The ghosts of Germany’s past are everywhere these days. In the US, critics of Donald Trump have so often compared him with Adolf Hitler that the analogy is by now a rhetorical cliche. Even JD Vance did it – before recanting and becoming vice-president. In Germany, references to the Weimar Republic, the fragile democracy that preceded Hitler’s rise to power, are a staple of debate as an unmistakable prelude-to-Hitler warning. The German inter-war period remains the starkest example of a liberal democracy turning into a
brutal dictatorship. An impulse to evoke this era in times of crisis is understandable, but the more Western democracies become fixated on the idea that they might be reliving one of history’s darkest chapters, the more they risk failing to address the challenges of the present. References to Weimar and Nazi Germany are usually intended to warn against political opponents or unwelcome policies. Take podcaster Joe Rogan, who last January likened the tactics of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to those of the Gestapo.
Or consider the German left-wing activists who turned up at a conference of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party on Saturday, adding a swastika made out of vegan mince to the breakfast buffet. Such words and gestures are intended to send a clear moral message: This policy or party is reminiscent of the Nazis, and therefore you mustn’t support it. The problem is that the message doesn’t work. Trump-Hitler comparisons were already popular before 2016, and didn’t deter American voters from making him president
twice. In Britain, Nigel Farage’s Reform UK has been leading in the polls consistently for more than a year, despite left-wing opponents describing the party as a “proto-fascist organisation” or using similar invective. In Germany, the AfD is now the most popular party, according to all major surveys. Nowhere in the West does the Nazi label kill a political career. Warnings of far-right extremism didn’t work in 1930s Germany; they didn’t even work in Weimar itself, the town that gave the ill-fated republic its name
because it was founded there in 1919 after World War I. I have studied the lives of the Weimar townspeople and found ample evidence that many of them knew exactly what they would get if they elected Hitler to power. Many voted for him anyway. The 1926 Nazi Party rally in Weimar is a point in case. At the time, the party was still tiny. The Nazis were in town for only two days, but left a trail of blood. They clashed with police, provoked
brawls, tried to burn down the local headquarters of the Social Democrats, attacked public figures and harassed women who wore the modern bob hairstyle. Nazis broke into cars and vandalised buildings. Beatings and knife attacks led to countless injuries. “In the town there is intense embitterment about the conduct of the swastika troops,” one local newspaper reported afterwards. The town council banned future Nazi Party gatherings. The appalling violence was noted in other parts of Germany, with the Berliner Tageblatt newspaper noting that this was
“how the National Socialists behave if they are allowed even a little bit of leverage”. Despite seeing Nazi thuggery first-hand, Weimarers supported the movement in larger-than-average numbers. In 1930, when the Great Depression was hitting Germany hard, the Nazis finished second in the federal elections with 18.3pc – a huge upturn from 2.6pc just two years earlier. In Weimar, the Nazis’ support in that 1930 election was 28.2pc. Three years later, Hitler rose to power. Germany’s economic, political and social upheaval had made vast numbers
of the electorate desperate enough to support the Nazis, disregarding years of liberals’ fervent alarms. There is no evidence from a century ago that warning voters of Nazism had much effect, and there is no evidence today. Voters turn to radical politics in times when they feel centrists aren’t providing effective solutions to the problems they see. Pointing to Germany’s past does nothing to restore lost confidence; only better politics, credible candidates and tangible improvements to people’s lives and prospects can do that. Of course,
there are many lessons to be learnt from history, but using the past to try to frighten present-day voters is not the way to do it. Offering hope, not fear, is a better political motivator. Katja Hoyer is the author of ‘Weimar: Life on the Edge of Catastrophe’, published last month.
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