Were the Nazis Rightwingers or Leftist?

[The New Sea Territory]

How? In any measurable way, how are the Nazis "left-wing"?

Words, names, labels and Nazi propaganda mean jack shit. I want actions: actual evidence of the Nazis doing leftist things.

The massive government and its control of society.

...isn't inherently left wing, try again. Rightism, for a very long time, was in complete support of a massive government that controlled society. It was called monarchism. In some places, it still is.

[Jamzmania]

The massive government and its control of society.

...isn't inherently left wing, try again. Rightism, for a very long time, was in complete support of a massive government that controlled society. It was called monarchism. In some places, it still is.

Then I suppose it depends on what you use to measure left and right. I use authoritarianism.

[Constantinopolis]

...isn't inherently left wing, try again. Rightism, for a very long time, was in complete support of a massive government that controlled society. It was called monarchism. In some places, it still is.

Then I suppose it depends on what you use to measure left and right. I use authoritarianism.

...which results in you being forced to position the majority of historical political movements (not just the Nazis) in a different place from where they were historically positioned. For example, anarchism has always been considered far-left.

The Left-Right spectrum is not, and never has been, about authoritarianism.

[Jamzmania]

Then I suppose it depends on what you use to measure left and right. I use authoritarianism.

...which results in you being forced to position the majority of historical political movements (not just the Nazis) in a different place from where they were historically positioned. For example, anarchism has always been considered far-left.

The Left-Right spectrum is not, and never has been, about authoritarianism.

I've never heard of anarchism being considered far left, however communism and socialism are considered far left. Their primary theme is significant (if not total) government control over the economy. Fascism operates in much the same way. There is a reason that the Nazi Party's name was the National Socialist German Workers' Party.

[Trotskylvania]

How? In any measurable way, how are the Nazis "left-wing"?

Words, names, labels and Nazi propaganda mean jack shit. I want actions: actual evidence of the Nazis doing leftist things.

The massive government and its control of society.

That's not a left wing idea, especially in Europe anywhere between 1789 and 1991.

In Germany specifically, state control was strongly associated with the right wing and the Prussian Junker aristocracy. Prussian militarism was mirrored by their economic policy; the state controlled the economy in the exercise of military prerogatives and to promote the prestige of the nation. It was anti-democratic, anti-liberal, strongly conservative and traditionalist, tied closely to titled/landed nobility.

[Jamzmania]

The massive government and its control of society.

That's not a left wing idea, especially in Europe anywhere between 1789 and 1991.

In Germany specifically, state control was strongly associated with the right wing and the Prussian Junker aristocracy. Prussian militarism was mirrored by their economic policy; the state controlled the economy in the exercise of military prerogatives and to promote the prestige of the nation. It was anti-democratic, anti-liberal, strongly conservative and traditionalist, tied closely to titled/landed nobility.

And yet we are talking, presumably, about modern definitions. In modern usage, the actual ideology of fascism would probably be considered left wing because it is a variation of socialism.

[Trotskylvania]

...which results in you being forced to position the majority of historical political movements (not just the Nazis) in a different place from where they were historically positioned. For example, anarchism has always been considered far-left.

The Left-Right spectrum is not, and never has been, about authoritarianism.

I've never heard of anarchism being considered far left, however communism and socialism are considered far left. Their primary theme is significant (if not total) government control over the economy. Fascism operates in much the same way. There is a reason that the Nazi Party's name was the National Socialist German Workers' Party.

Until Murray Rothbard and his cadre of Anarcho-Capitalists came on the scene in the 1970s, anarchism was an excusively left-wing and explicitly socialist idea. As Mikhail Bakunin, influential anarchist and contemporary of Karl Marx put it, "liberty without socialism is privilege and injustice; socialism without liberty is brutality and slavery."

They believed, in various forms, in an immediate revolutionary transition to a stateless society based on the principle of free association in which land and capital would be held in common and managed according to the principles of free association. They weren't that much different from Marx and Engels, who mistrusted the state and believed in dismantling it as soon as possible, again based on principles of free association.

As I've stated early, the name "National Socialist German Workers Party" was a deliberate exercise in contradictions. Words like "National" and "German" in a political context were coded right wing, such as the German National Volk Party, another far-right party that were the first collaborators with the Nazis. "Socialist" and "Workers" were almost exclusively the province of the left; such as the profusion of Socialist, Socialist Workers, Communist Workers, Free Workers, etc. left-wing splitter groups in the 20s and early 30s.

The equivalent in America would be a party naming itself the Conservative Progressive Taxpayer's Green Party.

[Warped Woods]

That's not a left wing idea, especially in Europe anywhere between 1789 and 1991.

In Germany specifically, state control was strongly associated with the right wing and the Prussian Junker aristocracy. Prussian militarism was mirrored by their economic policy; the state controlled the economy in the exercise of military prerogatives and to promote the prestige of the nation. It was anti-democratic, anti-liberal, strongly conservative and traditionalist, tied closely to titled/landed nobility.

And yet we are talking, presumably, about modern definitions. In modern usage, the actual ideology of fascism would probably be considered left wing because it is a variation of socialism.

What's socialism?

[Radiatia]

The Nazis are considered far right because, unlike the left - whose ultimate goal is equality - the ultimate goal of the national socialists was actually a highly competitive, stratified society based on race.

So if left is more equal, and right is more unequal, then the Nazis represent the extreme right, because they promoted an extreme type of inequality.

[Trotskylvania]

That's not a left wing idea, especially in Europe anywhere between 1789 and 1991.

In Germany specifically, state control was strongly associated with the right wing and the Prussian Junker aristocracy. Prussian militarism was mirrored by their economic policy; the state controlled the economy in the exercise of military prerogatives and to promote the prestige of the nation. It was anti-democratic, anti-liberal, strongly conservative and traditionalist, tied closely to titled/landed nobility.

And yet we are talking, presumably, about modern definitions. In modern usage, the actual ideology of fascism would probably be considered left wing because it is a variation of socialism.

Left and right are always contextual. The left-wingers of one era often become the right-wingers of another era; the Montangards of the French Revolution would come to embody the orthodoxy of French political thought by 1914, while new groups like the SFIO emerged as new anti-establishment forces.

There's only one group that ties the left-right distinction to government role in the economy, and that's modern American conservatives. It's a definition that is completely ahistorical. The Right wing has, throughout history, meant the forces of orthodoxy, and in some sense this is even before modern mass politics, as attested to idioms like "the right hand of X", "left-handed compliment," etc. But the ideas were set in stone by the French Revolution; the supporters of the ancien regime sat on the right wing of the National Assembly, their opponents who championed a new liberal order based on the rights of man and republicanism at on the left-wing of the chamber.

It has been that way ever since.

[Wallenburg]

Homework threads are against the rules.

[The Lacedaemonians]

I am pretty sure they were right-wing reactionaries, particularly to the post-WWI politico-economical status quo, the Treaty of Versailles and the perceived Marxist threat.

[Quokkastan]

That's not a left wing idea, especially in Europe anywhere between 1789 and 1991.

In Germany specifically, state control was strongly associated with the right wing and the Prussian Junker aristocracy. Prussian militarism was mirrored by their economic policy; the state controlled the economy in the exercise of military prerogatives and to promote the prestige of the nation. It was anti-democratic, anti-liberal, strongly conservative and traditionalist, tied closely to titled/landed nobility.

And yet we are talking, presumably, about modern definitions. In modern usage, the actual ideology of fascism would probably be considered left wing because it is a variation of socialism.

Presumably we're not. Since it's been pointed out to you that your definition and usage are atypical. The "modern" definition does not agree with yours.

[Netherlands Mualenia]

Neither. Nazism is generally considered an offshoot of fascism, which is in the Third Way branch together with most forms of nationalism that can incorporate any aspects of the two sides.

Looking at their policies, they are often more leaning towards leftist policies than rightwing ones. People have to remember that left isn't equal to progressive.

[Kubra]

It's not generally a secret that the nazi's (and a lot of western european fascist parties) had roots in the socialist movement, specifically the rather patriotic thinkers and factions of the first two workers internationals. Even Proudhon and Bakunin end up with a bit of implication in its ideological formation (not proudhons fault, of course). For Germany, they'd only been a unified state for about 40 years, 40 years dominated by the being and memory of Bismarck and his relationship with the factions of the left (especially the Lasallians) that would later be integral to the split of the second international.
What it meant to be a communist or a socialist is different these days than it was then. Marxism predominated less in the form of marxist-leninism and more in the form of orthodox marxism (the latter being the ideology of the social democratic parties founded on marxist lines, at the time basically all social democratic parties), with the other lesser known socialists (blanquists, fourierists, proudhonists, lasallists, other such now obscure names) had nonetheless large followings. Altogether, the majority of socialists were not marxist, but of the various schools with varying sorts of theory and practice. There was overarching revolutionary body (such as the comintern) enforcing any particular politics, no established canon of works, and thus being on the "left" and what that meant was very different. It wasn't some group identity full of solidarity for even the weirdest hippy at a may day parade, it was folks who happened to read works similar to yours and whose guts you probably hated, for being unscientific or insufficiently prussian and so on.

[MERIZoC]

Leftist because I don't like them and I also don't like communism.

[Luziyca]

Far-right.

[Imperializt Russia]

Leftist because I don't like them and I also don't like communism.

You're an anarchist and a primitivist.

[Major-Tom]

Leftist because I don't like them and I also don't like communism.

You're an anarchist and a primitivist.

And sarcastic.

[Hirota]

Horseshoe theory folks.

[Legitimists]

Undoubtedly far-right but at the same time they were undoubtedly something new. I'd put some pressure on those posters who said that they were reactionary; they were not reactionary because they did not wish to return to any past state of affairs (except perhaps some imaginary mythic, Tolkien-esque past); they shunned monarchy, aristocracy and the trappings of the old Germany and aesthetically were very proletarian in nature (as all fascist movements were), with marches and uniformed militias coming from the tradition of the workers movement. They also embraced some ideas considered hyper-modern such as eugenics and 'scientific racialism' and Spencerite social darwinism. In short it was the tremendously destructive birthing cry of racist, proletarian, skinhead politics which the world had not seen before then.

[Frank Zipper]

Horseshoe theory folks.

The Nazis were strange, primitive crabs? I can live with that.

[MERIZoC]

You're an anarchist and a primitivist.

And sarcastic.

[Emerald Ilses Empire]

Alrighty, time to pad my foot into this cesspool!

First issue I'd like to point out in this discussion, is to make sure to separate Nazism and Fascism. Nazism a child of Fascism (Though didn't really carry on much of the traits, more on this later), but they are still separate entities. So things that may apply to most Fascist ideologies may not necessarily apply to Nazi's.


Secondary issue, is on what we are really defining as "Right Wing" versus "Left Wing". From each country, to each individual, you will have radically different definitions of what constitutes the political spectrum. They range from scholarly attempts to simplifying ideologies to find patterns and similarities, to Stalin calling anyone who opposes him a member of the right wing. The terms originally derived from the French revolution on where the delegates sat within the assembly, with it's only consistency being that it constantly changed (For example, originally Robespierre, Danton and Hébert were all sitting in the far left, later in the revolution, Danton was on the right, Robespierre in the center, and Hébert on the left).

To get an idea where a Nazi would have sat at some point during that time, we would have to look more at their influences, which for Hitler, is fairly difficult. Hitler himself once said that all it took to be a fascist, was to believe you are fascist, and follow the party (Apoligies for not citing this, I looked but can't find this quote again. I BELIEVE I found it either from The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, or Mein Kampf). This...Isn't a very solid example of ideology from the leader of Nazism.

The Nazis obviously did believe in their racial superiority, but also had many other ideals often left unsaid and not always seemingly fitting with their image. They were adamant environmentalists as well as heavy followers of healthy foods and natural (instead of artificial) meals. They encouraged children to remain adamantly loyal to their parents and their state, then at the same time encouraged out-of-wedlock births and strong antipathy to establishment (Notable being that any notion of "Establishemnt" was always the old state of the Republic, even when Hitler's Dictatorship was long entrenched"). They seemed heavily religious, yet had a program planning to remove "The foreign roman faith" from Germany and replace it with German Paganism.`

On Economics, Hitler mostly just left it to Schacht to run for Hitler believed that having a strong military and conquering land will make the economy strong, and had little interest in most economics. What economics ended up happening was corporatism, where the German government forced companies into strictly regulated cartels, and gave all workers a pass that could essentially be held ransom for forced labor. The German government made strict regulations on price controls, amount of production, distribution of resources, etc. It was more or less a command economy under the guise of a free market.

To cut down on the lenght of this giant post, the conclusion!

Overall, in light of all of this, I would have to place a Nazi on the left side, assuming the Right Vs. Left wing was in early/middle period of the French revolution. Nazis would not like the current system allowing a decadent nobility to live luxuriously at the cost of the nation, as well would want a national instead of a dynastic forum of government. The Nazi also would be against the institutionalized church, viewing it's vast possession of lands and privileges to be detrimental to the state. The Nazi would also probably be for the establishment of a Committee of Public Saftey, due to it's extreme power and relative disconnect from obeying the population (since the commune typically only operated in the interests of Paris and of the Jacobins, and completely ignored and disenfranchised the outer regions)

[Virtannis]

On the traditional Left-Right spectrum Nazism and Fascism in general is located on the far-right.
The fact that this two-sided spectrum is highly flawed when it comes to presenting what's left and right that's true, but if you are going to use it Nazis are traditionally associated and are widely considered far-right despite their mixed economic policies for example.

For example- what's more "Left"- Communism or Anarchism? You get the point, both are considered "Far-Left ideologies" but they usually don't get along very well- in that definition that you're seeking Fascism is indeed Right-Wing.