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planners created a back door for indirectly regulating<br />

industries. As time passed, the planners delegated to the<br />

cartel leaders more and more regulatory power over their<br />

own industries. 12 The government rewarded promising<br />

party members with top executive positions in “private”<br />

companies, and it offered devoted Nazi businessmen<br />

government positions in one of the numerous regulatory<br />

agencies. By 1938, it was virtually impossible to distinguish<br />

the business interests from the party interests in<br />

the cartel hierarchy. 13<br />

In Nazi Germany, the cost of being a political outsider<br />

was extremely high. In addition to indirectly regulating<br />

nonconnected firms out of business, the Nazi state<br />

often directly seized the means of production and property<br />

from its political enemies, from Jewish Germans,<br />

and from conquered peoples. In 1938, the Third Reich<br />

passed a law that stripped Jewish Germans of all claims<br />

to property and businesses and seized these assets. The<br />

party distributed the spoils of this direct theft to its top<br />

members and their allies and relatives. 14 After the German<br />

military conquered an area, it passed decrees that limited<br />

the native population’s ability to transact and run their<br />

businesses. In Bohemia-Moravia, large domestic firms<br />

had to appoint a native German to the board of directors<br />

in order to do business. 15 Regulations like this one<br />

effectively transferred ownership to connected German<br />

parties. These occurrences serve to illustrate how political<br />

influence trumped competition and value creation in<br />

Nazi economic policy.<br />

One of the easiest ways to survive in business in Nazi<br />

Germany was to devote time and resources toward cozying<br />

up to powerful members of the Nazi party. Those<br />

FASCISM 43

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