Atlas / Comparisons / Romantic Nationalism vs National Socialism
Romantic Nationalism and National Socialism
Measured distance across six axes
Opposed programmes with little shared ground. They agree within three points on EC, CH. They diverge by eight points or more on CU, AU.
Axis by axis
| Axis | Mazzini, Young Europe | NSDAP | Gap | Reading | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| EC · Economic organisation | +03 | +02 | 1 | Agrees | Effectively the same position. Not what an argument between them is about. |
| CU · Social and cultural order | −03 | +09 | 12 | Diverges | Carries the disagreement. Any claim that these two are alike has to explain this. |
| AU · Organisation of power | −03 | +10 | 13 | Diverges | Carries the disagreement. Any claim that these two are alike has to explain this. |
| SC · Scale of decision | +02 | +09 | 7 | Differs | Real difference, but not the dividing line. |
| ID · Rule of membership | +03 | +10 | 7 | Differs | Real difference, but not the dividing line. |
| CH · Method and tempo | +06 | +09 | 3 | Agrees | Effectively the same position. Not what an argument between them is about. |
Each axis runs from −10 to +10; the distance is the straight-line separation across all six at once, out of a maximum of 49.0. How the scoring works →
The evidence behind the widest gaps
A distance figure is worth nothing unless the scores behind it can be checked. These are the artefacts supporting the axes that separate these two most.
Mazzini, Young Europe · CU −03
Coded −3: republican, anticlerical and committed to education.
- Programme textYoung Italy's programme required national education alongside political independence.
NSDAP · CU +09
Social order was to be reconstituted on racial hierarchy, with women's role restricted by policy and all autonomous civil association dissolved.
- Documented act or statuteMarried women were pushed out of the professions from 1933 and awarded the Mother's Cross for childbearing from 1938.
- Documented act or statuteYouth, professional and leisure organisations were merged into party bodies under the Gleichschaltung laws of 1933–34.
Mazzini, Young Europe · AU −03
Coded −3: a democratic republic with universal suffrage.
- Documented act or statuteThe Roman Republic of 1849 abolished the death penalty and granted universal male suffrage.
NSDAP · AU +10
Every independent institution was either abolished or absorbed within eighteen months of taking office. There is no lower-scoring case available.
- Documented act or statuteThe Enabling Act of March 1933 transferred legislative power to the cabinet.
- Documented act or statuteAll parties other than the NSDAP were banned by July 1933.
What this comparison does not establish
Proximity means similarity of stated position. It carries no claim about competence, circumstance, scale of operation, or what either organisation actually did to the people under it. Two organisations can sit close together and produce entirely different histories, because those things are not on any axis and could not be.
Romantic Nationalism
1831–1872 · Italy, Europe
Each nation has a duty to constitute itself as a free republic, and free nations will federate in brotherhood.
National Socialism
1920–1945 · Germany
A racially defined national community, hierarchy by blood, conquest of living space, extermination of designated enemies.
Distance is not the whole answer. Two organisations can sit the same distance apart for entirely different reasons, and the reason is the content of any claim about them. Open the comparison in the atlas to weight the axes yourself.
Open in the atlas