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A Failed Nazism: The Rise and Fall of the Deutschvolkische Freiheitspartei, 1919-1928

Braverman, Ilya
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1334343233

Abstract Details

2012, MA, Kent State University, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of History.
This study explores the tension between the better-known Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP) and an often overlooked familial rival, the Deutschvolkische Freiheitspartei (DVFP) during the early years of the Weimar Republic. Following a decades-long radicalization of the German right wing, and exacerbated by Germany's defeat in the First World War the NSDAP and DVFP emerged as representatives of a volkisch worldview that rejected the new system of parliament and was underscored by a fascist nature. This thesis challenges the too-simple conception of the rise to power of the NSDAP as having been inevitable, and of the party as seemingly unchallenged during its formative years. The existence of a plurality of Nazisms, reflected by the existence of the Nazistic DVFP that espoused a worldview nominally similar to that of the NSDAP, shows us that the rise to power of the NSDAP was a much more contingent affair than previously thought. The worldviews of both the NSDAP and DVFP are comparatively examined in this study to illuminate the existence of a variety of strands of Nazism, an ideology that was not a unique conception but rather a widespread worldview which was advocated by a variety of parties on the German extreme right wing during the Weimar years. The cooperative turned rivalrous relationship between the two parties between 1922-1928 is examined in this thesis in functional and cultural terms to highlight the structural and contingent factors which led to the success of the NSDAP and the failure of the DVFP. This study proposes that historians of the NSDAP, and particularly those studying its formative years use a different methodological approach in their attempts to understand the party's rise to power. Borrowing from the field of comparative fascist studies, this work uses the DVFP and its relationship with the NSDAP to explore the functional and cultural factors which led to the NSDAP's rise to power at the expense of a variety of other, Nazistic parties.
Richard Steigmann-Gall, PhD (Advisor)
Shelley Baranowski, PhD (Committee Member)
Matthew Crawford, PhD (Committee Member)
156 p.
European History; History; Modern History
Nazism; Weimar Republic; Right wing groups; DVFP; NSDAP; Fascism

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Braverman, I. (2012). A Failed Nazism: The Rise and Fall of the Deutschvolkische Freiheitspartei, 1919-1928 [Master's thesis, Kent State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1334343233

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Braverman, Ilya. A Failed Nazism: The Rise and Fall of the Deutschvolkische Freiheitspartei, 1919-1928. 2012. Kent State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1334343233.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Braverman, Ilya. "A Failed Nazism: The Rise and Fall of the Deutschvolkische Freiheitspartei, 1919-1928." Master's thesis, Kent State University, 2012. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1334343233

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

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© 2012, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Kent State University and OhioLINK.