By Lynne Ann Hartnett, Villanova University
In the words of the German political philosopher, Hannah Arendt, “Fact depends entirely on the power of the man who can fabricate it.” It speaks of totalitarianism where facts become fluid, and reality is seen solely through the prism of the totalitarian perspective. But once truth and reason are sacrificed in devotion to the cult of the leader, such as the likes of Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler, totalitarianism becomes lethal.
Nazified German Life
To consolidate his totalitarian power, Adolf Hitler Nazified German life. The party took over economic, occupational, and social groups, and created new organizations to supplant them. Hitler himself said that Germans needed to “develop [new] organizations in which an individual’s entire life can take place”.
So, if a German professional wanted to keep his or her job, they needed to join a Nazi organization, such as the National Socialist Physicians’ League, the National Socialist Teacher’s League, or one of many others. The Nazis also formed recreational and social clubs that ranged from choral groups and sports clubs to shooting societies and youth organizations. Virtually any public body that wasn’t under Nazi organizational control was dissolved.
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Joseph Stalin’s Vision
A similar trend took place in the Soviet Union. As Stalin sought to mobilize his population to modernize at a breakneck pace, no action, belief, or even thought, could be apolitical. Boris Pasternak captures this in his Nobel Prize-winning novel Doctor Zhivago, when the devout communist character Strelnikov declares that “the private life is dead” in Soviet Russia.
To support Stalin’s vision, rivers were to be rerouted, dams built, and canals dug to link seas hundreds of miles apart. Plus, people were reprogrammed as heroic shock workers, dedicated to Communist Party goals, and making superhuman sacrifices for objectives outlined in Moscow.
The Soviet Food Supply
One potential weak point was the Soviet food supply. Mobilizing industry required food for the soldiers of industry. And although Stalin had moved toward collectivizing agriculture, the process was too slow for his liking. A flood of grain was needed in urban areas, and on the industrial front, to feed hungry, hardworking people. And that flow was too much of a trickle.
But Stalin couldn’t accept any personal responsibility for the shortfall. Totalitarian leaders can never admit mistakes. Instead, scapegoats must be found elsewhere.
Stalin’s foils in the early 1930s were a group of farmers known as kulaks, who resisted collectivization. Because organized production and distribution were painted as necessary in both industry and agriculture, the kulaks became enemies of the state.
In this way, Stalin became not a source of failure but the champion of a just cause.
Socialist Realism
One key feature of a totalitarian state is the government’s ability to control messaging and information. In the Soviet Union, rigid censorship ensured that its people had access only to the official information and perspectives emanating from the Kremlin line. No independent press or media existed. The party newspaper, Pravda, and the government organ, Izvestiya, defined reality, even if fabricated, with little basis in fact.
So, as the process of de-kulakization forced five million peasants from their homes, reality and ideals diverged. Up to one million men, women, and children were never heard from again.
And yet, some Soviet journalists, authors, artists and filmmakers depicted collectivization and breakneck industrialization as an enchanting accomplishment in which ordinary people guided by party leadership built a beautiful new world.
Theater, film, and literature all presented sanitized versions of Soviet life during the 1930s through a lens that became known as Socialist realism. Socialist ideals—and the people working to achieve them—were depicted as happy and heroic.
The dark side of life was painted over in pastel hues, casting the Soviet system, its party, and leader in a warm glow.
The Power of Artists and Intellectuals
Meanwhile, Hitler’s goals of eliminating democracy and Marxism, and achieving global supremacy for the Aryan race meant that to succeed, his vision would have to reign supreme over Stalin’s; one system would have to prevail over the other.
Still, Hitler and Stalin both realized the power of artists and intellectuals. And so the Nazis held public book burnings to enforce proper thinking in the emerging Third Reich. The work of famous German authors, philosophers, and thinkers such as Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, and Erich Maria Remarque went up in flames.
In addition, communist, Jewish, and liberal intellectuals were purged from teaching positions. Many artists chose to leave the country.
A Paradox in Nazi Ideology
The Nazis, like the Soviets, also enlisted artists to depict the German people and nation in idealized sacred terms. But whereas Stalin’s social engineers found inspiration in industry, Nazi artists fixated on natural elements: rural landscapes, peasant values, family, and motherhood; in other words, traditional representations of German blood and soil.
This artistic inclination points to a paradox in Nazi ideology. While the Nazi state relied upon modern industry, modern means of communication, and a technologically advanced military, its propaganda celebrated traditional values, folk styles, and medieval histories.
Secret Police
The Soviet and Nazi states also mobilized secret police to enforce the rules of their totalitarian regimes. In Nazi Germany, it was the Gestapo; in the Soviet Union, it was the NKVD.
By the mid-1930s, Stalin was turning against some of the people who’d helped him to isolate his enemies and stigmatize others. Stalin’s use of the secret police against even loyal followers was consistent with a pattern of authoritarian rule.
In 1937, the NKVD was ordered to initiate mass shooting or imprisonment of several categories of socially harmful elements, including kulaks and former tsarist officials. In the same way, a German terror campaign was directed by the Gestapo. It organized the first concentration camps in 1933, and targeted anyone deemed to be an ideological, moral, or racial enemy of the fuehrer and the Third Reich.
Common Questions about Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin: Consolidating Totalitarian Power
Theater, film, and literature all presented sanitized versions of Soviet life during the 1930s through a lens that became known as Socialist realism. Socialist ideals—and the people working to achieve them—were depicted as happy and heroic.
The paradox in Nazi ideology was that while the Nazi state relied upon modern industry, modern means of communication, and a technologically advanced military, its propaganda celebrated traditional values, folk styles, and medieval histories.
The Soviet and Nazi states had mobilized secret police to enforce the rules of their totalitarian regimes. In Nazi Germany, it was the Gestapo; in the Soviet Union, it was the NKVD.
