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    The Death of Democracy: Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic
    The Death of Democracy: Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic
    The Death of Democracy: Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic
    Audiobook11 hours

    The Death of Democracy: Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic

    Written by Benjamin Carter Hett

    Narrated by Steven Crossley

    4.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    "[Narrator Steven Crossley's] British accent gives his narration an academic-sounding quality fitting for the text. He is clear and precise in pronunciation and enunciation and is suitably expressive throughout." — AudioFile Magazine

    The Death of Democracy     is a riveting audiobook account of how the Nazi Party came to power, and how the failures of the Weimar Republic and the shortsightedness of German politicians allowed it to happen.

    Why did democracy fall apart so quickly and completely in Germany in the 1930s? How did a democratic government allow Adolf Hitler to seize power? In this dramatic audiobook, Benjamin Carter Hett answers these questions, and the story he tells has disturbing resonances for our own time.

    To say that Hitler was elected is too simple. From the late 1920s, the Weimar Republic’s very political success sparked insurgencies against it, of which the most dangerous was the populist anti-globalization movement led by Hitler. But as Hett shows, Hitler would never have come to power if Germany’s leading politicians had not tried to coopt him, a strategy that backed them into a corner from which the only way out was to bring the Nazis in. Hett lays bare the misguided confidence of conservative politicians who believed that Hitler and his followers would willingly support them, not recognizing that their efforts to use the Nazis actually played into Hitler’s hands. They had willingly given him the tools to turn Germany into a vicious dictatorship.

    Benjamin Carter Hett is one of America’s leading scholars of twentieth-century Germany and a gifted storyteller whose portraits of these feckless politicians show how fragile democracy can be when those in power do not respect it. He offers a powerful lesson for today, when democracy once again finds itself embattled and the siren song of strongmen sounds ever louder.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMacmillan Audio
    Release dateApr 3, 2018
    ISBN9781427298652
    Author

    Benjamin Carter Hett

    Benjamin Carter Hett is the author of The Death of Democracy, Burning the Reichstag, Crossing Hitler, and Death in the Tiergarten. He is a professor of history at Hunter College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, and holds a PhD in history from Harvard University and a law degree from the University of Toronto. He now lives in New York City.

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    Reviews for The Death of Democracy

    4.5/5

    29 ratings5 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Very easy to listen and very informative. There are so many other factors leading up to Hitlers Chancellorship that it is truly amazing that people didn’t realize what a deal with the devil in January 1933. I’d strongly recommend to anyone that wants a good understanding of the reasons for the rise (not all that one thinks).

      1 person found this helpful

    • 1/5
      This is a horrible book. The author is trying to shift the blame away from the ideology that is still with us. This book is not worth the read just read who the author gas worked for and it will tell you all you need to know.
    • 3/5
      It was just okay, some interesting tidbits and insights on what brought down Weimar but at times had the depth of a Wikipedia article. It also tried to be too on point with folks views on current politics. I didn’t get it until I saw the copyright date and then I figured it out. Next time I would read something at least 15+ years old. It is worth a listen but not a high priority one
    • 5/5
      During such times as these, having an understand of what brought down democracy in Germany after the 1st World War, is essential for this wanting to save democracies from destruction going forward (or at least avoid being inside when the roof collapses). This book is so extraordinarily in it's storytelling that it should be required reading. Thank you to the author.
    • 5/5
      If everyone in the West had read this book, we would not be on the precipice in (nearly exactly) the same way in the current moment.
      I -only- wish that there had been a little deeper dive into the hedonistic and completely deviant behavior that was overtaking the Weimar Republic as it rose and fell, and how that added momentum from the people who wanted a return to “normalcy” and more conservative social behavior, to the surge of opposition to the Treaty of Versailles...
      Once I find a book as detailed and excellent as this one, that includes that “side note”, I will be buying and gifting it to my kids (university students) as well as anyone else who might be willing to read even a portion of it -