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From the Death of God to the Rise of Hitler

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  • Sascha O. Becker
  • Hans-Joachim Voth

Abstract

Can weakened religiosity lead to the rise of totalitarianism? The Nazi Party set itself up as a political religion, emphasizing redemption, sacrifice, rituals, and communal spirit. This had a major impact on its success: Where the Christian Church only had shallow roots, the Nazis received higher electoral support and saw more party entry. “Shallow Christianity” reflects the geography of medieval Christianization and the strength of pagan practices, which we use as sources of exogenous variation. We also find predictive power at the individual level: Within each municipality, the likelihood of joining the Nazi Party was higher for those with less Christian first names.

Suggested Citation

  • Sascha O. Becker & Hans-Joachim Voth, 2023. "From the Death of God to the Rise of Hitler," CESifo Working Paper Series 10730, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_10730
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sascha O. Becker & Ludger Woessmann, 2009. "Was Weber Wrong? A Human Capital Theory of Protestant Economic History," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(2), pages 531-596.
    2. David Clingingsmith & Asim Ijaz Khwaja & Michael Kremer, 2009. "Estimating the Impact of The Hajj: Religion and Tolerance in Islam's Global Gathering," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(3), pages 1133-1170.
    3. Nico Voigtländer & Hans-Joachim Voth, 2012. "Persecution Perpetuated: The Medieval Origins of Anti-Semitic Violence in Nazi Germany," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 127(3), pages 1339-1392.
    4. Davide Cantoni & Jeremiah Dittmar & Noam Yuchtman, 2018. "Religious Competition and Reallocation: the Political Economy of Secularization in the Protestant Reformation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(4), pages 2037-2096.
    5. Shanker Satyanath & Nico Voigtländer & Hans-Joachim Voth, 2017. "Bowling for Fascism: Social Capital and the Rise of the Nazi Party," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 125(2), pages 478-526.
    6. Doerr, Sebastian & Gissler, Stefan & Peydró, José-Luis & Voth, Hans-Joachim, 2022. "Financial crises and political radicalization: How failing banks paved Hitler’s path to power," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 77(6), pages 3339-3372.
    7. Keisuke Kondo, 2016. "Hot and cold spot analysis using Stata," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 16(3), pages 613-631, September.
    8. Jörg L. Spenkuch & Philipp Tillmann, 2018. "Elite Influence? Religion and the Electoral Success of the Nazis," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 62(1), pages 19-36, January.
    9. Matthias Schonlau & Rosie Yuyan Zou, 2020. "The random forest algorithm for statistical learning," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 20(1), pages 3-29, March.
    10. Simon Heß, 2017. "Randomization inference with Stata: A guide and software," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 17(3), pages 630-651, September.
    11. Alessandro Lizzeri & Nicola Persico, 2004. "Why did the Elites Extend the Suffrage? Democracy and the Scope of Government, with an Application to Britain's "Age of Reform"," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 119(2), pages 707-765.
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    political religion; behavioral political economy; voting; Nazi Party; Protestantism; Shallow Christianity; political religion; Paganism;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • N13 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations - - - Europe: Pre-1913
    • N14 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations - - - Europe: 1913-
    • N44 - Economic History - - Government, War, Law, International Relations, and Regulation - - - Europe: 1913-
    • P16 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Capitalist Economies - - - Capitalist Institutions; Welfare State
    • Z12 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Religion
    • Z18 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Public Policy

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