> On Feb 18, 2010, at 10:29 AM, Wojtek S wrote:
>
>> Prior to 1930, Germany was a social democracy (social democrats were
>> getting
>> most of the votes) known for its high culture and civilization.
>
> Hey, that's another big difference with the U.S., another reason to be
> skeptical about all these pre-Nazi analogies.
I fully share the skepticism about the pre-Nazi analogies. Every single actual scholar of fascism agrees that the existence of a threatening mass left is almost the sine qua non ingredient.
But I want to correct one point. The SPD *never* got most of the votes. They *always* had to rule in a coalition with the progressive liberals (DDP) and the (Catholic) Center Party. During the Weimar years, the SPD averaged about 25% of the vote. In fact, the SPD has never once in its history obtained an absolute majority. (The one time it came close was 1972, under Brandt.)
Therefore - and this is the point - even if the American public woke up tomorrow and somehow were suddenly just as sympathetic to social democracy as the Germans, any social democratic party they created would have zero chance of winning an election. Therefore it would disappear - since no political party can survive as a mass phenomenon if it has no hope of ever winning an election.
And of course, without any social democratic party to be the vehicle of the soc dem ideology, the ideology would almost certainly wither, as all those soc dem voters were forced to vote again and again for watered-down capitalist candidates who could win 51% of the vote by themselves. Soon the watered-down ideology would replace the original one.
Just a reminder that the structure of an electoral system *itself* determines a society's ideology.
SA