The Long Shadow of

the Twentieth Century

World War II and Genocide

A Timeline of the 20th Century

Age of Catastrophe1914 to 1945

Golden Age1945 to 1970

Age of Decomposition and Turmoil1970s onwards

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War fatalities by year

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The Holocaust5.9 to 11 million murders

Hiroshima

Over 100 000 dead

Korean WarOver 3 million civilian and military deaths

Vietnam War

Upwards of 3.8 million war deaths

• There have been perhaps 160 million deaths from war in the

20th century

• This is perhaps more the total death toll of all human

conflict before the 20th century

• Yet it is seen as a century of unparalleled progress

• A century of unrivaled development and hopes

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Economic prosperity and the suburban dreamApollo 11 moon landing and space explorationIdealized, patriotic portrayals of war

What is War?

Carl von Clausewitz: On war

“War is no more than the continuation of politics”

• War is a ‘political instrument’, an ever looming threat, element

and negotiation piece in the dance of political interaction

• If declared, it becomes a means of determining political

differences, a means of forcing one to another’s viewpoint

• Thus, it is a dialectical social phenomenon, ever present and

threatening in all political interaction

• War is a double edged sword, the final, self destructive

instrument of government

Governmentality

• A concept proposed by Foucault, “The art of governance”

• Establishment and perpetuation of the state

• Methods of governance - War

• Preservation and expansion of the state as opposed to

universality and imperial amibitions

• Preservation of the state in accordance with its essence

• Further the national interest of the state

The European Context

The Peace of Westphalia

The European Context

The European Context

• The Peace of Westphalia created the modern independent

states of Europe from the Holy Roman Empire

• Signed in 1648, ending the Thirty Years’ War and the Eighty

Years’ War and establishing sovereignty over empire

• Established the division of Church, and its wane in politics

• Created ‘modern war’; states wage war to maintain their inner

coherence and persistence, and as a means of negotiation

A Soldier Starts Out As Any Man

• The military is a place where people are desensitized to killing

• Humans do not are not natural killers of other humans

• Training attempts to eradicate previous beliefs

• Killing becomes mechanical

• The enemy is objectified, inhuman

• Pack mentality is established through ritual, isolation from

civilians, immense physical demands and group identification

The Dividing Line between Good and Evil

“Evidently evildoing also has a threshold magnitude. Yes, a human

being hesitates and bobs back and forth between good and evil all

his life. He slips, falls back, clambers up, repents, things begin to

darken again. But just so long as the threshold of evildoing is not

crossed, the possibility of returning remains. But when, through

the density of evil actions the result either of their own extreme

degree or of the absoluteness of his power, he suddenly crosses

that threshold, he has left humanity behind, and without, perhaps,

the possibility of return.” Alexander Solzhenitsyn

• Human action is complex and determined by situation, context,

situation and history

• Situation and context can push people over thresholds they

would never have previously imagined crossing

• Good and evil is subjective and what is normal is dialectical

The Dividing Line between Good and Evil

Dayak Headhunter

Wehrmacht shooting Jewish mother

Actions of the Third Reich

• Ordinary Germans killed helpless Jews because of pervasive

ideas and beliefs – norms

• Goldhagen – Holocaust was sui generis, unique, situational, and

thus must be taken within historical and cultural context

• Eliminationist anti-Semitism of German culture, shaped and

normalized by charismatic leader, Adolf Hitler

• Solzhenitsyn – the circumstances of individual Germans

caused them to commit atrocities

• Combination of micro and macro - six specific factors

Ideology

• Belief in Kampf (war/struggle) as inspirational, cohesive force

• War is ennobling, forges Kampfgemeinschaft (brotherhood)

and Volksgemeinschaft (community)

• Germans indoctrinated from young age

• Specific, well crafted ideology as primary motivators

• Inhuman enemy with high integration

Orders

• Actualizes ideology and transforms it into reality

• Reinforces norms created by ideology

Actions and Discipline

• Soldiers rewarded for brutal actions

• Strongly disciplined for dissent

• Reinforced norms and dehumanized status of enemy

• Created hardened troops

Complicity

• Combination of brutal discipline and outlet through the enemy

maintained moral and built revulsion and hatred for enemy

• Escalates actions and leads to total war

Total War and the Consequences of Defeat

• Fear of revolt and domestic unrest in Germany

• Goal of war changes from ‘disarming the enemy’ to

‘annihilating the enemy’ and pre-emptive revenge

Genocide in World War II: Conclusion

• Genocide in World War II was not isolated

• Sociologists must analyze Nazi ideology, context, culture,

internalization to understand the Holocaust and similar events