A plea to learn from the past
Donald Trump was sworn in as 45th US president on Friday last week. The US is now being led by a tax-avoiding billionaire whose policies will inevitably lead to even more economic inequality, a hatemonger who has already caused a spike in hate crimes, a climate change denier who might single-handedly push the world’s climate and ecosystems into breakdown and a man who has this week again been accused of being a sexual predator.
This represents a collective failure of historic proportions, and we should all be afraid (“Fear before a ‘Trumpian’ world,” Jan. 15, page 6).
While comparisons of everybody and everything to Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party have become tiresome and the US president even used this idiotic comparison to describe his own intelligence services, there are actually lessons to learn here.
Former German chancellor Helmut Schmidt once said that, even in 1,000 years, the Holocaust will be associated with Germany.
While it is to be hoped that Trump will not leave such an indelible mark on history, even the election of such a despicable candidate is already a smudge on the US’ historical record.
Given Trump’s emotional and intellectual unsuitability for the job, again obvious in his acceptance speech, the omens are not good (“Living in a world according to Trump,” Nov. 16, 2016, page 8).
Since I am a German who has studied at one of the US’ best universities and lived there for four years, I believe I am allowed to draw some parallels between what happened in Germany’s Weimar Republic, which led to the rise of Hitler, and what just happened in the US.
Historians who have studied Hitler’s rise to power generally agree that there were several conditions that allowed the Nazis to turn a democracy into a dictatorship.
An important one was socio-economic inequality brought on by neoliberal economics which left millions of people unemployed, disenfranchised and angry (“Hitler was not elected by majority,” Dec. 10, 2015, page 8).
Another reason was that the weak Weimar democracy allowed hate and lies to be spread without consequences. Two famous lies of Hitler’s demagoguery were the stab-in-the-back myth and the Jewish conspiracy.
The former purported that the German Army did not lose World War I on the battlefield, but was instead betrayed by civilians on the home front, especially the republicans who overthrew the German monarchy in the 1918-1919 revolution. The latter alleged the idea of a worldwide Jewish conspiracy, linking international finance with Bolshevism.
A third reason was that the Weimar Republic was a weak democracy with flawed institutions and which was not supported intellectually by many people in powerful positions of industry, politics, law and police.
One consequence of this was that Hitler was allowed to openly challenge the legitimacy of democratic institutions (the so-called “elite”) and to build up the Sturmabteilung (SA) which functioned as the paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party. The SA openly intimidated and even injured and killed political opponents without consequence.
No historical situation is ever the same, and I am not so stupid as to equate the Weimar Republic to the current situation in the US. Nevertheless, it is important to learn lessons by drawing parallels.
Undoubtedly, many US voters were swayed by their current economic disenfranchisement brought on by neoliberal politics which include trickle-down economics and global market liberalization. Their anger was then turned toward “others” which instead of “Jews” is illegal immigrants, Muslims and the nebulously defined “elite.”
Added to the hate were innumerable lies and I do not need to repeat the insidious effect which fake news had on the US election and the many outright lies, such as climate change, which are committed daily by post-truth Republicans.
However, there are also clear differences. The Republican Party does not command a paramilitary unit, and intellectual support for the basic tenets of democracy is still overall strong among most US citizens and institutions, although even that is eroding (“Donald Trump rises to top in a world of distrust,” Nov. 10, 2016, page 9).
Sting famously sang “History will teach us nothing,” and I am afraid that many Americans have a very weak grasp of history, especially beyond their own borders.
I am writing in the hope that people in Taiwan and worldwide will heed the lessons of the past, so that history will teach us something.
Taiwan is also suffering from some of these global developments, especially socio-economic inequality and post-truth politics. (“Addressing the wealth gap,” Dec. 12, 2016 and “Gay marriage and post-truth politics,” Dec. 11, 2016, page 6). Most religions actually consider lying a sin, and it is high time that lying on the Internet and other media is effectively banished and punished (“How the Internet is loosening our grip on the truth,” Nov. 7, 2016, page 8).
I work in global health, environmental science and sustainability, and lies about the merits of vaccination or the dangers of fossil fuel pollution are endangering people’s lives. We should not allow the liars, fear peddlers and hatemongers to take over the world.
As a German, I learned in history class what terrible consequences that can lead to.
Bruno Walther
Taipei
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