The Political Effects of Witnessing State Atrocities: Evidence from the Nazi Death Marches
Publikation: Bidrag til tidsskrift › Tidsskriftartikel › Forskning › fagfællebedømt
Standard
The Political Effects of Witnessing State Atrocities : Evidence from the Nazi Death Marches. / De Juan, Alexander; Gläßel, Christian; Haass, Felix; Scharpf, Adam.
I: Comparative Political Studies, 01.06.2023.Publikation: Bidrag til tidsskrift › Tidsskriftartikel › Forskning › fagfællebedømt
Harvard
APA
Vancouver
Author
Bibtex
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
T1 - The Political Effects of Witnessing State Atrocities
T2 - Evidence from the Nazi Death Marches
AU - De Juan, Alexander
AU - Gläßel, Christian
AU - Haass, Felix
AU - Scharpf, Adam
PY - 2023/6/1
Y1 - 2023/6/1
N2 - How does witnessing regime atrocities influence the political attitudes of bystanders? We argue that observing regime violence against innocent civilians triggers psychological dissonance between beliefs about the regime and the witnessed moral transgression. As a result, regime support should decrease among bystanders of state atrocities. We analyze original, highly disaggregated archival data from the Nazi death marches at the end of World War II, which confronted ordinary German citizens with the regime’s crimes. We find that locations with higher victim numbers had lower vote shares for right-wing nationalist parties after the war. Supporting our proposed mechanism, we show that (1) this effect was strongest when Nazi crimes were at the center of public discourse and (2) that witnessing Nazi atrocities was associated with individuals’ rejection of Hitler 20 years later. The findings have implications for understanding democratization prospects and people’s nostalgia for fallen autocrats.
AB - How does witnessing regime atrocities influence the political attitudes of bystanders? We argue that observing regime violence against innocent civilians triggers psychological dissonance between beliefs about the regime and the witnessed moral transgression. As a result, regime support should decrease among bystanders of state atrocities. We analyze original, highly disaggregated archival data from the Nazi death marches at the end of World War II, which confronted ordinary German citizens with the regime’s crimes. We find that locations with higher victim numbers had lower vote shares for right-wing nationalist parties after the war. Supporting our proposed mechanism, we show that (1) this effect was strongest when Nazi crimes were at the center of public discourse and (2) that witnessing Nazi atrocities was associated with individuals’ rejection of Hitler 20 years later. The findings have implications for understanding democratization prospects and people’s nostalgia for fallen autocrats.
KW - Faculty of Social Sciences
KW - repression
KW - regime breakdown
KW - voting
KW - extremisme
KW - democratization
KW - authoritarian legacy
U2 - 10.1177/00104140231178736
DO - 10.1177/00104140231178736
M3 - Journal article
JO - Comparative Political Studies
JF - Comparative Political Studies
SN - 0010-4140
ER -
ID: 356229533