarkably concise (and gripping!) book of the end of German democracy in the 1930s. Hett is an impressive historian -- not only in the way he synthesizes so many developments leading up to the Night of the Long Knives, but in the way he presents disturbing parallels to the Orange Menace without overplaying his hand. It's genuinely unsettling to see how close Hitler and Trump are in their scheming. And anyone concerned about the future of democracy needs to read this book. Hett is so good that he got me to order the Hitler bio by Konrad Heiden, who William Shirer, of course, also leaned into heavily.
April 9, 2018
How Hitler was able to come into power in Germany has always been an interesting debate. What could have been differently? How much of our debates are 20-20 hindsight versus what was actually seen and known at the time? Could something like that ever happen again? Benjamin Carter Hett's The Death of Democracy: Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic is the latest look into the Germany of the 1920s and 1930s and an attempt to understand what happened.
Unfortunately, for as potentially interesting as the topic is, Hett completely failed to keep me engaged in the book. He assumes his reader is familiar with the Weimar republic and much of the German condition post World War I, and mentions conspiracies and people that he only later goes back to explain. There was a level of back and forth to his timeline that kept me uncertain of the order of many of the events he was talking about. I found it hard to keep track of the different political parties in Germany for most of the book, thought whether that was a lack of understanding on my part or Hett's to explain in memorable detail I still don't know. Often repetitive, hammering in points that the readers easily grasps and remembers while glancing off topics you wish he's spent more time on, Hett explores how no one single event created the situation, but decades of cultural, political, and economic change and unrest. By the end of the book I didn't feel like I had a much clearer grasp on the topic as when I started, but Hett did write one idea that stuck out to me, and probably summed up much of the situation: sometimes it isn't about reality. Statements can be demonstrably untrue, but it is all about what people emotionally need to believe, even in the face of evidence to the contrary.
For a book that was only a little over 200 pages, reading it seemed to be an uphill slog the whole way, and much more work than it was worth. Hett spent as much time making comparisons between Germany in the 1930s and the Nazi methods and today's American political climate (while carefully not naming names) that it seemed to me the end point of his book was not so much to explain how Hitler and the Nazis managed to come into power (which he had only limited success with for me) as showing how it can happen again today. Anyone who really wants to give this book a try to see what they can learn should just read the last chapter, which is as much a summary of the rest of the book as a wrap up and lead in to World War II. It gives you the clearest ideas without actually making you read the entire book.
I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review
Unfortunately, for as potentially interesting as the topic is, Hett completely failed to keep me engaged in the book. He assumes his reader is familiar with the Weimar republic and much of the German condition post World War I, and mentions conspiracies and people that he only later goes back to explain. There was a level of back and forth to his timeline that kept me uncertain of the order of many of the events he was talking about. I found it hard to keep track of the different political parties in Germany for most of the book, thought whether that was a lack of understanding on my part or Hett's to explain in memorable detail I still don't know. Often repetitive, hammering in points that the readers easily grasps and remembers while glancing off topics you wish he's spent more time on, Hett explores how no one single event created the situation, but decades of cultural, political, and economic change and unrest. By the end of the book I didn't feel like I had a much clearer grasp on the topic as when I started, but Hett did write one idea that stuck out to me, and probably summed up much of the situation: sometimes it isn't about reality. Statements can be demonstrably untrue, but it is all about what people emotionally need to believe, even in the face of evidence to the contrary.
For a book that was only a little over 200 pages, reading it seemed to be an uphill slog the whole way, and much more work than it was worth. Hett spent as much time making comparisons between Germany in the 1930s and the Nazi methods and today's American political climate (while carefully not naming names) that it seemed to me the end point of his book was not so much to explain how Hitler and the Nazis managed to come into power (which he had only limited success with for me) as showing how it can happen again today. Anyone who really wants to give this book a try to see what they can learn should just read the last chapter, which is as much a summary of the rest of the book as a wrap up and lead in to World War II. It gives you the clearest ideas without actually making you read the entire book.
I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review
September 3, 2018
This is a history focusing on the Nazi seizure of power in Germany. I have been reading it in conjunction with the Winkler book on German political history, since it nearly overlaps between the two volumes at ther transition. The focus is from the shift away from a parliamentary cabinet to a presidential cabinet leading eventually to the appointment of Hitler as Chancellor and then the story of the Nazi consolidation of power through the emergency decree, the process of coordination, and finally the “Night of the Long Knives” in 1934. To set the stage for this story, the author provides a masterful summary and interpretation of the Weimar Republic and its links to the traumatic German experience in the World War I. Professor Hett sees the failure of Weimar and the rise of the Nazis as directly related to the myths that grew up after the German defeat around the supposed glorious start of the war in August 1914 and the treacherous “stab in the back” by Republican politicians in the November 1918 revolution.
The story is well known of course, although Hett does a fine job at explaining the unsavory dynamics that led to Hitler’s rise and that fail to square with simplistic notions about the basis of the Nazis in democratic electoral outcomes. The book is especially valuable in tying the story to the strange set of actors that brought about this landmark and infamous result. For example, I had not known much about the potential pressures on Hindenburg to appoint Hitler out of fear of impeachment or even criminal liability for violating the requirements of the Weimar constitution. While this is certainly not “what if” history, it is hard to escape the conclusion that events could have turned out very differently here.
The book is well written and reminds me of Erik Larsen’s “In the Garden of Beasts”, which overlaps with this account in its concluding chapters. I also think the author may have given some thought to similarities between the situation in Germany in the late 1920s and early 1930s, although the analogies are not overemphasized or overdone by and large (page 53 for example).
This is a powerful book, with sufficient background and detail to be valuable to those who are less than fully familiar with the detailed histories of the Nazi and Weimar regimes.
The story is well known of course, although Hett does a fine job at explaining the unsavory dynamics that led to Hitler’s rise and that fail to square with simplistic notions about the basis of the Nazis in democratic electoral outcomes. The book is especially valuable in tying the story to the strange set of actors that brought about this landmark and infamous result. For example, I had not known much about the potential pressures on Hindenburg to appoint Hitler out of fear of impeachment or even criminal liability for violating the requirements of the Weimar constitution. While this is certainly not “what if” history, it is hard to escape the conclusion that events could have turned out very differently here.
The book is well written and reminds me of Erik Larsen’s “In the Garden of Beasts”, which overlaps with this account in its concluding chapters. I also think the author may have given some thought to similarities between the situation in Germany in the late 1920s and early 1930s, although the analogies are not overemphasized or overdone by and large (page 53 for example).
This is a powerful book, with sufficient background and detail to be valuable to those who are less than fully familiar with the detailed histories of the Nazi and Weimar regimes.
May 7, 2020
I didn't realize how much I needed to read this book until I read it. I was always fuzzy on the details of how Hitler came to power, but his rise was always presented as so inexorable that I guess I just sort of accepted that all of Germany went crazy.
This book is dire and depressing and terrible, but it still inspired hope in me, because I realized that of course Hitler's takeover of Germany was a process during which many people made many decisions that could have gone another way--if they just hadn't been such right-wing shits:
Which of course means that we have opportunities to reverse our own trajectory, because it's easy to see what sort of trajectory we are on. Without going out of its way to do so, the book underscores correspondences between Germany before the war and the US today:
Especially striking was the Hett's discussion of Nazi irrationality:
And I cannot resist sharing this whim of fate, because it is truly grotesque:
This book is dire and depressing and terrible, but it still inspired hope in me, because I realized that of course Hitler's takeover of Germany was a process during which many people made many decisions that could have gone another way--if they just hadn't been such right-wing shits:
After the catastrophes of Nazi rule, it has often been argued that Hindenburg had no choice but to appoint Hitler. Testifying at Nuremberg after the war, Hitler’s finance minister, Count Lutz Schwerin von Krosigk, said that “no one, not even the strongest opponent of Hitler, has yet told me what possibility there was in 1933 other than calling on the leader of the strongest party, since the parliament could not itself produce an administration.” Meissner quoted these words approvingly in his memoirs, but this claim obscures how much responsibility conservative politicians such as Krosigk and Meisnner themselves bore for what happened. Hermann Muller’s government in 1928-30 had had a stable majority. Heinrich Bruning had won a confidence vote in the Reichstag just days before Hindenburg sacked him. There was no need to call an election in 1932. The crisis and the deadlock of 1932 and early 1933, to which Hitler appeared as the only solution, was manufactured by a political right wing that wanted to exclude more than half the population from political representation and refused even the mildest compromise. To this end, a succession of conservative politicians (Hugenberg, Bruning, Papen and Hindenberg) courted the Nazis as the only way to retain power on terms congenial to them. Hitler’s regime was the result. (181-182)
Which of course means that we have opportunities to reverse our own trajectory, because it's easy to see what sort of trajectory we are on. Without going out of its way to do so, the book underscores correspondences between Germany before the war and the US today:
Autarky [economic independence or self-sufficiency; see also "Germany first" or "America first"] was central to the Nazis’ political campaigns, and the theme of freeing Germany from its dependence on a hostile world clearly struck a chord with voters. The canny party propagandist Joseph Goebbels wrote in 1932 that a nation that couldn’t manage to get control over the “necessary space, natural forces and natural resources for its material life” would inevitably “fall into dependence on foreign countries and lose its freedom.” The outcome of the First World War and the nature of the postwar world had proven this clearly, he claimed. “Thus a thick wall around Germany?” he asked. “Certainly we want to build a wall, a protective wall.”(109)
Especially striking was the Hett's discussion of Nazi irrationality:
The best explanation of Nazism that [Peter] Drucker had ever encountered came from a Nazi agitator “whom, many years ago, I heard proclaim to a wildly cheering peasants’ meeting: ‘We don't want lower bread prices, we don't want higher bread prices, we don't want unchanged bread prices—we want National Socialist bread prices.’” Since their logically inconsistent rage and hatred could never deliver any satisfactory social progress, the Nazis’ only recourse was this kind of irrationality: Nazism could only “accomplish its task through a miracle.” Higher bread prices, lower bread prices, and unchanged bread prices, “have all failed. The only hope lies in a kind of bread price which is none of these, which nobody has ever seen before, and which belies the evidence of one's reason.” (197)
The cynical dishonesty of the Nazis' propaganda received a significant boost from the cult or irrationality that drove their followers: the contempt for, indeed the revolution against, Enlightenment rationality. (194)
Hitler pulled all this together—the deliberate dishonesty, the concern with public personality, and yet also the desire to revel in this irrationality. The Nazis’ emphasis on race as the key to history, and racial thinking as the answer to all problems, grew out of both prewar irrationality and wartime violence. Nazi racial thinking was consciously anti-intellectual; “thinking with the blood” was its watchword. (196)
And I cannot resist sharing this whim of fate, because it is truly grotesque:
Right at the beginning we find one of those points of uncertainty with significant implications. Hitler’s father [Alois] was born out of wedlock. Extensive research has never brought full clarity on the identity of Alois’s father. His mother was Maria Anna Schicklgruber, and Alois bore the name Schicklgruber until he was thirty-nine. The most likely candidate for his father is one of the Hiedler brothers, Johann Georg and Johann Nepomuk. Johann Georg married Maria Anna after Alois’s birth, but never gave him name to his wife’s child. It was only after Johann Georg’s death that Johann Nepomuk arranged for Alois to be legally declared Johann Georg’s son, and only then did Alois change his name to Hiedler, though he spelled it “Hitler.” Such spelling variations were common in rural Austria in those days....
Hitler said later that his father’s change of name was the biggest favor Alois had ever done him. It is hard to imagine rapturous crowds yelling “Heil Schicklgruber”—at least outside of a satire like Charlie Chaplin’s film The Great Dictator. (42-43)
March 22, 2025
În 1933 puțini germani își puteau închipui Treblinka sau Auschwitz, execuțiile în masă de la Babi Iar sau marșurile morții din ultimele luni ale celui de-al Doilea Război Mondial. Este greu să-i învinovățim că nu au anticipat ceea ce era de neconceput. Cu toate acestea, inocența le-a jucat feste și s-au înșelat catastrofal în privința viitorului lor. Noi, care trăim într-o epocă ulterioară, avem un singur avantaj față de ei: avem exemplul lor înaintea ochilor. (p. 220)
Nu-mi doream neapărat să citesc o carte despre ascensiunea lui Hitler. Am fost mai degrabă intrigat de titlu. Aveam speranța că autorul a identificat niște lecții, niște reguli general valabile utile pentru prezent. Nu a fost să fie. E o carte de istorie despre cum a murit democrația în Republica de la Weimar. Atât.
Autorul documentează și prezintă foarte bine și în detaliu modul în care șubreda democrație germană s-a dezintegrat în anii ’20-’30 ai secolului trecut și combinația de circumstanțe care i-a permis lui Hitler să ajungă la putere și să o acapareze total. Prăbușirea democrației, potrivit autorului, nu a fost un eveniment inevitabil, ci mai degrabă rezultatul unor calcule politice greșite și a unor serii de întâmplări nefericite.
Puțini dintre membrii grupurilor insurgente din Republica de la Weimar voiau o dictatură fără legi și barbară, condusă de cineva ca Hitler. Ei pur și simplu își doreau cele mai rapide și mai ușoare soluții la propriile probleme și nu voiau să facă niciun compromis cu adversarii lor. Când naziștii s-au dovedit a fi politicienii cei mai pricepuți la captarea resentimentelor celor nemulțumiți, în special ale protestanților din mediul rural, ecuația politică s-a schimbat. După 1929 nu a mai existat nicio coaliție antidemocratică viabilă care să nu-i includă pe Hitler și pe naziști. (p. 219)
Hett arată că elita conservatoare a crezut că poate controla mișcarea nazistă și o poate folosi pentru a-și atinge propriile scopuri, subestimând pericolul pe care Hitler îl reprezenta pentru democrație. Una a dus la alta pe drumul pierzaniei până când o întoarcere la democrație a devenit imposibilă. Asta de la nivelul elitelor conducătoare.
Pentru germanii de rând lucrurile au fost mai simple. Politicienii pur și simplu au exploatat clivajele și miturile care circulau în societate. Cei din sate îi urau pe cei din orașe, în special din Berlin, pentru stilul lor de viață, pentru libertățile sexuale, pentru cât de deconectați erau de realitatea muncitorilor și țăranilor. O mulțime de imigranți, veniți în special din est după Primul Război Mondial, creau neliniște. Crize economice suprapuse, pentru care guvernele nu aveau soluții, timp sau disponibilitate de a le rezolva. Două mituri suprapuse – al unității germane din august 1914 și al înfrângerii/trădării din 1918 – au fost instrumentalizate de naziști pentru a câștiga simpatii. Peste toate mai era și un limbaj antisemit codificat, promovat de naziști. Oboseală și nevoia de soluții simple.
Naziștii ar fi fost de neconceput fără Primul Război Mondial, și aici, chiar la începutul poveștii, vedem altceva: trauma înfrângerii i-a făcut pe milioane de germani să creadă o anumită poveste despre război nu pentru că era un adevăr demonstrabil, ci pentru că era necesar din punct de vedere emoțional. Națiunea trăise gloria unității sub soarele din august 1914 – sau cel puțin așa credeau majoritatea germanilor. Dar, sub ploaia rece din noiembrie 1918, trădarea și lașitatea din țară – „cuțitul în spate” – aduseseră înfrângerea pe câmpul de luptă. Nicio parte a acestei povești nu era exactă, dar contrastul constant dintre august și noiembrie le-a permis naziștilor să promită c�� vor readuce unitatea din august după ce vor învinge trădarea din noiembrie. Ceea ce crede un popor despre trecutul său este cel puțin la fel de important ca și ceea ce s-a întâmplat de fapt în acest trecut. (pp. 217-8)
Când naziștii au înregistrat prima lor victorie, în 1930, prim-ministrul Prusiei, Otto Braun, a declarat că nu ideea de democrație a eșuat. Eșecul era mai degrabă al „unei părți considerabile a poporului german”, care nu s-a dovedit a fi la înălțimea „responsabilității aflate deodată pe umerii săi”. La începutul anului 1933, veteranul avocat și politician social-democrat Wolfgang Heine îi scria prietenului său Carl Severing: „Mi se pare că nici clasa muncitoare nu era încă suficient de matură pentru a-și exprima voința democratică”. Severing a răspuns că „era de la sine înțeles” că e de acord. El a adăugat că nu Constituția de la Weimar era de vină pentru rezultate. Problema o constituiau „oamenii care erau lipsiți de educație politică și care nu știau cum să folosească corect drepturile ce le fuseseră acordate”. Socialistul revoluționar Ernst Toller a atins aceeași coardă în sumbra autobiografie pe care a terminat-o după ce a plecat în exil în 1933: „Oamenii s-au săturat de rațiune, s-au săturat de gândire și de reflecție. Ei se întreabă ce a făcut rațiunea în ultimii ani, ce bine ne-au făcut înțelegerea și cunoașterea”. (p. 188)
Pentru naziști, statutul de evreu avea prea puțină legătură cu religia. Un om care era definit drept evreu nu își putea schimba statutul prin convertire. Evreii germani, indiferent de câtă vreme se aflau familiile lor în Germania, oricât de asimilate erau, indiferent dacă se convertiseră la creștinism, indiferent dacă fuseră în armată și își vărsaseră sângele în tranșeele Marelui Război, nu puteau fi cetățeni ai unui Reich nazist. (p. 102)
„Gloatele sunt leneșe și lașe”, scrie el [Hitler] în Mein Kampf. Nu are niciun rost să încerci să le convingi prin mesaje sofisticate despre tarife sau niveluri de taxare ori detalii despre tratate externe. Greșeala politicienilor „burghezi” (liberali din clasa mijlocie) era că încercau să facă asta, să țină prelegeri savante și anoste despre politică. Oamenii obișnuiți nu pot înțelege asemenea lucruri și nici nu au chef să încerce. Pentru a fi înțeles de mintea oamenilor obișnuiți, un mesaj trebuie să fie simplu. Trebuie să fie emoțional – ura funcționează bine –, nu intelectual. Și trebuie repetat la nesfârșit. (p. 49)
Toată înșiruirea cronologică de detalii politice și biografii este oarecum obositoare pentru cititorul neavizat. Nu cred că ajută nici traducerea și nici felul în care a fost editată cartea în română.
În Reichstag, în februarie 1932, Goebbels a stârnit indignare în rândul social-democraților spunând că sunt „partidul dezertorilor”. Deputați din toate partidele s-au ridicat să-1 apostrofeze. [...] Răspunsul cel mai direct și mai colorat a venit din partea lui Kurt Schumacher, un social-democrat din Prusia Occidentală, care va deveni faimos în calitate de lider curajos și carismatic al social-democraților în primii ani de după al Doilea Război Mondial. Și Schumacher luptase în război și fusese rănit. Nu avea rost să se protesteze oficial împotriva felului în care se comportase Goebbels, a afirmat el. „Toată agitația asta național-socialistă”, a continuat, „este un apel constant la porcinele din interiorul ființelor umane. Dacă e să recunoaștem vreun merit național-socialismului, este faptul că a reușit pentru prima dată în politica germană să mobilizeze complet prostia umană”. Cu o desconsiderație nimicitoare, el a conchis că naziștii pot „face tot ce le place, dar niciodată nu vor egala disprețul nostru față de ei”. (p. 126)
Intelectualul conservator Edgar Julius Jung și redactorul Rudolf Pechel urmăresc procesiunea [o paradă] împreună, dezgustați. În cele din urmă, Jung se întoarce către Pechel și spune: „Nu e îngrozitor cât de singuri suntem în acest popor german, pe care îl iubim atât de mult?”. Reacția cea mai plină de miez vine de la marele pictor impresionist Max Liebermann, în timp ce urmărește marșul de la fereastra apartamentului său de pe bulevardul Unter den Linden: „Nu pot mânca pe cât de mult aș vrea să vomit”.
Este 30 ianuarie 1933.
Dimineață, președintele Reichului, Paul von Hindenburg, l-a învestit pe Adolf Hitler în funcția de cancelar al Reichului. (p. 158)
3,5/5
May 26, 2025
This is a very accessible yet detailed political history of the Weimar Republic, specifically focused on how German democracy in the 1920's and 1930's was undermined to pave the way for the Third Reich. There were so many interesting figures operating in German politics and society at this time that I had never heard of and greatly enjoyed learning about. I was aware that the Nazis legally gained power but did not fully grasp how German conservatives like Hindenburg and many others enabled Hitler's ascent to chancellor for selfish and ideological reasons.
October 14, 2018
Men zou kunnen stellen dat de Amerikaanse historicus Benjamin Carter Hett met De Populist een zoveelste werk over Adolf Hitler heeft geschreven. Ian Kershaw en Joachim Fest gingen hem voor met biografieën over Hitler. Carter Hett zelf schreef eerder boeken over de Rijksdagbrand (De rijksdag staat in brand) en over advocaat Hans Litten die Hitler aan een kruisverhoor onderwierp tijdens een rechtszaak in 1931 (Crossing Hitler).
Met De Populist wordt duidelijk dat de eerder geponeerde stelling niet opgaat. Alle opgebouwde kennis die de auteur heeft laten zien in zijn eerdere boeken, bundelt hij in dit boek. Daarnaast kijkt hij direct een stap verder dan anderen tot nu toe deden: het huidige decennium wordt bij het verhaal getrokken als waarschuwing voor onze democratieën. Leiders of kandidaat-leiders met radicale uitspraken worden altijd tot bezinning gebracht als ze eenmaal de macht (in zicht) hebben, zo was de ervaring tot de jaren 1930. En áls ze eenmaal een machtspositie verworven hebben, worden ze toch vanzelf tegengehouden door de functionerende democratische instellingen. Een associatie met de huidige tijd is snel gemaakt als je aan de Amerikaanse presidentsverkiezingen van 2016 denkt.
Dat het tegenhouden van antidemocratische krachten in Duitsland na de verkiezingen in 1932 niet zo gemakkelijk ging, zet Carter Hett uiteen in enkele hoofdstukken. Op een fijn leesbare manier lees je hoe en waarom president Paul von Hindenburg en vicekanselier Franz von Papen juist Hitler tot kanselier benoemden en hem in hun zak dachten te hebben. Toen in januari 1933, Hitler was net benoemd, direct geweldsexplosies plaatsvonden door nazistormtroepen, meende de publieke opinie dat hij nog steeds gestopt kon worden met wetten. Helaas werden kranten en politieke manifestaties van de oppositie verboden en kon er nauwelijks nog campagne gevoerd worden. Op 27 januari 1933 veranderde alles door de brand in de Rijksdag te Berlijn. Het ‘Decreet van rijkspresident von Hindenburg ter bescherming van volk en staat’ oftewel het ‘Rijksdagbranddecreet’ maakte het mogelijk direct de noodtoestand uit te roepen in het Duitse Rijk. Alle burgerlijke vrijheden (van meningsuiting, vergadering en vereniging, briefgeheim…) werden per direct opgeheven, waardoor de fundamenten van een goed werkende democratie weggeslagen werden.
Uiteraard komt de nipte overwinning van 1932 van de nationaalsocialisten niet uit de lucht vallen. Ook hierover geeft de auteur uitvoerig uitleg, want het is te eenvoudig om te stellen dat het Verdrag van Versailles alleen de voedingsbodem heeft gelegd voor Hitlers onvrede. Carter Hett laat duidelijk zien dat de Weimarrepubliek weliswaar een moderne democratie was, maar dat men in het Duitse Rijk niet goed wist hiermee om te gaan. Niet voor niets waren er eenentwintig kabinetten in veertien jaar tijd.
In de inleiding van het boek komt de vraag naar voren waarom de opkomst van Hitler nu weer besproken dient te worden. Carter Hett geeft hiervoor twee redenen: het opnieuw vrijkomen van bronnenmateriaal uit gesloten archieven en de daaruit voortkomende herijking van de als bekend veronderstelde gegevens. Ook de wisseling van generaties speelt een rol, aangezien er in elke generatie ruimte is om de geschiedenis in een ander licht te bezien. Juist daarom kon dit werk niet eerder geschreven worden en past het uitstekend in deze tijd, waarin de democratie in enkele werelddelen onder druk staat.
Al met al is dit boek in verschillende opzichten een goed leesbaar overzichtswerk voor zowel de geïnteresseerde leek als de geoefende historicus. De Populist is een titel die niet misstaat op de Tweede Wereldoorlogboekenplank!
Met De Populist wordt duidelijk dat de eerder geponeerde stelling niet opgaat. Alle opgebouwde kennis die de auteur heeft laten zien in zijn eerdere boeken, bundelt hij in dit boek. Daarnaast kijkt hij direct een stap verder dan anderen tot nu toe deden: het huidige decennium wordt bij het verhaal getrokken als waarschuwing voor onze democratieën. Leiders of kandidaat-leiders met radicale uitspraken worden altijd tot bezinning gebracht als ze eenmaal de macht (in zicht) hebben, zo was de ervaring tot de jaren 1930. En áls ze eenmaal een machtspositie verworven hebben, worden ze toch vanzelf tegengehouden door de functionerende democratische instellingen. Een associatie met de huidige tijd is snel gemaakt als je aan de Amerikaanse presidentsverkiezingen van 2016 denkt.
Dat het tegenhouden van antidemocratische krachten in Duitsland na de verkiezingen in 1932 niet zo gemakkelijk ging, zet Carter Hett uiteen in enkele hoofdstukken. Op een fijn leesbare manier lees je hoe en waarom president Paul von Hindenburg en vicekanselier Franz von Papen juist Hitler tot kanselier benoemden en hem in hun zak dachten te hebben. Toen in januari 1933, Hitler was net benoemd, direct geweldsexplosies plaatsvonden door nazistormtroepen, meende de publieke opinie dat hij nog steeds gestopt kon worden met wetten. Helaas werden kranten en politieke manifestaties van de oppositie verboden en kon er nauwelijks nog campagne gevoerd worden. Op 27 januari 1933 veranderde alles door de brand in de Rijksdag te Berlijn. Het ‘Decreet van rijkspresident von Hindenburg ter bescherming van volk en staat’ oftewel het ‘Rijksdagbranddecreet’ maakte het mogelijk direct de noodtoestand uit te roepen in het Duitse Rijk. Alle burgerlijke vrijheden (van meningsuiting, vergadering en vereniging, briefgeheim…) werden per direct opgeheven, waardoor de fundamenten van een goed werkende democratie weggeslagen werden.
Uiteraard komt de nipte overwinning van 1932 van de nationaalsocialisten niet uit de lucht vallen. Ook hierover geeft de auteur uitvoerig uitleg, want het is te eenvoudig om te stellen dat het Verdrag van Versailles alleen de voedingsbodem heeft gelegd voor Hitlers onvrede. Carter Hett laat duidelijk zien dat de Weimarrepubliek weliswaar een moderne democratie was, maar dat men in het Duitse Rijk niet goed wist hiermee om te gaan. Niet voor niets waren er eenentwintig kabinetten in veertien jaar tijd.
In de inleiding van het boek komt de vraag naar voren waarom de opkomst van Hitler nu weer besproken dient te worden. Carter Hett geeft hiervoor twee redenen: het opnieuw vrijkomen van bronnenmateriaal uit gesloten archieven en de daaruit voortkomende herijking van de als bekend veronderstelde gegevens. Ook de wisseling van generaties speelt een rol, aangezien er in elke generatie ruimte is om de geschiedenis in een ander licht te bezien. Juist daarom kon dit werk niet eerder geschreven worden en past het uitstekend in deze tijd, waarin de democratie in enkele werelddelen onder druk staat.
Al met al is dit boek in verschillende opzichten een goed leesbaar overzichtswerk voor zowel de geïnteresseerde leek als de geoefende historicus. De Populist is een titel die niet misstaat op de Tweede Wereldoorlogboekenplank!
October 25, 2024
So much information that I had to listen and read at the same time. It's scary how history is repeating itself and some comments by Hitler are what we're hearing now, almost verbatim! Worth the read.
February 16, 2025
"Written laws on their own seldom mean very much, or, rather, they can mean many things, which amounts to the same thing. Laws cannot apply themselves. What matters is the whole cultural and political context in which fallible humans are going to execute them." The Death of Democracy: Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic by Benjamin Hett (2018)
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February 15, 2024
"He who saves his Country does not violate any Law," U.S. President Donald J. Trump on Truth Social February 15, 2024
April 30, 2024
Whether or not he was kidding about bringing a tyrannical end to our 248-year experiment in democracy, I ask him, Don’t you see why many Americans see such talk of dictatorship as contrary to our most cherished principles? Trump says no. Quite the opposite, he insists. “I think a lot of people like it.” (How Far Would Trump Go by Eric Cortellessa)
December 3, 2022
“Do you throw the Presidential Election Results of 2020 OUT and declare the RIGHTFUL WINNER, or do you have a NEW ELECTION? A Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.” Donald J. Trump on Truth Social (emphasis mine)
Sep 20, 2021
"When the courts stop you, stand before the country, like Andrew Jackson did, and say, 'The chief justice has made his ruling. Now let him enforce it." J.D. Vance on Jack Murphy Podcast.
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February 15, 2024
"He who saves his Country does not violate any Law," U.S. President Donald J. Trump on Truth Social February 15, 2024
April 30, 2024
Whether or not he was kidding about bringing a tyrannical end to our 248-year experiment in democracy, I ask him, Don’t you see why many Americans see such talk of dictatorship as contrary to our most cherished principles? Trump says no. Quite the opposite, he insists. “I think a lot of people like it.” (How Far Would Trump Go by Eric Cortellessa)
December 3, 2022
“Do you throw the Presidential Election Results of 2020 OUT and declare the RIGHTFUL WINNER, or do you have a NEW ELECTION? A Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.” Donald J. Trump on Truth Social (emphasis mine)
Sep 20, 2021
"When the courts stop you, stand before the country, like Andrew Jackson did, and say, 'The chief justice has made his ruling. Now let him enforce it." J.D. Vance on Jack Murphy Podcast.
April 1, 2018
Four out of Five Stars
I received a free Kindle copy of The Death of Democracy by Benjamin Carter Hett courtesy of Net Galley and Henry Holt and Company, the publisher. It was with the understanding that I would post a review on Net Galley, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes and Noble and my fiction book review blog. I also posted it to my Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google Plus pages.
I requested this book as I have read a number of books on World War II and the rise of Nazi Germany. The description made this one sound interesting as it promised a different view of the rise of the Nazi Party. It is the first book by Benjamin Carter Hett that I have read.
The subtitle of the book "Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic" provides a good overview of the subject of the book. The title is a little deceiving in that a quick glance could lead the casual observer to think that it is a book dealing with the events of modern day America.
This book is well written and researched and the author provides plenty of detail addressing some of the myths to the Nazi rise to power while also showing that many of the incidents were real. What I enjoyed most about this book was that the author clearly pointed out what was supposition that could not be factually proven where many other books present it as fact.
I recommend this book to anyone who has an interest in the Nazi Party's rise to power in Germany and the circumstances that lead up to it.
I received a free Kindle copy of The Death of Democracy by Benjamin Carter Hett courtesy of Net Galley and Henry Holt and Company, the publisher. It was with the understanding that I would post a review on Net Galley, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes and Noble and my fiction book review blog. I also posted it to my Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google Plus pages.
I requested this book as I have read a number of books on World War II and the rise of Nazi Germany. The description made this one sound interesting as it promised a different view of the rise of the Nazi Party. It is the first book by Benjamin Carter Hett that I have read.
The subtitle of the book "Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic" provides a good overview of the subject of the book. The title is a little deceiving in that a quick glance could lead the casual observer to think that it is a book dealing with the events of modern day America.
This book is well written and researched and the author provides plenty of detail addressing some of the myths to the Nazi rise to power while also showing that many of the incidents were real. What I enjoyed most about this book was that the author clearly pointed out what was supposition that could not be factually proven where many other books present it as fact.
I recommend this book to anyone who has an interest in the Nazi Party's rise to power in Germany and the circumstances that lead up to it.
September 11, 2022
Cineva spunea că democrația se câștigă greu și se pierde ușor. Cum a fost cazul ca una dintre cele mai democratice țări ale lumii, Germania de după primul război mondial să cadă pradă uneia dintre cele mai sângeroase dictaturi este scopul acestei lucrări. Germania Republicii de la Weimar, prin constituția din 1919, al cărei artizan a fost Hugo Preuss, care s-a simțit constrâns să copieze pur și simplu Constituția americană, era un exemplu de succes al unei democrații moderne și avansate care făcuse din Germania deceniului al treilea un reper de prim rang în rândul democrațiilor occidentale pe mai multe planuri: drepturile omului (mișcarea cea mai amplă din lume pentru drepturile homosexualilor; mișcarea feministă care obținuse pentru femei dreptul la vot și milita pentru dreptul la avort; renunțarea la pedeapsa cu moartea; ziua de muncă de 8 ore cu plata integrală a muncitorilor), în cultură și artă (pictorii germani realizau opere unice și valoroase; arhitectura care a influențat puternic epoca; în muzică nemții deveniseră neîntrecuți; filmele rivalizau cu cele de la Hollywood; literatura se ridica la cele mai înalte standarde europene), în știință și educație, Germania de după marele război era fără egal.
Noua republică, din noiembrie 1918, modernă, cu principiile ei democratice, materialistă, revolta tabăra protestanților a căror viziune asupra naturii umane era mai pesimistă și considera că doar un stat autoritar putea corecta această tendință. În 1925, un teolog protestant afirma că: "Alianța dintre iluminismul materialist și democrație este de obicei simptomul tipic al declinului popoarelor". Drept urmare tabăra protestantă a clasei de mijloc a migrat spre nazism, alături de o minoritate catolică și socialistă — protestanții din clasa muncitoare au rămas însă în tabăra social democrată.
Dar urmările războiului mondial și ezitările guvernării de la Weimar au costat mai mult decât libertatea Germaniei. Ce s-a întâmplat în 1933, când Hitler a prealuat puterea, și după anul fatidic —întrabă autorul— a fost cauzat de faptul că Germania nu era suficient de democratică sau că era prea democratică? Sau din cauza elitelor prea puternice și imposibil de controlat sau că masele n-au funcționat precum niște cetățeni responsabili? Erau naziștii prea conservatori sau prea revoluționari? „Nazismul a fost o problemă specific germană sau o manifestare a unei crize mai ample?” Lucrarea de față încearcă să ofere niște răspunsuri făcând lumină prin dezvelirea straturilor de sedimente istorice care se depun mereu unul peste altul odată cu trecerea timpului.
Povestea nu poate clarifica imaginea dacă autorul nu face o incursiune exact la începuturile instaurării Republicii de la Weimar, o analiză succintă a perioadei imediat postbelice, a partidelor politice și personajelor care le conduc, a liderilor statului și, nu în ultimul rând, al vinei înfrângerii, căci vina va defini mai departe situația politică și zbaterile întregii națiuni. Era nazismul inevitaibil? Ascensiunea extremei drepte în Germania anilor 30 este o altă mărturie a fragilității democrației. Democrația este fragilă. În 1930, când naziștii reușesc prima victorie electorală, prim-ministrul Prusiei, Otto Braun nu consideră asta un eșec al ideii de democație, ci vina este a unei bune părți a poporului german care nu a fost la înălțimea „responsabilității aflate deodată pe umerii săi”. Trei ani mai târziu, social democratul Wolfgang Heine scria într-o scrisoare că muncitorii nu aveau încă suficientă maturitate pentru a-și exprima voința democratică.
Oamenii nu știau să-și aprecieze îndeajuns drepturile oferite de-o constituție democrată, „oamenii care erau lipsiți de educație politică și care nu știau cum să folosească corect drepturile ce le fuseseră acordate”. Astfel de oameni, scrie și socialistul Ernst Toller, „s-au săturat de rațiune, s-au săturat de gândire și reflecție. Ei se întreabă ce a făcut rațiunea în ultimii ani, ce bine ne-au făcut înțelegerea și cunoașterea”. Și nazismul a profitat din plin din acest cult al iraționalității dezvoltând printre altele, în disprețul lor față de ideile iluministe raționale, ideea de „a gândi cu sângele”. Odată cu respingerea raționalității, doctrina respingea concepte precum Occident liberal și capitalist, concepte care se întruneau în mult blamata de către conservatori (și a aliaților naziști) Republică de la Weimar. Un viitor antinazist, conservatorul Edgar Julius Jung critica Republica ca fiind „descoperire tardivă a Iluminismului în centrul Europei”, înglobând în ea valorile democratice și liberale ale Revoluției Franceze, din 1789, iar datoria germanilor, afirma mai departe Jung, era să se opună Iluminismului prin „tradiție, sânge și spirit”. Jung se va trezi mult prea târziu din tirada aceasta naționalistă, fiind una dintre victimele „Nopții cuțitelor lungi”.
Democrația a căzut în cele din urmă victimă forțelor centrifuge ale societății. Democrația este fragilă tocmai din cauza tendinței ei de a îngloba în ea forțe centrifuge. În funcție de condițiile istorice, ele se accentuează, sau se diminuează în diferite direcții. În cazul Germaniei de după Primu Război Mondial și în contextul economiei globale de la începutul secolului XX, o serie de tendințe au conlucrat la o atomizare socială sporită, dar în spatele ei, în inconștientul colectiv trenând o fervoare naționalistă copleșitoare. Forțele precum armata care voia mai mulți bani pentru arme; marii oameni de afaceri care voiau desființarea sindicatelor și implicarea statului în politicile salariale; fermierii care voiau încetarea importurilor și a acordurilor comerciale care subminau agricultura germană, au luptat sub stindardul naționalismului pentru a înlătura influența pacifistă, democrată și cosmopolită a social-democraților.
Aceste forțe antidemocratice, conservatoare, naționaliste, n-au reușit niciodată să coaguleze o majoritate a alegătorilor, cu alte cuvinte „democrația nu funcționa pentru ei tocmai pentru că interesele lor nu puteau atrage un sprijinul unei majorități — sau măcar a unei pluralități mai mari — dintre alegători” și au sperat s-o facă apropiindu-l pe cel care era capabil de-o mobilizare a maselor mare și totodată avea și dorința de a zdrobi sindicatele și a reface forțele armate. Aceste forțe naționaliste s-au amăgit că-l pot controla pe Hitler, că-l pot domoli și folosi în interesul lor. „O întreagă serie de politicieni conservatori (Hugenberg, Bruning, Schleicher, von Papen și Hindenburg — președintele Germaniei, care dorea unitatea națională, o unitate națională formată doar din dreapta politică, inclusiv naziști, excluzându-i pe social-democrați) i-au curtat pe naziști pentru că aceștia reprezentau singurul mod în care puteau păstra puterea în condiții favorabile pentru ei. Rezultatul a fost regimul lui Hitler”.
30 iunie 1934 le-a arătat tuturor celor care au făcut front comun cu nazismul, că Hitler și partidul lui nu se joacă. Conservatorii și-au pierdut influența, iar unii chiar viața. „Noaptea cuțitelor lungi” a însemnat înfrângerea rezistenței conservatoare. Președintele Hindenburg, cel care a refuzat în numeroase momente să-l numească pe Hitler cancelar considerându-l cu dispreț „soldatul din Boemia”, a murit împăcat de alegerea făcută: a lăsat în urmă un om care i-a înfăptuit visul unei mari națiuni unite. 30 iunie 1934 a însemnat moartea Republicii de la Weimar, decesul democrației și instaurarea unui sistem totalitar care va arunca lumea într-un război sângeros.
Noua republică, din noiembrie 1918, modernă, cu principiile ei democratice, materialistă, revolta tabăra protestanților a căror viziune asupra naturii umane era mai pesimistă și considera că doar un stat autoritar putea corecta această tendință. În 1925, un teolog protestant afirma că: "Alianța dintre iluminismul materialist și democrație este de obicei simptomul tipic al declinului popoarelor". Drept urmare tabăra protestantă a clasei de mijloc a migrat spre nazism, alături de o minoritate catolică și socialistă — protestanții din clasa muncitoare au rămas însă în tabăra social democrată.
Dar urmările războiului mondial și ezitările guvernării de la Weimar au costat mai mult decât libertatea Germaniei. Ce s-a întâmplat în 1933, când Hitler a prealuat puterea, și după anul fatidic —întrabă autorul— a fost cauzat de faptul că Germania nu era suficient de democratică sau că era prea democratică? Sau din cauza elitelor prea puternice și imposibil de controlat sau că masele n-au funcționat precum niște cetățeni responsabili? Erau naziștii prea conservatori sau prea revoluționari? „Nazismul a fost o problemă specific germană sau o manifestare a unei crize mai ample?” Lucrarea de față încearcă să ofere niște răspunsuri făcând lumină prin dezvelirea straturilor de sedimente istorice care se depun mereu unul peste altul odată cu trecerea timpului.
Povestea nu poate clarifica imaginea dacă autorul nu face o incursiune exact la începuturile instaurării Republicii de la Weimar, o analiză succintă a perioadei imediat postbelice, a partidelor politice și personajelor care le conduc, a liderilor statului și, nu în ultimul rând, al vinei înfrângerii, căci vina va defini mai departe situația politică și zbaterile întregii națiuni. Era nazismul inevitaibil? Ascensiunea extremei drepte în Germania anilor 30 este o altă mărturie a fragilității democrației. Democrația este fragilă. În 1930, când naziștii reușesc prima victorie electorală, prim-ministrul Prusiei, Otto Braun nu consideră asta un eșec al ideii de democație, ci vina este a unei bune părți a poporului german care nu a fost la înălțimea „responsabilității aflate deodată pe umerii săi”. Trei ani mai târziu, social democratul Wolfgang Heine scria într-o scrisoare că muncitorii nu aveau încă suficientă maturitate pentru a-și exprima voința democratică.
Oamenii nu știau să-și aprecieze îndeajuns drepturile oferite de-o constituție democrată, „oamenii care erau lipsiți de educație politică și care nu știau cum să folosească corect drepturile ce le fuseseră acordate”. Astfel de oameni, scrie și socialistul Ernst Toller, „s-au săturat de rațiune, s-au săturat de gândire și reflecție. Ei se întreabă ce a făcut rațiunea în ultimii ani, ce bine ne-au făcut înțelegerea și cunoașterea”. Și nazismul a profitat din plin din acest cult al iraționalității dezvoltând printre altele, în disprețul lor față de ideile iluministe raționale, ideea de „a gândi cu sângele”. Odată cu respingerea raționalității, doctrina respingea concepte precum Occident liberal și capitalist, concepte care se întruneau în mult blamata de către conservatori (și a aliaților naziști) Republică de la Weimar. Un viitor antinazist, conservatorul Edgar Julius Jung critica Republica ca fiind „descoperire tardivă a Iluminismului în centrul Europei”, înglobând în ea valorile democratice și liberale ale Revoluției Franceze, din 1789, iar datoria germanilor, afirma mai departe Jung, era să se opună Iluminismului prin „tradiție, sânge și spirit”. Jung se va trezi mult prea târziu din tirada aceasta naționalistă, fiind una dintre victimele „Nopții cuțitelor lungi”.
Democrația a căzut în cele din urmă victimă forțelor centrifuge ale societății. Democrația este fragilă tocmai din cauza tendinței ei de a îngloba în ea forțe centrifuge. În funcție de condițiile istorice, ele se accentuează, sau se diminuează în diferite direcții. În cazul Germaniei de după Primu Război Mondial și în contextul economiei globale de la începutul secolului XX, o serie de tendințe au conlucrat la o atomizare socială sporită, dar în spatele ei, în inconștientul colectiv trenând o fervoare naționalistă copleșitoare. Forțele precum armata care voia mai mulți bani pentru arme; marii oameni de afaceri care voiau desființarea sindicatelor și implicarea statului în politicile salariale; fermierii care voiau încetarea importurilor și a acordurilor comerciale care subminau agricultura germană, au luptat sub stindardul naționalismului pentru a înlătura influența pacifistă, democrată și cosmopolită a social-democraților.
Aceste forțe antidemocratice, conservatoare, naționaliste, n-au reușit niciodată să coaguleze o majoritate a alegătorilor, cu alte cuvinte „democrația nu funcționa pentru ei tocmai pentru că interesele lor nu puteau atrage un sprijinul unei majorități — sau măcar a unei pluralități mai mari — dintre alegători” și au sperat s-o facă apropiindu-l pe cel care era capabil de-o mobilizare a maselor mare și totodată avea și dorința de a zdrobi sindicatele și a reface forțele armate. Aceste forțe naționaliste s-au amăgit că-l pot controla pe Hitler, că-l pot domoli și folosi în interesul lor. „O întreagă serie de politicieni conservatori (Hugenberg, Bruning, Schleicher, von Papen și Hindenburg — președintele Germaniei, care dorea unitatea națională, o unitate națională formată doar din dreapta politică, inclusiv naziști, excluzându-i pe social-democrați) i-au curtat pe naziști pentru că aceștia reprezentau singurul mod în care puteau păstra puterea în condiții favorabile pentru ei. Rezultatul a fost regimul lui Hitler”.
30 iunie 1934 le-a arătat tuturor celor care au făcut front comun cu nazismul, că Hitler și partidul lui nu se joacă. Conservatorii și-au pierdut influența, iar unii chiar viața. „Noaptea cuțitelor lungi” a însemnat înfrângerea rezistenței conservatoare. Președintele Hindenburg, cel care a refuzat în numeroase momente să-l numească pe Hitler cancelar considerându-l cu dispreț „soldatul din Boemia”, a murit împăcat de alegerea făcută: a lăsat în urmă un om care i-a înfăptuit visul unei mari națiuni unite. 30 iunie 1934 a însemnat moartea Republicii de la Weimar, decesul democrației și instaurarea unui sistem totalitar care va arunca lumea într-un război sângeros.
June 8, 2024
2024 reread : All of the below stands, with this extra bit at the end that punched hard in today's climate :
It's hard sometimes to explain the attraction of significant chunks of our voting public to party platforms which seem to promise nothing but hate and rage and tearing things down without offering anything constructive to replace it, but that quote does as good a job as any as trying to make sense of it, I suppose.
---
This should be required reading in today's political climate. He doesn't draw direct parallels -- but the frightening thing is that he doesn't have to. They're there, and they're obvious.
Are there distinct differences between the circumstances that caused Weimar to break down and what's going on now? Sure. Are there a lot of dangerous similarities? Absolutely. Ultimately my main takeaways were :
1) If you have enough people who see that they're not going to get their way democratically because they have worldviews that are not compatible with the majority, and these people possess a great deal of power, then they're not incentivized to work within a democratic system because that's not working for them. But because they can't win democratically, they will ally themselves with unscrupulous men (Hitler, Trump) who DO have a mass following or capacity to stir up the mob and get them over the finish line, so to speak. With the hopefully-obvious caveat that Trump is not Hitler, but the point the book makes is that a lot of this came about because people weren't thinking ahead. People voted to destroy "the system" without really having a clear conception of what was going to replace it. Conservative big-business owners allied with Hitler because they thought they could "manage" him (oops, hindsight). Other voters saw Hitler was a crazy demagogue, but assumed that once he was in power the office would moderate him and make him more rational -- remember Trump promising he could be super-presidential, just you wait? Regardless of whether Trump makes you sick to your stomach, or if you're cheering his norm-breaking brand of personality / tweetstorming / etc, I think (hope?) we can all agree that the office of the Presidency has done little if anything to moderate his pre-election behavior.
2) What a country believes about its past is at least as important as what actually happened in the past. It was so hard for me to wrap my head around this -- as a policy wonk (I guess?) and someone who loves to read dry historical facts, the idea that ideas have more value than facts is ... borderline heretical. Germans in the book buy into what the author broadly describes as two massively counter-factual narratives : that in August 1914, Germans were all united together, buried their differences, and marched heroically off to war to fight together as a band of brothers; and that in November 1918, they were all viciously betrayed and stabbed in the back by the home front. Neither of these things is remotely true, though I have more sympathy for the latter -- if your government constantly tells you you're winning, and if no Allied soldiers have yet set foot on German soil when you abruptly sue for peace, I can certainly see why that's jarring. Hitler was constantly preaching about stringing up the "November criminals" and uniting the country just like the good old days of 1914. Hindenburg enabled this because he too dreamed of a country ruled by a unified right(-wing). The fact that it's not true doesn't matter. The common *idea* that everyone's buying into does. So when people march with MAGA hats, and I think, well, what makes the 50s so great? Because it seems like that's when the Great America that MAGA folks dream after happened, and the 50s were not all that great for anyone who wasn't a white man (see the excellent novel Lovecraft Country, for example). I would venture that even a number of white men probably weren't having a great time, because there's always a section of people who aren't doing well. But if we all buy into the Idea that life was a halcyon paradise then, and we'd love to have it back, that makes us dangerously susceptible to people who promise they can make it happen. They can't. At the risk of politicizing...I think conservatism in general would get a lot more mileage out of pursuing a Meiji Restoration style of politics that says "what conservative elements of our society can we preserve while moving our country forward into the future?" rather than this trumpist/boris johnsonesque backward-looking, reject-all-change thing that's been the preaching for decades.
3) No effective political opposition can happen without the help of existing institutions. This is a controversial position, maybe -- a lot of revolutions seem to happen from the ground up, but I think he's probably right here that you need some help from the inside. Hitler knew this, it's why he worked from within Weimar to destroy it, and it's why when he took over he made sure to dismantle or completely Nazify any institutions. Political parties, courts, army, labor unions, newspapers...all destroyed within a year. We're lucky in the US that we still have institutional support for contrarian views (if trump were succeeded by some liberal oligarch seeking tyranny, the same would hold true).
Democracy is messy. Compromises have to be made with people who don't agree with you. When we have everyone passing purity tests and refusing to build any consensus -- on both sides -- we're pushing ourselves further down a Weimar road, and that's not good for anyone except Hitler.
"[Drucker thought that] Nazi and fascist doctrines had evolved in a general climate of a loss of belief -- not only in capitalism but in socialism as well. Since there were no positive answers to any social problems, Nazism could only be against everything, even against inconsistent things: it was antiliberal and anticonservative, antireligious and anti-atheist, anticapitalist and antisocialist, and most of all antisemitic...Clearly, [Drucker] concluded, 'nobody would have been a Nazi if rational belief in the Nazi promises had been a prerequisite.'
The best explanation of Nazism that Drucker had ever encountered came from a Nazi agitator 'whom, many years ago, I heard proclaim to a wildly cheering peasants' meeting: "We don't want lower bread prices, we don't want higher bread prices, we don't want unchanged bread prices -- we want National Socialist bread prices."' [...] Higher bread prices, lower bread prices, and unchanged bread prices 'have all failed. The only hope lies in a kind of bread price which is none of these, which nobody has ever seen before, and which belies the evidence of one's reason.'"
It's hard sometimes to explain the attraction of significant chunks of our voting public to party platforms which seem to promise nothing but hate and rage and tearing things down without offering anything constructive to replace it, but that quote does as good a job as any as trying to make sense of it, I suppose.
---
This should be required reading in today's political climate. He doesn't draw direct parallels -- but the frightening thing is that he doesn't have to. They're there, and they're obvious.
Are there distinct differences between the circumstances that caused Weimar to break down and what's going on now? Sure. Are there a lot of dangerous similarities? Absolutely. Ultimately my main takeaways were :
1) If you have enough people who see that they're not going to get their way democratically because they have worldviews that are not compatible with the majority, and these people possess a great deal of power, then they're not incentivized to work within a democratic system because that's not working for them. But because they can't win democratically, they will ally themselves with unscrupulous men (Hitler, Trump) who DO have a mass following or capacity to stir up the mob and get them over the finish line, so to speak. With the hopefully-obvious caveat that Trump is not Hitler, but the point the book makes is that a lot of this came about because people weren't thinking ahead. People voted to destroy "the system" without really having a clear conception of what was going to replace it. Conservative big-business owners allied with Hitler because they thought they could "manage" him (oops, hindsight). Other voters saw Hitler was a crazy demagogue, but assumed that once he was in power the office would moderate him and make him more rational -- remember Trump promising he could be super-presidential, just you wait? Regardless of whether Trump makes you sick to your stomach, or if you're cheering his norm-breaking brand of personality / tweetstorming / etc, I think (hope?) we can all agree that the office of the Presidency has done little if anything to moderate his pre-election behavior.
2) What a country believes about its past is at least as important as what actually happened in the past. It was so hard for me to wrap my head around this -- as a policy wonk (I guess?) and someone who loves to read dry historical facts, the idea that ideas have more value than facts is ... borderline heretical. Germans in the book buy into what the author broadly describes as two massively counter-factual narratives : that in August 1914, Germans were all united together, buried their differences, and marched heroically off to war to fight together as a band of brothers; and that in November 1918, they were all viciously betrayed and stabbed in the back by the home front. Neither of these things is remotely true, though I have more sympathy for the latter -- if your government constantly tells you you're winning, and if no Allied soldiers have yet set foot on German soil when you abruptly sue for peace, I can certainly see why that's jarring. Hitler was constantly preaching about stringing up the "November criminals" and uniting the country just like the good old days of 1914. Hindenburg enabled this because he too dreamed of a country ruled by a unified right(-wing). The fact that it's not true doesn't matter. The common *idea* that everyone's buying into does. So when people march with MAGA hats, and I think, well, what makes the 50s so great? Because it seems like that's when the Great America that MAGA folks dream after happened, and the 50s were not all that great for anyone who wasn't a white man (see the excellent novel Lovecraft Country, for example). I would venture that even a number of white men probably weren't having a great time, because there's always a section of people who aren't doing well. But if we all buy into the Idea that life was a halcyon paradise then, and we'd love to have it back, that makes us dangerously susceptible to people who promise they can make it happen. They can't. At the risk of politicizing...I think conservatism in general would get a lot more mileage out of pursuing a Meiji Restoration style of politics that says "what conservative elements of our society can we preserve while moving our country forward into the future?" rather than this trumpist/boris johnsonesque backward-looking, reject-all-change thing that's been the preaching for decades.
3) No effective political opposition can happen without the help of existing institutions. This is a controversial position, maybe -- a lot of revolutions seem to happen from the ground up, but I think he's probably right here that you need some help from the inside. Hitler knew this, it's why he worked from within Weimar to destroy it, and it's why when he took over he made sure to dismantle or completely Nazify any institutions. Political parties, courts, army, labor unions, newspapers...all destroyed within a year. We're lucky in the US that we still have institutional support for contrarian views (if trump were succeeded by some liberal oligarch seeking tyranny, the same would hold true).
Democracy is messy. Compromises have to be made with people who don't agree with you. When we have everyone passing purity tests and refusing to build any consensus -- on both sides -- we're pushing ourselves further down a Weimar road, and that's not good for anyone except Hitler.
July 9, 2023
Läsvärd bok om ett 20- & - 30-tal som stundvis känns alltför bekant.
August 17, 2023
Demokratiaa eli kansanvaltaa pidetään (länsimaissa) vankkumattomana ja tavoiteltavana valtiojärjestyksenä, rauhan, tasa-arvon ja kansalaisten vapauden takeena. Historiantutkija Benjamin Carter Hettin Demokratian kuolema - Kuinka Hitler nousi valtaan osoittaa kuitenkin, kuinka hauras rakennelma demokratia on, jos sitä ei vaalita ja jos siitä ei pidetä huolta.
Hitlerin valtaannousu ei ollut pelkästään historiallisten yhteensattumien summa, vaan useampikin saksalainen valtiomies uskoi hyötyvänsä Hitlerin kansansuosiosta ja hänen kanssaan tehdyistä sopimuksista. Toisin kävi, ja homma lähti niin sanotusti lapasesta. Hitler nousi mielivaltaiseksi diktaattoriksi, ja lopputuloksena oli toinen maailmansota ja miljoonien juutalaisten joukkotuho.
Hettin teos on yksityiskohtia vilisevä tietopaketti Saksan historiasta 1920-1930-luvuilla. Moni ilmiö tuosta ajasta tuntuu pelottavan tutulta nykyajassakin. Toivon todellakin, ettei historia toistaisi itseään. Hitlerin pysäyttäminen olisi vaatinut päättäjiltä valppautta ja päättäväisyyttä, kuten Hett kirjansa lopussa toteaa.
Hitlerin valtaannousu ei ollut pelkästään historiallisten yhteensattumien summa, vaan useampikin saksalainen valtiomies uskoi hyötyvänsä Hitlerin kansansuosiosta ja hänen kanssaan tehdyistä sopimuksista. Toisin kävi, ja homma lähti niin sanotusti lapasesta. Hitler nousi mielivaltaiseksi diktaattoriksi, ja lopputuloksena oli toinen maailmansota ja miljoonien juutalaisten joukkotuho.
Hettin teos on yksityiskohtia vilisevä tietopaketti Saksan historiasta 1920-1930-luvuilla. Moni ilmiö tuosta ajasta tuntuu pelottavan tutulta nykyajassakin. Toivon todellakin, ettei historia toistaisi itseään. Hitlerin pysäyttäminen olisi vaatinut päättäjiltä valppautta ja päättäväisyyttä, kuten Hett kirjansa lopussa toteaa.
January 15, 2020
As a historian I was very interested in the subject of this book. I expected with the premise of losing democracy in Germany that there would be a general discussion of the history of Germany and the life of Adolph Hitler and it was. The problem was the wordiness of the discussion. The story just did not flow.
February 27, 2020
Demokratian kuolema on upea tietokirja. Se kuvaa Hitlerin valtaan nousun ensimmäisestä maailmansodasta alkaen pitkien puukkojen yöhön 1934 asti. Kirjan ytimessä on kysymys: miten ihmeessä tämä oli mahdollista?
Amerikkalainen historioitsija Benjamin Carter Hett on paitsi äärimmäisen perehtynyt aiheeseensa, hän osaa myös kuvata sen erittäin elävästi. Lukija seuraa 20- ja 30-luvun tapahtumia kuin tiivistä jännitysnäytelmää. Aika kuohuu ja poliittinen elämä on kuin vuoristorataa. Sen keskeiset pelurit ovat moni-ilmeinen henkilökaarti ja hahmottuvat Hettin kynästä persoonina sävykkäästi.
Hitler halusi kaapata vallan laillisesti. Hän halusi tuhota demokratian lähtien sen omista keinoista. Kaoottinen aika, Hitlerin omalaatuinen karisma ja puhujankyvyt sekä hänen yksinkertainen, populistinen viestinsä tekivät sen mahdolliseksi. Merkittävää oli, että poliittisten kilpakumppaniensa piirissä hänet jatkuvasti aliarvioitiin. Luovuttamalla valtaa Hitlerille ja natseille heistä oli tarkoitus hyötyä, mutta kävikin toisinpäin. Mitä siitä seurasi on kaikkien tiedossa.
Hettin teoksen piinallisin ja vaikuttavin anti syntyy kuitenkin siitä, miten monet hänen kuvaamansa ajan piirteet ovat taas tuttuja meille uutta 20-lukua eläville. Vaikuttava ja tärkeä muistutus siitä, että demokratia kuolee, jos sitä ei vaali.
Amerikkalainen historioitsija Benjamin Carter Hett on paitsi äärimmäisen perehtynyt aiheeseensa, hän osaa myös kuvata sen erittäin elävästi. Lukija seuraa 20- ja 30-luvun tapahtumia kuin tiivistä jännitysnäytelmää. Aika kuohuu ja poliittinen elämä on kuin vuoristorataa. Sen keskeiset pelurit ovat moni-ilmeinen henkilökaarti ja hahmottuvat Hettin kynästä persoonina sävykkäästi.
Hitler halusi kaapata vallan laillisesti. Hän halusi tuhota demokratian lähtien sen omista keinoista. Kaoottinen aika, Hitlerin omalaatuinen karisma ja puhujankyvyt sekä hänen yksinkertainen, populistinen viestinsä tekivät sen mahdolliseksi. Merkittävää oli, että poliittisten kilpakumppaniensa piirissä hänet jatkuvasti aliarvioitiin. Luovuttamalla valtaa Hitlerille ja natseille heistä oli tarkoitus hyötyä, mutta kävikin toisinpäin. Mitä siitä seurasi on kaikkien tiedossa.
Hettin teoksen piinallisin ja vaikuttavin anti syntyy kuitenkin siitä, miten monet hänen kuvaamansa ajan piirteet ovat taas tuttuja meille uutta 20-lukua eläville. Vaikuttava ja tärkeä muistutus siitä, että demokratia kuolee, jos sitä ei vaali.
July 28, 2018
In this concise but important new book, Hett takes into full account the most recent and up to date scholarship on Weimar, including sources not yet translated into English. Hett intelligently concentrates not on the Nazis, as most books do, but on the entire political arc of Weimar Germany, particularly the conservatives who thought they could use Hitler and then dispose of him. It is said - the quote is attributed to Twain but that is almost certainly wrong - that history doesn't repeat, but it does rhyme. There are a lot of timely rhymes here, and Hett does well in selecting illuminating stories and quotes; his portraits of people who often are footnotes in history are particularly valuable (Edgar Julius Jung, for instance, is usually dismissed in books as "Papen's secretary." There was a lot more to it than that). The endnotes provide more information as well as note the sources. Short, succinct, well written, and vital for our times when history is rhyming like mad.
October 25, 2018
How could Hitler become the leader of a democratic country that was so advanced in the arts, science and liberal ideology? Having just visited this beautiful country this question haunted me. Could it happen here?
Benjamin Hett's book is a detailed account (often too much detail) of how a country can politically transform in just a few years. It was a complexity of circumstances, misguided and egotistical politicians and extreme left and right ideology. The presumed harshness of the Treaty of Versailles was not, according the Hett, responsible for the rage that brought the Nazi's to power. However, Hitler's campaign rhetoric of hate, anger, lies and nationalism riled some of the disenfranchised Germans (and worried many others).
Heft does not compare Hitler's rise to any current politician. His dedication of the book is all that needs to be said. "To everyone who fights for freedom, human rights, democracy, peace and tolerance".
Benjamin Hett's book is a detailed account (often too much detail) of how a country can politically transform in just a few years. It was a complexity of circumstances, misguided and egotistical politicians and extreme left and right ideology. The presumed harshness of the Treaty of Versailles was not, according the Hett, responsible for the rage that brought the Nazi's to power. However, Hitler's campaign rhetoric of hate, anger, lies and nationalism riled some of the disenfranchised Germans (and worried many others).
Heft does not compare Hitler's rise to any current politician. His dedication of the book is all that needs to be said. "To everyone who fights for freedom, human rights, democracy, peace and tolerance".
July 9, 2023
Hyvä, valtaa pitäneisiin yksilöihin keskittyvä selostus siitä, mikä mahdollisti sen, että Hitler nousi valtaan. Jos Carter Hettiä on uskominen, Hitlerin valtaan nousu oli viime kädessä kourallisen miehiä käsissä. Noille miehille oli tärkeämpää suojella henkilökohtaisia etujaan ja pitää vasemmisto (sosiaalidemokraatit) poissa vallasta kuin säilyttää demokratia.
Lopun muutamista, ei mitenkään graafisista väkivallantekojen kuvauksista tulee huono olo. Muutoin tämä on yhteiskunta- ja yksilötason analyysia, ei veritekojen kuvausta.
Joitakin kehityskulkuja on mahdollista tunnistaa nykypäivän politiikasta, ja demokratian hauraudesta Carter Hett lukijaansa haluaakin muistuttaa.
3,5 tähteä.
Lopun muutamista, ei mitenkään graafisista väkivallantekojen kuvauksista tulee huono olo. Muutoin tämä on yhteiskunta- ja yksilötason analyysia, ei veritekojen kuvausta.
Joitakin kehityskulkuja on mahdollista tunnistaa nykypäivän politiikasta, ja demokratian hauraudesta Carter Hett lukijaansa haluaakin muistuttaa.
3,5 tähteä.
June 30, 2024
A very good and concise overview of the collapse of the Weimar Republic and Hitler's rise to power in the early 1930s. This book covers political games played by the leading figures at the top of Weimar Republic and, at times, it feels like an episode of House of Cards. It's concerning that the history can repeat itself if we're not careful. This is an important read if you're concerned about the future of democracy or if you want to learn about the beginnings of Hitler's dictatorship in Nazi Germany.
May 29, 2025
A great example of the dangers of political appeasement, selfishness, and capitulation. Some of these events echo through our politics today.
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