Are National Socialism and Social Liberalism the same thing?

Measured across six independent axes they are 32.8 apart out of a possible 49.0, which is opposite ends of the recorded space. They agree within three points on EC. They diverge by eight points or more on CU, AU, ID, CH.

Atlas / Comparisons / National Socialism vs Social Liberalism

National Socialism and Social Liberalism

Measured distance across six axes

32.8 / 49.0 possible

Opposite ends of the recorded space. They agree within three points on EC. They diverge by eight points or more on CU, AU, ID, CH.

Axis by axis

Axis	NSDAP	Rawlsian liberalism	Gap		Reading
EC · Economic organisation	+02	+01	1	Agrees	Effectively the same position. Not what an argument between them is about.
CU · Social and cultural order	+09	−06	15	Diverges	Carries the disagreement. Any claim that these two are alike has to explain this.
AU · Organisation of power	+10	−06	16	Diverges	Carries the disagreement. Any claim that these two are alike has to explain this.
SC · Scale of decision	+09	+02	7	Differs	Real difference, but not the dividing line.
ID · Rule of membership	+10	−07	17	Diverges	Carries the disagreement. Any claim that these two are alike has to explain this.
CH · Method and tempo	+09	−07	16	Diverges	Carries the disagreement. Any claim that these two are alike has to explain this.

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.

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.

Rawlsian liberalism · CU −06

Coded −6: equal basic liberties as lexically prior to everything else.

Programme textThe first principle of justice takes priority over the distributive one in Rawls's ordering.

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.

1 more artefact on the full entry →

Rawlsian liberalism · AU −06

Coded −6: entrenched rights and judicial review.

Programme textThe framework places basic liberties beyond ordinary majority revision.

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.

National Socialism

1920–1945 · Germany

A racially defined national community, hierarchy by blood, conquest of living space, extermination of designated enemies.

Social Liberalism

1971– · Global North

Equal basic liberties first, then fair equality of opportunity, then inequalities only where they benefit the worst off.

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.

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