Nazi indoctrination and anti-Semitic beliefs in Germany

Abstract

Attempts at modifying public opinions, attitudes, and beliefs range from advertising and schooling to "brainwashing." Their effectiveness is highly controversial. In this paper, we use survey data on antiSemitic beliefs and attitudes in a representative sample of Germans surveyed in 1996 and 2006 to show that Nazi indoctrination--with its singular focus on fostering racial hatred--was highly effective. Between 1933 and 1945, young Germans were exposed to anti-Semitic ideology in schools, in the (extracurricular) Hitler Youth, and through radio, print, and film. As a result, Germans who grew up under the Nazi regime are much more anti-Semitic than those born before or after that period: the share of committed anti-Semites, who answer a host of questions about attitudes toward Jews in an extreme fashion, is 2-3 times higher than in the population as a whole. Results also hold for average beliefs, and not just the share of extremists; average views of Jews are much more negative among those born in the 1920s and 1930s. Nazi indoctrination was most effective where it could tap into preexisting prejudices; those born in districts that supported anti-Semitic parties before 1914 show the greatest increases in anti-Jewish attitudes. These findings demonstrate the extent to which beliefs can be modified through policy intervention. We also identify parameters amplifying the effectiveness of such measures, such as preexisting prejudices.cultural transmission | indoctrination | persistence | anti-Semitism

Implicit and Explicit Attitudes Toward African Americans and Barack Obama Did not Substantively Change During Obama's Presidency

“…In a recent analysis of anti-Semitic attitudes among Germans alive during the Third Reich, children between the ages of 6 and 15 were the most likely to express negative opinions toward Jews when measured more than 50 years later (Voigtländer & Voth, 2015). These findings are consistent with developmental research illustrating a similar critical period for intergroup attitude formation (e.g., Enesco, Navarro, Paradela, & Guerrero, 2005).…”

Social Changes in Impressionable Years and Adult Political Attitudes: Evidence From Jewish Expulsions in Nazi Germany

“…Finally, this paper improves our understanding of the long-term causes, consequences, and impacts, of the Nazi regime (Acemoglu, Hassan, and Robinson 2011;Akbulut-Yuksel and Yuksel 2015;Braun 2016;Cantoni, Hagemeister, and Westcott 2019;D'Acunto, Prokopczuk, and Weber 2015;Fontana, Nannicini, and Tabellini 2018;Grosfeld, Rodnyansky, and Zhuravskaya 2013;Moser, Voena, and Waldinger 2014;Pascali 2009;Satyanath, Voigtländer, and Voth 2017;Voigtländer and Voth 2015;Waldinger 2010Waldinger , 2012. Consistent with our findings, Acemoglu, Hassan, and Robinson (2011) find that Jewish persecution during the holocaust in Russia is negatively related to current political behavior, due to changes in the social structure within Russian society.…”

Legally Irrelevant Factors in Judicial Decision-Making: Battle Deaths and the Imposition of the Death Penalty in Nazi Germany

“…Our findings contribute to recent studies that use data from Nazi Germany to better understand economic, legal or social processes (see, for example, Akbulut-Yuksel and Yuksel, 2015;Ferguson and Voth, 2008;Satyanath et al 2017;Voigtländer and Voth, 2015;Waldinger, 2016). More specifically, our findings add to studies that have sought to better understand different aspects of decision-making on the People's Court (Gruchmann, 1988;Marxen, 1994;Schlüter, 1995), the closest of which to our study are Geerling et al (2016Geerling et al ( , 2017.…”