Notes on German Big Business
and the Rise of Hitler by Henry Ashby Turner
page 6
by William P. Meyers

Site Search

Popular pages:

Hitler Rhetoric becomes Reality

In the Spring of 1933 Hitler and the Nazis moved quickly to assert their rule over all Germans, including the capitalist class. The Nazis replaced capitalist institutions like the Reichsverband with a corporatist structure. [Note: corporate and corporatist denote very different forms of organization. A corporation is owned by shareholders. Fascist corporatist structures came from Roman Catholic ideology and gave the church and state absolute control over workers, managers, and even business owners.] Capitalists "sought to protect their Jewish colleagues from the anti-Semitism unleashed on the country. . . they failed to take Nazi anti-Semitism seriously." [336]

"Acceptance of the regime became easier when its early monghts brought, or, more properly, coincided with the long hoped-for retrn of prosperity. Beginning in 1933 economic activity picked up rapidly until, only three years later, Germany became the first country to shake off the Great Depression and achieve full employment again." [337]

Page 1 2 3 4 5 6