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... e reactions to Nazi propaganda were not due to the public disagreeing with the principle and ideologies that were being put forward, but feeling that the vacuum produced by preventive censorship was filled with mediocrity. This would suggest that the Nazi culture became less influential as the regime progressed. Therefore, although many aspects of propaganda were successful, its main downfall was apparent when censorship was used in order to implement the Nazi propaganda.
Although radio and film were successful mediums in influencing the public, their structure was not altered vastly. The press, literature, the arts and music all came under heavy censorship, and their mediocre replacements were much less well received. However, the issue of to what extent propaganda consolidated Nazi power can only be assessed once other aspects of the Nazi regime have been analysed and their links with propaganda explained. A common opinion of Nazi Germany is that the only reason the regime remained in place was due to the fear factor. Organisations such as the SS, and the control of the Block Leader frightened people to conform.
Although this is true to an extent, this orthodox opinion has changed over recent years. The revisionist view is that the SS (and Gestapo) were much less well organised than once thought, as the historian Hhne writes the SS world was a nonsensical affair, devoid of all logic it has recently been argued that it was the public that were striving to keep the regime in place. In addition, Ian Kershaw states that to suggest that Nazi power rested on the totalitarian regime is in fact, only a partial truth. It was their voluntary participation that enabled the structure to function.
However, the orthodox view still is valid, as the threat of terror still worked well because although it only affected a tiny minority it influenced a large majority in not speaking out over issues that did not affect them. However, although fear may have helped consolidate power, propaganda also played a part here. It was through the use of propaganda that the Nazis justified their claims, such as the Reichstag fire and one of the most significant events, the Night of the Long Knives, on 30 th June 1934. The Nazis decided to be open about the incident, and conveyed the message to the German nation that Re and the other leaders were dangerous and their actions were for the greater good of the German Reich. Here, propaganda played the vital role of preventing an uprising and convincing the people that because the Nazis were open about the event it had to be for the good of the nation. This tactic was used once again with the legal revolution that occurred between 1933 - 1934 that resulted in people having no choice but to conform to the Nazi regime.
Following the introduction of the Enabling Act in March 1932 the states, the trade unions and the political parties were all brought into line, as a result of the Gleichschaltung in Nazi Germany. On March 1933 Hitler closed down all the state parliaments, which resulted in the Nazi Party being the largest in the Reichstag. On 7 th April Hitler appointed Nazi state governors to each state, but soon abolished state parliaments completely, in 1934. On 2 nd May 1933 Nazis broke into trade unions offices and arrested thousands of union officials.
The unions were then merged into the German Labour Front, which had a Nazi leader. Political parties suffered the same fate on 10 th May Nazis occupied the Social Democrat offices and confiscated its funds, and then did the same with the Communist party with all their leaders arrested. This Gleichshaltung culminated on the 14 th July when a law was passed forbidding the creation of any other party thus Germany became a one-party state. Therefore, propaganda still permeated the issue of fear, as it accentuated the fear of not conforming and reassured those within the German Reich that actions were justified. An example of where this was successfully achieved is illustrated in Elizabeth von Stahlenbergs diaries, which were written under the Nazi regime. However, because it was mainly this voluntary participation that enabled the regime to remain in place, the German people must have had good reason to endorse it.
One large factor was the remarkable economic recovery that occurred under Nazi rule. Although John Maynard Keynes had not yet fully devised his economic method of deficit spending, it was with this method that the Nazis produced an economic upswing. However, the question of the actual success of the improvement of living conditions under the Nazis is debatable. Although the economic statistics may look impressive, the reality is somewhat different, and is highlighted by Stephen J. Lee. Unemployment was in rapid decline, signifying economic recovery the figure stood at 4. 8 million in 1933, dropping to a mere 0. 1 million in 1939.
In addition to this people became increasingly wealthier, according to the statistics. Germany's national income rose from 44 billion marks in 1933 to 80 billion in 1938. However, this was all not primarily down to the Nazis, although the regime would have certainly made it appear so. Lee highlights the cyclic nature of economic upswings and downswings, which, by striking (and unfortunate) coincidence, meant that Hitler came to power just as the economy was beginning to recover naturally anyway. The Nazis did artificially reduce unemployment, by the use of public work schemes such as the Autobahns and the Four Year Plan.
But although this looked extremely impressive given the scale of unemployment under the Weimar Republic, in reality the workforce received an ever-declining proportion of the national income as wages. In 1933 wages amounted to 63 % of the national income, while by 1939 they had steadily dropped each year to 57 %, including a seven-hour extension on average working hours. However once again, propaganda also had a role in this factor, as the statistics depicting prosperity in the Reich were glorified by propaganda, and the more pessimistic information remained filed away and undisclosed. Therefore, the nations concrete evidence that the country was prospering, which although was true to an extent, was further fabricated due to the services of propaganda.
This is not to assume that the consolidation of power ran completely smoothly (which in turn suggests that their indoctrination and fearful regime was not completely successful), although the transformation of the country was already a huge achievement. Although indoctrination in schools had been implemented since 1933, youth groups such as the Edelweiss Pirates were in existence until the collapse of the Nazi regime at the end of the Second World War. The revisionist historian Frank McDonough writes The desire to express an individual cultural identity exhibited by these youth subcultures is further evidence that Nazism did not have the total grip on German society which its propaganda indicated. The White Rose, a group that appeared later during the Second World War, took a more radical stand against the Nazis.
They bravely attempted to warn the German people of the horrors of Nazi tyranny, although they themselves did realise that it was highly unlikely for them to have popular backing for their actions. There was also Communist and industrial resistance to the regime one estimate suggests that between 1933 - 35 there were around 36, 000 people who were active within the underground resistance - quite a substantial number but a tiny minority compared to the full German population. Therefore, most dissenters of the regime who were active were minorities who were eradicated when the concentration camps were formed. And although several attempts were made on Hitlers life, there was no real threat of revolution during this period. This was presumably due to the lack of support from the majority of the German population, who were of course influenced by fascist propaganda. Propaganda as a tool of consolidating Nazi power did not only serve its purpose as a method of steering opinion towards the Nazi party, it also acted as a net, by holding the whole regime together.
It did this by permeating the whole system the Nazis laid the foundations of the system with the legal revolution, the outlawing of any other opposition, and the creation of the SS and Gestapo. Propaganda further reassured people that the Nazi regime was on the right course and should be supported, and that some repression of freedom must be allowed for the greater good of the German nation. It ensured that the people accepted the changes and supported them in short, it held the regime together and ensured that the Nazi system remained in place.
R Berghahn, Cambridge, 1987 Germany 1918 - 45, Josh Brooman, Longman, 1996 The Order of the Deaths Head, H. Hhne, Ballantine, 1967 Life in the Third Reich, R. Bessel, Oxford, 1987,
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