the nature of Nazi ideology

Question 1

What did the Nazi’s argue that they aimed to create?

Answer 1

The Nazis argued that they aimed to create a new people’s community, or Volksgemeinschaft, based on what they saw as the traditional values of the German people

Question 2

What did the Volksgemeinschaft imply?

Answer 2

The volksgemeinschaft implied a classless society, which would be at the heart of the community

Question 3

What did Hitler aim to create? And what was the slogan?

Answer 3

Hitler aimed to create a national solidarity behind the regime, as in the slogan ‘One people, one country, one leader.’

Question 4

According to Ian Kershaw, where was all the authority placed under the Fuhrer principle?

Answer 4

According to IAN KERSHAW, the so-called Fuhrer principle placed all authority in the hands of the leader

Question 5

Whose image did Nazi propaganda build up? and what did it create?

Answer 5

Nazi propaganda deliberately built up Hitler’s image, creating the ‘Hitler myth’

Question 6

According to the myth, who did Hitler represent?

Answer 6

According to this myth, Hitler represented the national will and worked tirelessly for his people

Question 7

According to the myth, Hitler was above?

Answer 7

According to this myth, he was above party politics or selfish motives

Question 8

According to the myth, what had Hitler brought?

Answer 8

According to the myth, he had brought prosperity and work to his people

Question 9

According to the myth, Hitler was?

Answer 9

According to the myth, he was a statesman, a defender of Germany’s rights and a rebuilder of national pride

Question 10

What did the idea of the ‘Hitler myth’ make possible?

Answer 10

This idea made it possible for the general public to separate their devotion to Hitler from their anxieties or complaints about the Nazi Party

Question 11

What are ideas?

Answer 11

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, ideas are ‘thoughts or suggestions as to a course of action’.

In other words, ideas are not necessarily permanent or binding- they can be ignored.

Question 12

What is ideology?

Answer 12

Ideology involves a commitment and is meant to be binding

Question 13

How many binding and enduring aspects of Nazi thinking that could be called ideology?

Answer 13

3 main aspects

Question 14

What was the first aspect?

Answer 14

The dominant leadership of Hitler (the Fuhrerprinzip) & the notion that the will of the Fuhrer was supreme in the Nazi Party, then in the Nazi State

Question 15

What was the second aspect (the commitment to the Volksgemeinschaft) about?

Answer 15

Commitment to the Volksgemeinschaft (people’s community); that is the creation and protection of a harmonious national racial community → this had associations with racist thinking & the perceived greatness of traditional German culture

Question 16

What was the third aspect (race thinking) about?

Answer 16

Race thinking → the notion that German greatness and the harmony of the Volksgemeinschaft were constantly under threat from jealous, evil, racially inferior groups, in particular the Jews and the Slavic peoples on German’s eastern borders (notably the Poles and Russians)

Question 17

Who is the individual must often described as the chief thinker or philosopher of the Nazi movement?

Answer 17

Alfred Rosenberg

Question 18

When was Rosenberg born?

Answer 18

1893

Question 19

Where was Rosenberg born?

Answer 19

Born in Estonia, which was then part of the Russian empire

Question 20

What was Rosenberg’s ethnicity?

Answer 20

Ethnic German

Question 21

What did Rosenberg have a deep hatred for?

Answer 21

He developed a deep hatred for both communism and the Jews

Question 22

What member of the Nazi Party was Rosenberg?

Answer 22

Rosenberg was one of the earliest members of the Nazi Party

Question 23

What did Rosenberg’s main influence on Nazi thinking come with? and in what year was it published?

Answer 23

His main influence on Nazi thinking came with the publication in 1930 of his book ‘The Myth of the Twentieth Century’

Question 24

How many copies of ‘The Myth of the Twentieth Century’ were sold by 1945?

Answer 24

More than a million copies had been sold by 1945

Question 25

According to historians Richard Evans & great German historian K. D. Bracher, what had more of an impact on the thinking of party members than Rosenberg’s book?

Answer 25

According to both RICHARD EVANS and the GREAT GERMAN HISTORIAN K.D. BRACHER, this book had far less impact on the thinking of party members than Goebbels propaganda, election pamphlets posters, Nazi newspaper articles and - above all - Hitler’s speeches

Question 26

What does Bracher suggest about limits?

Answer 26

BRACHER suggests that limits were imposed on both Rosenberg’s influence and the role of ideology by ‘Hitler’s tactical opportunism’

Question 27

What did the limits imposed on both Rosenberg’s influence and the role of ideology by ‘Hitler’s tactical opportunism’ mean?

Answer 27

In other words, there were times when Hitler was willing to abandon what was loosely described as Nazi ideology to serve his desire for power

Question 28

What were the only binding and permanent aspects of Nazi thinking that might be described as ideology?

Answer 28

They were were Hitler’s supreme power, the Volksgemeinschaft & the associated race thinking