Modern World History: Pages 152-155

The Depression and the rise of the Nazis

In 1929 the American stock market crashed and lots of American businessmen lost money. America now had a very bad economic situation. This was called the DEPRESSION. This affected other countries, too. American banks had lent money to other countries – now they wanted their money back. Germany had borrowed money from America. They had to pay it back. Lots of German banks and businesses went bankrupt. Lots of people lost their jobs and became unemployed.

Governments all over the world had similar problems and didn't know what to do. Germany's Weimar government didn't know what to do either. The Depression affected Germany more than other countries because they'd borrowed so much from America and also because they had to pay back the reparations. Also, Germany's constitution had a very careful balance of power and it wasn't easy for the Weimar government to pass laws to try and solve the country's economic problems. This made the Weimar government seem weak.

Enter the Nazis!

Hitler's ideas now seemed very important to many people. He said:

Hitler had written down Twenty-Five Points which were all the things he thought Germany should do. (See p.148 of your book GCSE Modern World History.) These ideas now seemed very good to some people in German society. These were the people who were very weak and could be easily affected by money problems e.g. the unemployed, the elderly, and the middle classes. Hitler told them who they should blame for Germany's troubles: the Allies, the Germans who had signed the Treaty of Versailles and the Jews. People had heard him say this before and they hadn't listened to him but now it seemed that the Weimar government, a democratic party, could not get Germany back to work so people started to listen to Hitler.

The Nazis began to get more popular. In the 1930 election, the Nazis got 107 seats in the government. In November 1932, they got almost 200. They were now the biggest single party in Germany, even though they didn't yet have an overall majority in the government.

Why did the Nazis succeed in the elections?

In the 1930s, the Nazis had lots of power in Germany. They had a propaganda chief called Josef Goebbels. Goebbels was very good at getting across the Nazi message to the German people.

Nazi campaigning

When there is an election in a country, each political party has a campaign. This is a lot of planned activities which will make people vote for them and not the other parties. The Nazi campaigns were modern and worked very well. They talked about bringing the people of Germany together behind one leader. They talked about going back to an old 'traditional' way of life – although they didn't give a lot of details about this. They didn't give a lot of details about lots of their policies (plans). This meant that it was difficult for people to criticize them (disagree with them). They just kept repeating that they believed Jews, Communists, Weimar politicians and the Treaty of Versailles were to blame for all Germany's problems. They said that the Weimar government was too weak to solve Germany's problems. The Nazis had big, loud meetings called rallies. They also made lots of posters and pamphlets which told people about their ideas.

At this time, there were lots of street fights between the Communists and the police. Also, large groups of unemployed men would meet on street corners and often make trouble. The SA and the SS (both were groups of Hitler's private soldiers and bodyguards) seemed very well-disciplined. People felt that the country needed ordered, disciplined men like these – not the loud men on the street corners. The SA often had fights with the Communists. They were better organized than the Communists and the police and ordinary soldiers were often happy to let them beat up the Communists. The SA also broke up Communist meetings and rallies.

The Nazis also organized soup kitchens for people who had no jobs.

The Nazis biggest advantage in their campaigns, however, was Hitler. He was a very powerful speaker. He made people listen to him. He travelled all over Germany by plane He seemed to be a man with lots of energy and lots of modern ideas leading a modern party. He appeared as a 'man of the people', an ordinary man who could understand an ordinary man's problems.

'Negative cohesion'

More people started to support the Nazi party. However, not all of them agreed with what the Nazis said. Some people supported them because they had the same fears and dislikes as the Nazis. This is called negative cohesion. They joined together because of negatives not positives. They thought: "If you hate what I hate, then you can't be all bad!"

'Disillusionment with democracy'

One of the things that people disliked the most was the democratic Weimar government. The politicians did not seem to be able to solve the problems of the Depression.

The Communist threat

People were also very frightened of the Communists becoming too powerful. Middle-class small business owners had read about what had happened in Russia when the Communists had come to power. They had taken the businesses away from the middle-classes. The industrialists were also worried that the communists would take away their businesses too and bring them under state control.The industrialists were also worried about the trade unions which were getting very powerful.The industrialists thought that the Nazi party would be good at controlling them. They started to give money to the Nazi party. All farmers were worried about the communists. They had heard that in Russia, the Communists had taken over all the farms and controlled them. They began to support the Nazis, too.

Decadence

The Social Democratic Party thought that the German people would not listen to the Nazi talk and promises. They were wrong – they didn't realize how unhappy people were with the Weimar government.

View a mind map with the reasons for Hitler's rise to power

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