'Beyond Totalitarianism - Stalinism and Nazism Compared'

Introduction 11terror has added buzz to the old formula. 45 Again, we note the heterogeneity ofinitiatives that insist on the need for a new round of thinking on totalitarianism.In the German context, the initial impetus – often under the rubric of thecomparative study of dictatorships – originated out of the attempt to integratethe East German regime into German history. 46 The notion of two dictatorships,a National Socialist and a Communist one, counterbalancing the relentlessand ultimately successful Westernization and democratization of (West)Germany seemed plausible. 47 The latter meant de-exceptionalizing and, in away, normalizing the Third Reich, even if only fringe groups doubted theextreme character of Nazism. 48 This internal German debate on the two dictatorshipsis particularly intriguing, as it quickly came to define the most salienteffort to revitalize thought on totalitarianism. This effort is best known forrediscovering and highlighting “ideology” as a key component of Nazism (andStalinism). 49 The novel interest in ideology led to a debate on political religionor religious politics and, more generally, various gestures in the direction ofpolitical theology. 50 The return to “ideology” developed in tandem with anapproach that emphasized extreme forms of violence and terror, motivatedless by interest than by principle and, hence, by reference to some higher law –be it extreme nationalism or a religious kind of belief or any other fundamentalism.51The extreme violence of totalitarianism is also what exercised Americanscholars, public intellectuals, and pundits. The most productive area of engagementhas been the field of genocide studies. 52 But the main push came from45 Michael Burleigh, Sacred Causes: The Clash of Religion and Politics, from the Great War tothe War on Terror, 1st U.S. ed. (New York: HarperCollins, 2007).46 Günther Heydemann and Eckhard Jesse, eds., Diktaturvergleich als Herausforderung: Theorieund Praxis (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1998).47 Hans Wilhelm Vahlefeld, Deutschlands totalitäre Tradition: Nationalsozialismus und SED-Sozialismus als politische Religionen (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 2002).48 Backes et al., Schatten der Vergangenheit, ftn 31.49 Alfons Söllner, “Totalitarismus: Eine notwendige Denkfigur des 20. Jahrhunderts,” Mittelweg36, no. 2 (1993): 83–8.50 Hans Maier, Politische Religionen: Die totalitären Regime und das Christentum (Freiburg:Herder Verlag, 1995); Hans Maier, ed., Totalitarismus und politische Religionen: Konzeptedes Diktaturvergleichs (Munich: F. Schoeningh Verlag, 1996); Hermann Lübbe and WladyslawBartosyewski, eds., Heilserwartung und Terror: Politische Religionen im 20. Jahrhundert(Düsseldorf: Patmos, 1995).51 Robert Gellately and Ben Kiernan, eds., The Specter of Genocide: Mass Murder in HistoricalPerspective (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003); Bernd Weisbrod, “FundamentalistViolence: Political Violence and Political Religion in Modern Conflict,” International SocialScience Journal 174 (2002): 499–508; Christian Gerlach, “Extremely Violent Societies: AnAlternative to the Concept of Genocide,” Journal of Genocide Research 8, no. 4 (2006): 455–71.For the terror of the German Left and the debate it elicited, see Gerrit-Jan Berendse, Schreiben imTerrordrom: Gewaltcodierung, kulturelle Erinnerung und das Bedingungsverhältnis zwischenLiteratur und Raf-Terrorismus (Munich: Edition text + kritik, 2005).52 Robert Gellately and Ben Kiernan, eds., The Specter of Genocide.