BOWLING FOR FASCISM: SOCIAL CAPITAL AND THE RISE OF THE NAZI PARTY IN WEIMAR GERMANY, 1919-33 Shanker Satyanath Nico Voigtländer Hans-Joachim Voth (NYU) (UCLA and NBER) (UZH and CEPR) 26 May 2015 1

Background: Social capital Social capital = a dense network of civic associations “[t]he study of social capital is that of network-based processes that generate beneficial outcomes through norms and trust” (Durlauf and Fafchamps, 2004) Social capital typically associated with benign outcomes: Vigorous democracy (Tocqueville, 1835 and Putnam, 1994,1995) Economic development (Knack and Keefer, 1997) Pro-social behavior (Guiso, Sapienza and Zingales, 2008, 2010) Also acknowledged that social capital can have negative effects, such as social polarization (Durlauf and Fafchamps, 2004); crime (Field, 2003) Autocratic rulers can use social capital as a means of control  entrench elites  persistence of “bad” institutions (Acemoglu, Reed, and Robinson, 2013) This paper: Can social capital also contribute to the fall of existing democracies and the emergence of autocracies? Durlauf and Fafchamps, 2004: social capital can lead to exclusion (e.g., professional networks: alumni can form bonding ‘clubs’, clubs excluding black people from membership) Field: similar, criminal networks can exclude non-criminals Tocqueville: travels through America Guiso, Sapienza and Zingales (2011) define civic capital as “those persistent shared beliefs and values that help a group overcome the free rider problem in the pursuit of socially valuable activities.”

Gleichschaltung = "coordination", "making the same“ Gleichschaltung = "coordination", "making the same“. System of totalitarian control and coordination over all aspects of society.

Origins of Totalitarianism: Mass-society, decline of traditional ties  susceptibility for totalitarian doctrine Large-scale, impersonal, social institutions: Individuals cut off from traditional and communal ties (Ortega y Gasset) Social isolation is key: Appeal to marginal loners on the fringes of society (Arendt, 1958). Stern (1972): Germany lacked “the kind of voluntary, civic activity that attracted their English and American counterparts.” Mass movements – NS, Communists – offer an alternative identity  weakness of German civic society facilitated rise of the Nazis Contrast: Berman (1997): Weimar Germany had comparatively high social capital, successfully exploited by NSDAP Mass society is any society of the modern era that possesses a mass culture and large-scale, impersonal, social institutions.[1] A mass society is a society in which prosperity and bureaucracy have weakened traditional social ties." Descriptions of society as a "mass" took form in the 19th century, referring to the leveling tendencies in the period of the Industrial Revolution that undermined traditional and aristocratic values In the late 19th century, in the work of Émile Durkheim, the term was associated with society as a mass of undifferentiated, atomistic individuals. In 20th century neo-Marxist accounts, such as those of the Frankfurt School, mass society was linked to a society of alienated individuals held together by a culture industry that served the interests of capitalism. Conservative accounts in the 20th century critiqued mass society from a different perspective. José Ortega y Gasset, for instance, lamented the decline of high culture in mass society.

This paper Construct novel dataset for association density in more than 225 towns and cities in the 1920s Show that there is a robust, strong relationship between density of associations and Nazi Party entry Results equally strong for bowling, singing, and animal breeding clubs etc. Address concerns over endogeneity Show that “dark side” of social capital was particularly strong where regional institutions were weak On second point: -- mobilization could have happened in low social capital areas of Weimar Germany – so national-level arguments not very convincing -- we’re the first paper to examine cross-sectional distribution of social capital in WR -- Note: A few other scholars have demonstrated that social capital can be related to negative outcomes, mostly due to the exclusionary character of many social networks, and with consequences at the local level. See Field (2003, chapter 3) for a review of this literature. 5 5

Background: Rise of the NSDAP Founded 1919 1923 – attempt to overthrow the government (“Beerhall Putsch”) Party banned in 1924 Returns to the polls in 1928, receives 2.6% of the vote In the late 20s, party organization growing rapidly 100,000 members 1,400 local chapters By 1933, 850,00 members; “Storm Troopers” (SA) strong enough to challenge the government militarily First major electoral success in 1930 (after the party had already built substantial membership base) Main message (voiceline): Party first grew its membership base, then it conquered the polls 1924 here must be DFVP (joint list with Nazis)

Why party entry matters Membership expansion via local party cells was a critical pre-condition for subsequent electoral success and the collapse of democracy (Brustein, 1998) Membership dues key source of financing Members important for major modes of mobilization (rallies, leafleting, etc.) NS entry rates predict (later) electoral success Main message (voiceline): Party first grew its membership base, then it conquered the polls Brustein: Book: “The Logic of Evil – Social Origins of the Nazi Party, 1998)

How did the NSDAP exploit local associations? Town chapters (Ortsgruppen) were responsible for recruiting members, collecting dues, coordinating activities, etc. Koshar (1986) uses the example of Emil Wissner, a salesman in Marburg: Member of a white-collar employee association (from 1921), and active in two gymnastics clubs (from 1904). Joined the party in 1929, and actively used his position to proselytize for the party, and to win new members.

Social Networks and Party Entry Fellow association members more trusted than randomly matched acquaintances: makes it easier for Nazi party ‘political entrepreneurs’ to spread the message One Nazi Party member recounts how he… “…became acquainted with a colleague of my own age with whom I had frequent conversations. He was a calm, quiet person whom I esteemed very highly. When I found out that he was one of the local leaders of the National Socialist party, my opinion of it as a group of criminals changed completely…” Other theories of party entry: petit bourgeoisie (Heiden, 1935; Stephan, 1931), Mittelstand (Kater, 1983). However, detailed examination of data reveals that class composition similar to SPD (social democrats)

NSDAP members were mostly members of ‘ordinary’ associations From Koshar (1987): Very few veterans and nationalist memberships. Mostly neutral cross-associations.

Data Collected data on associations from 229 town and city directories, altogether 22,127 associations 2.61 associations per 1,000 inhabitants on average Conditions to be in the sample: Contacted all towns larger than 10,000 in 1925 (~550) Surviving directories listing associations in the 1920s For many towns and cities, this information was lost, destroyed during the war, or it did not exist in the first place Core measure: “Association density” number of associations per 1,000 inhabitants (Unfortunately, no systematic data on number of members) Matched with sample Falter-Brustein computerized sample of 38,752 Nazi Party members for 1925-33 (Schneider-Haase, 1991). Identify 9,169 members in the 229 towns and cities

Towns and cities in the sample, by association density and party entry Nazi Party entry Note: Full dots = above median; empty dots = below median. 12 12 12 12 12

Balancedness Omnibus test: Test if predicted NSDAP entry (by all controls) is correlated with club density p-value 0.19 for baseline controls p-value 0.80 for all controls, conditional on baseline controls

Baseline results: Nazi Party entry and association density

Partial scatter plot, NSDAP entry rate and association density (baseline)

Baseline results – some robustness

More robustness… Subsamples by high/low Catholic, blue-collar, city size Bonding and bridging social capital Matching estimation (also by location)

NSDAP Party Membership and Success at the Polls

Mediation test: Club density  Party entry  Electoral success

Towards an Interpretation When do associations matter most? Early vs. late party entry: Stronger results for early entry Role of `Nazi potential’: Associations matter more in towns with lower right-wing votes in early 1920s Panel results: Existing members most ‘useful’ for fostering party growth in locations with high club density Interpretation: Local networks particularly useful for new parties that cannot rely on existing members for local recruitment efforts Further suggestive evidence: Elections – Counterfactuals: Weak negative relationship with KPD (communists), none with DNVP (right-wing party) in 1928-33

Understanding the effects of social capital: The role of institutions A lot of evidence – social capital positive for democracy In Weimar – contributes to decline and fall of democracy How do we make sense of the difference? One answer – institutions Strong, stable institutions align expectations Provide a positive prior for democracy Can crack down on anti-democratic movements while they’re still small 1930 turning point for Prussia: The appointment of Heinrich Brüning as Chancellor in 1930 is considered by historians to be the de facto end of democracy in Weimar Germany (Bracher 1978). Emphasize how shocking it is for social democrats to order the police to break up May day demonstrations! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preu%C3%9Fenschlag

Example: Prussia 1919-32 = “The Weimar that works” Stable Social Democrat coalition (narrow majority) Vigorous defenders of democracy (against right and left) Police stops paramilitary groups Bans political marches (e.g., police shoots on Communist demonstrators on May 1, 1929) Increasing pressure from central government starting 1930. Prussian government deposed in a putsch in July 1932 1930 turning point for Prussia: The appointment of Heinrich Brüning as Chancellor in 1930 is considered by historians to be the de facto end of democracy in Weimar Germany (Bracher 1978). Emphasize how shocking it is for social democrats to order the police to break up May day demonstrations! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preu%C3%9Fenschlag

Proxy for government stability (state-level): Three indicators over the period 1918-July 32 (ending with the Prussian coup d’etat) the percentage of time that the longest-serving government was in office the percentage of time that the longest-serving party was in office (possibly in different coalitions) the percentage of time that a state was governed by at least one party from the “Weimar coalition” (SPD, DDP, Zentrum) Compute first principal component Prussia in the upper third, but some states equally or more stable 1930 turning point for Prussia: The appointment of Heinrich Brüning as Chancellor in 1930 is considered by historians to be the de facto end of democracy in Weimar Germany (Bracher 1978). Emphasize how shocking it is for social democrats to order the police to break up May day demonstrations! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preu%C3%9Fenschlag

The role of stable government – preview Low stability, outside Prussia (N=58) Prussia (N=119) High stability, outside Prussia (N=48) Our results show that a working institutional framework can nullify the negative effects of social capital – even in a largely disfunctional country like Germany

Our results show that a working institutional framework can nullify the negative effects of social capital – even in a largely disfunctional country like Germany

The net effect of club density on NSDAP entry Our results show that a working institutional framework can nullify the negative effects of social capital – even in a largely disfunctional country like Germany

Towards causality IV Additional checks “Plausibly exogenous” Selection on unobservables Altonji et al. 28

IV strategy 1860s membership in gymnast associations 1861 participation in the Nuremberg Singing Festival 283 singing associations 6,000-20,000 participants [Friedrich Nietzsche among them] Exclusion restriction 19C nationalism vs. national socialism (“spirit of 1848”) Turn towards the apolitical after 1850 Evidence from Democratic congress in Berlin, 1848 19th century nationalism was typically liberal, not militarist nor aggressive: “Germany and other modernizing nations became real to people because many thousands traveled around these nations…meeting their fellow countrymen and singing together” (Applegate 2013). The liberal, folk-based nationalism of the 19th century is not to be confused with the political agitation and xenophobia that the Nazis and other right-wing parties represented in Weimar Germany. Turner especially democratic – many ended emigrating to US after post-1849 repression. Turner movement flourished in the US, ended up fighting on the Union side for civil rights. 29

IV results

Conclusions Social capital associated with many beneficial outcomes We showed: dense networks of clubs associated with rise of the Nazi party, and thus contributing to the collapse of Weimar Germany’s democracy Does not depend on the type of association Important interaction with institutions: Social capital can be exploited to undermine democracy when institutions are weak

Tocqueville knew it all along… “The most natural privilege of man… is that of combining his exertions with those of his fellow creatures and of acting in common with them. The right of association therefore appears to me almost as inalienable in its nature as the right of personal liberty. … Nevertheless, if the liberty of association is only a source of advantage and prosperity to some nations, it may be perverted or carried to excess by others, and from an element of life may be changed into a cause of destruction.” [italics added] Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville; 29 July 1805 – 16 April 1859) was a French political thinker and historian best known for his Democracy in America (appearing in two volumes: 1835 and 1840) and The Old Regime and the Revolution (1856). In both of these works, he analyzed the rising living standards and social conditions of individuals and their relationship to the market and state in Western societies. Democracy in America published after his travels in the United States, is today considered an early work of sociology and political science.

BACKUP

The basic result Total entries per 1,000 Below-median club denisty: 27.7 Above-median club density: 35.2 Cumulative NSDAP membership, by association density Note: Each data point reflects the cumulative NSDAP entry rate (per 1,000 inhabitants), starting in 1925 and averaged across the cities with above- and below- median association density. The data are described in Section 3. NSDAP entries are from the Berlin-Minneapolis sample (Schneider-Haase 1991); starting in 1930, we correct aggregate entry rates for a change in sampling methodology, as described in Appendix C.

Partial scatter – exclude 90pctile of club density

Historians’ judgment “…the movement may have ‘fed’ on preexisting membership structures and clusters which the single members helped channel into the reestablished Nazi party. Ties with other ‘bourgeois’ associations of Germany’s civil society may well have enhanced this process by extending the reach of single members for recruitment purposes.” (Anheier 2003) “Weimar's rich associational life provided a critical training ground for eventual Nazi cadres and a base from which the NSDAP could launch its Machtergreifung (seizure of power).” (Berman 2007)

Example: Coburg

Veterans of 5th infantry Regiment Bamberg Soccer And athletics

Bad Langensalza [member count not listed]

Associations in the sample 40

Members per capita vs. Clubs p.c. Membership data for sports and gymnastics clubs members available for Prussian towns in 1927 41

Elections – Counterfactuals This finding offers strong support to the historical hypothesis as supported by local and regional case studies, that the NSDAP successfully penetrated clubs and associations, and co-opted local opinion leaders (see Section 2) – a path not open to other radical parties like the Communists because of basic ideological incompatibilities between its main message and the bourgeois associations (Anheier 2003a; Bösch 2005; Noakes 1971)

Early and late Nazi Party entries, by locality Note: The x-axis plots average rates of Nazi Party entry (per 1,000 inhabitants) in each city over the period 1925-28, and the y-axis over the period 1929-33. Data are described in Section 3.

Location-specific ‘sociability’? Worker associations as counterfactual One important question concerns interpretation – is it the case that in towns and cities with more civic associations, people were simply more social, and joined all manners of clubs, societies and parties to a greater extent? Ideally, we would like to test if entry rates at the opposite end of the political spectrum, for example for the Communist party, were higher as well in places with more associations. Unfortunately, Communist membership records are not available for the period. Instead, we turn the question around to ask: i) is there a general sociability component in association membership – are there also more workers’ associations in cities with generally high membership rates; ii) is the density of workers’ associations also correlated with Nazi Party entry (which would lend support to the notion of a location-specific sociability). In sum, these results suggest that places with high social capital were more sociable across the political spectrum, but sociability alone cannot explain the rise of the Nazi Party. Middle-class clubs acted as gateways to the Nazi movement, but working class associations did not – "infection" apparently required a minimum degree of ideological compatibility. Evidence for “general sociability”, but not for an effect on Nazi party entry Working class associations did not act as gateways to the Nazi movement – "infection" apparently required a minimum degree of ideological compatibility

Civic vs. Military clubs

“Bridging” vs. “Bonding” social capital

Bonding and bridging social capital

Matching estimation and geographic location Matching estimation based on the variables listed in the row “Matching var.” Treatment variable is an indicator that equals one for the upper tercile of association density (for each of the three measures) and zero for the lower tercile. The average treatment effect for the treated (ATT) is reported, using robust nearest neighbor estimation with the three closest matches.

Quantile regressions Wiki: Quantile regression is a type of regression analysis used in statistics and econometrics. Whereas the method of least squares results in estimates that approximate the conditional mean of the response variable given certain values of the predictor variables, quantile regression aims at estimating either the conditional median or other quantiles of the response variable. One advantage of quantile regression, relative to the ordinary least squares regression, is that the quantile regression estimates are more robust against outliers in the response measurements. However, the main attraction of quantile regression goes beyond that. In practice we often prefer using different measures of central tendency and statistical dispersion to obtain a more comprehensive analysis of the relationship between variables

Quantile regression – graph Note: The figure shows the effect of a unit increase in association density on Nazi Party entry rates, by quantile of the dependent variable. The shaded area reflects the 95% confidence interval of the quantile regressions. The figure is derived for our main specification, with the three baseline controls: share of Catholics, ln(population), and the of share blue collar workers, all measured in 1925. Absolute coefficient sizes are plotted. For standardized beta coefficients, see Table 13 in the paper.

Annually standardized entry rates

Plausible exogeneity – Results following Conley, Hansen, and Rossi (2012) 0.014 – reduced form effect using principal components of the two instruments  for our IV result to become insignificant, the direct effect of the instruments would have to be at least one-half of their overall reduced form effect on party entry. In other words, Sängerfest participation in 1861 and the density of gymnasts in the 1860s would have to be at least half as potent a pathway to NS membership as participation in clubs and associations in the 1920s – which seems improbable. The Conley et al. results strongly suggests that the IV estimates are robust even to substantial deviations from strict exogeneity. Conley, Timothy G, Christian B Hansen, and Peter E Rossi. 2012. “Plausibly Exogenous.” Review of Economics and Statistics 94 (1): 260–272 Comparison: Reduced-form coefficient on IV is 0.227.

Selection on unobservables - Altonji ratios

Association delegates to Democratic Congress in Berlin, 1848 19th century nationalism was typically liberal, not militarist nor aggressive: “Germany and other modernizing nations became real to people because many thousands traveled around these nations…meeting their fellow countrymen and singing together” (Applegate 2013). The liberal, folk-based nationalism of the 19th century is not to be confused with the political agitation and xenophobia that the Nazis and other right-wing parties represented in Weimar Germany. Turner especially democratic – many ended emigrating to US after post-1849 repression. Turner movement flourished in the US, ended up fighting on the Union side for civil rights. 59