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Voting for Hitler and Stalin

Elections Under 20th Century Dictatorships

Erschienen am 14.11.2011, Auflage: 1/2011
Bibliografische Daten
ISBN/EAN: 9783593394893
Sprache: Englisch
Umfang: 349 S., 6 s/w Fotos
Format (T/L/B): 2.1 x 21.5 x 14 cm
Einband: Paperback

Beschreibung

InhaltsangabeContents Introduction NonCompetitive Elections in 20th Century Dictatorships: Some Questions and General Considerations 9 Ralph Jessen and Hedwig Richter I Legitimacy The SelfStaging of a Plebiscitary Dictatorship: The NSRegime Between "Uniformed Reichstag", Referendum and Reichsparteitag 39 Markus Urban Popular Sovereignty and Constitutional Rights in the USSR's Supreme Soviet Elections of February 194659 Mark B. Smith Integration, Celebration, and Challenge: Soviet Youth and Elections, 19531968 81 Gleb Tsipursky Mass Obedience: Practices and Functions of Elections in the German Democratic Republic103 Hedwig Richter Elections in Modern Dictatorships: Some Analytical Considerations126 Werner J. Patzelt II Discipline The Great Soviet Paradox: Elections and Terror in the Unions, 19371938 147 Wendy Z. Goldman Plebiscites in Fascist Italy: National Unity and the Importance of the Appearance of Unity 173 Paul Corner Works Council Elections in Czechoslovakia, 1948-1968 186 Peter Heumos Faking It: Neo-Soviet Electoral Politics in Central Asia 204 Donnacha Ó Beacháin III Dissent and Loyalty Elections, Plebiscitary Elections, and Plebiscites in Fascist Italy and NaziGermany: Comparative Perspectives 231 Enzo Fimiani "Germany Totally National Socialist"-National Socialist Reichstag Elections and Plebiscites, 1933-1938: The Example of SchleswigHolstein 254 Frank Omland Elections in the Soviet Union, 1937-1989: A View into a Paternalistic World from Below 276 Stephan Merl "The People's Voice": The Elections to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in 1958 in the Belarusian Capital Minsk 309 Thomas M. Bohn Contributors337 Index341

Autorenportrait

Ralph Jessen ist Professor für Neuere Geschichte an der Universität zu Köln. Hedwig Richter, Dr. phil., ist Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin an der Universität Greifswald.

Leseprobe

Non-Competitive Elections in 20th Century Dictatorships: Some Questions and General Considerations Ralph Jessen and Hedwig Richter Elections make the difference between a democracy and a dictatorship. Not the only difference, of course, but nevertheless a decisive one. Any acceptable definition of a democratic order includes the following: universal suffrage, a secret ballot, and competing candidates. These are the essential prerequisites for the legitimization of a political regime. Regardless of all critical considerations concerning limits of representation which could hamper democracy, the elitist isolation of the political class, or the socially, economically or culturally biased structure of the electoral system, elections are considered to be a cornerstone of popular sovereignty. However, despite this, elections were and are not limited to liberal democracies. In fact most of the 20th century dictatorships put a great deal of effort into arranging general elections and referenda. For example, the Soviet government along with other governments in the Eastern Bloc countries regularly called their populations out to vote in general, equal, direct and secret elections. No effort was spared in enticing the voters to the ballot box. During the 1960s millions of Soviet citizens came together in hundreds of thousands of election meetings to take part in the elections for the Supreme Soviet. In Moscow thousands of shows, dance performances and concerts were put on in order to entertain the voters. In the polling stations play areas and buffets were set up. Around 15 per cent of the total population took part in the Soviet election campaigns as agitators and canvassers (see Tsipursky, Bohn, Smith, Heumos in this volume; Jacobs 1970, 62-68). Of course, with regard to influencing the composition of the parliament, or even the government, all of this remained quite meaningless. Yet, why did dictatorships stage these "elections without choice" (Hermet et al., 1978) if their function as "institutionalized procedures for the choosing of office holders by some or all of the recognized members of an organization" was not being fulfilled in the slightest (Rokkan 1968, 6; see also Lipset and Rokkan 1967)? Why did political regimes, which were radically opposed to liberal democracy, imitate one of the crucial features of that antagonistic system? This is the main question which this volume of essays seeks to answer, and it is based on the assumption that fake democratic elections cannot simply be dismissed as trivial propaganda phenomena, but rather are a source of valuable insights into the functioning of dictatorships in the 20th century. 20th Century Dictatorships Juan Linz distinguishes between democratic, authoritarian and totalitarian regimes (Linz 1975, 2000). This typology has been adopted by many political scientists and historians-despite the fact that the different types of authoritarian regime make it difficult to bring them all under one common term, and also despite the criticism of different aspects of the theory of totalitarianism. For as much as one might regard the term totalitarianism as problematic given its normative connotations, its fixation on the structures of a regime, and its relative blindness to social and cultural practices, a typological classification of the main different types of dictatorship is essential (Jessen 1995; Bessel and Jessen 1996). This is even more so the case in respect to elections. Political scientists dealing with this topic have quite rightly highlighted the close relationship between the form and function of the elections, and the type of political regime. In this respect the determining classification criteria are institutionalization and the practice of political competition. Thus, Dieter Nohlen distinguishes between competitive elections in democratic systems, semi-competitive elections in authoritarian systems, and non-competitive elections in totalitarian systems (Nohl