We learned some wrong lessons about the rise of Nazis

There's probably nothing which is more universally condemned than Nazi ideology. Because of that, we have devoted a lot of thinking on how that could happen there, in the Germany of the 1930s, and if and how it could happen elsewhere. Two of the lessons we supposedly learned, however, are outright wrong. Failing to learn the correct lessons presents a risk we should not be willing to face.

The first wrong lesson is that the rise of the Nazis either a) shows that the parliamentary form of government is no more protective of democracy because Germany was parliamentary or, worse, b) that parliamentarism itself was a factor behind the collapse of democracy there. The second wrong lesson, intrinsically related to the first, is that the rise of the Nazis demonstrates the dangers of majority rule. In this post, I will deal with the first wrong lesson, and leave the second to a different post.

It should be clear that, even if it had been a case of failure in a parliamentary government, one instance of failure should not condemn a whole form of government. Refraining from smoking significantly lowers your probability of lung cancer, yet you may still get lung cancer even if you have never smoked in your life. 

But the type of failure which happened in Germany was not one of parliamentary government, it was a failure of the presidential aspects of the country. Weimar Germany was not a full parliamentary system, it was a semi-presidential system. As the name implies, this type of government combines aspects of the presidential and the parliamentary form of government. In my book, I use the World Bank-IDB Database of Political Institutions classification, which mostly lumps these countries together with parliamentary governments. An attentive reader (do I have them?) would call me a cheater now. How can I have the nerve to call semi-presidential countries parliamentary when I am providing evidence that parliamentary countries do well, but when we have a disastrous failure in a semi-presidential country, I blame it on it being "presidential"? 

I understand the concern. Like many critics of socialism, I find the "that was not real socialism" objection a very poor argument. Like many critics of libertarianism, I also think that the "that's not true libertarianism*" argument is a bad one. But both are very common. Most socialists - though not all - will instantly object to calling the failed experiences of the 20th century real socialism. Likewise, many libertarians will instantly disavow other self-styled libertarians who they perceive to be too accomodating of authoritarian tendencies. While I believe the sincerity of those who argue this way, I am not convinced. If your ideology is so confusing that the people who most loudly claim to support it so often deviate from the true tenets, then you should work to improve it, no matter how beautiful you imagine it to be. Yet I will argue that, in the case of Weimar Germany, it really was "not true parliamentarism". Bear with me.

 Think of semi-presidentialism as a mermaid, half fish, half human**. Despite being half fish, half human, mermaids live in the sea, and share most of their habits and concerns with other marine animals. They also presumably do not develop lung cancer in high rates, to stick with the smoking metaphor. One could present an argument: a marine lifestyle is protective against cancer. To make things simpler, it could even be said: humans get lung cancer, fish do not. Then someone could present a chart showing that mermaids are very safe from lung cancer. And we might reply: for our purposes, mermaids are fish. Imagine, however, that somebody else showed evidence of a mermaid who smoked three packs a day and developed lung cancer. Of course that would not be evidence against fish not getting lung cancer, solely because we previously had established that mermaids were "fish". 

The first thing to point out is that while the "not true socialists" will constantly reaffirm their absolute commitment to the cause of socialism, this was not the case in Weimar Germany. Already in 1923, only four years after the promulgation of the constitution, Carl Schimdt, one of the most influential political theorists of the time, published "Crisis of Parliamentarism", which "portrayed liberal parliamentary government as a sham: interest-based political parties feign protection of the national good while actually pursuing their own particularist agendas. Contemporary parliaments, Schmitt averred, were incapable of reconciling democracy, which presupposed political unity, with liberalism, a fundamentally individualist and pluralist doctrine." 

Likewise, it is clear that it was the presidential aspects of German constitution, not the parliamentary, that fostered the rise of the Nazis and the breakdown of democracy. Too see this, let us give names to two main forms of possible breakdown of democracy that political thinkers worry about: Madisonian and Linzian. A Madisonian breakdown happens when a branch of government becomes too powerful and starts enacting policies which reflect the support only of that specific branch but not of society as a whole. In a parliamentary country, this would happen if the main assembly was controlled by a majority of legislators which is cohesive enough to implement all sorts of policies which do not have support in other areas of society. The "faceless" nature of assemblies, where no single person can be held responsible for decisions, would aggravate this capacity to deviate from the public interest. A lack of fixed mandates and independent survival of the executive from the legislature would further embolden the authoritarian tendencies of parliament.

A Linzian breakdown, in turn, would happen if the president and parliament had equal claims to legitimacy of implementing policies. That could lead to less cohesive policies and recurrent crises. Instead of the "faceless" issue, the problem would be too much personalism. Unilateral government by the president ("winner-take-all") would also be a concern. Independent survival would also contribute to the crisis.

In all accounts, the collapse of Weimar Germany had a Linzian nature. 

After 1925, Weimar had a directly elected president, one of the main sources of the dual legitimacy problem. When presidents are directly elected, it is often the case that they claim a special kind of legitimacy against all other elected they alone were elected by the whole population of the country. Increasing the dual legitimacy problem, the constitution gave the president very significant powes, which pure parliamentary countries do not leave to the head of state. While parliament could have votes of no-confidence and remove ministers, it could not pick the cabinet of their choosing. That was a task left to the president, and one which President Hindenburg did not take lightly. One year into office, advisor Kurt von Schleicher had already suggested the adoption of  "25/48/53 formula" , which 

referred to the three articles of the Weimar Constitution that could make a presidential government possible:

• Article 25 allowed the President to dissolve the Reichstag.

• Article 48 allowed the President to sign into law emergency bills without the consent of the Reichstag. However the Reichstag could cancel any law passed by Article 48 by a simple majority within sixty days of its passage.

• Article 53 allowed the President to appoint the Chancellor.

Carl Schmitt, on his side, maintained his attacks on parliamentarism and sustained the legitimacy of the president. Here is Britannica:  

In the midst of economic collapse and social conflict bordering on civil war, Schmitt argued that the democratic legitimacy of the republic’s president outweighed any limits on his authority as legally articulated in the Weimar Constitution. Schmitt advised members of President Paul von Hindenburg’s circle to bypass the parliament and rule by presidential decree for the duration of the crisis and potentially beyond it. 

Clearly Weimar suffered from dual legitimacy and unilateral action by the president, very severely. It also had the problem of independent survival, but only of the president. While the president could - and did, on several occasions - dissolve parliament, a removal of the president from office would require not only a 2/3 majority in parliament, but an approval by referendum. If voters rejected the proposal, parliament would be dissolved. Surely I do not need to expand on the personalistic character of the Nazi party. A Madisonian breakdown, in turn, would have implied a concentration of powers in the parliament. But German was legislators were notoriously powerless in light of the crisis.

In sum, the Weimar Republic was a semi-presidential system. Semi-presidential systems usually behave more like parliamentary systems than presidential ones. This is not always the case. For Weimar, it is clear that the presidential aspects were not only very strong, but also key to the downfall of democracy and the rise of the Nazis. Not true parliamentarism indeed.

* The comparison is very unfair in a way. The harms caused by the "not true socialists" do not begin to compare to those caused by the the "not true libertarians", which are much smaller. But in another way it is fitting. Indeed, the name "libertarian" only came about because people were frustrated that those who called themselves "liberals" were not true liberals. Several libertarians still try to claim the name "liberal" for the "true liberals", not the progressives. Sometimes this becomes "classical liberal". 

  ** The scenario is silly, but the metaphor still fits, as long as, with any metaphor, we do not take it too far. It is only trying to convey an idea.