Nazi Propaganda

Describe how and why propaganda was used in Nazi Germany. Discuss how effective the Nazi propaganda was.

Propaganda is a form of communication used to persuade and is the opposite of providing impartial information as it only presents, or supports, one side of an argument. In theory, propaganda is a tool to direct the public opinion and by extension, the actions of the public.

In Nazi Germany, propaganda was ever present as an aspect of the everyday life of the nation. The Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, with Joseph Goebbels as its leader, strategically influenced and gradually changed the public opinion of the nation and formed Germany into a conform body. However, it is important to realize and keep in mind, that the ideas which the regime served its people were not forced upon the public. Most of the content of propaganda was attractive, convincing and appealing to traditionalist German ideas. Thus, many people actually wanted this to be what it presented itself as - the truth. The regime was popular because of the economic recovery that took place under it and therefore had public support, which the Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda used to its advantage and also to the advantage of the Nazi ideas.

As to how was propaganda used in Nazi Germany in practice, the key words are gradualism and control.

Control, because the regime had command over virtually every aspect of the lives of its people. It controlled the education of future generations, culture (film, art), press (eventually a considerable portion of newspapers was state-owned, editors were made responsible for the content of their newspaper by the Editors Law of October 1933) and radio (which was used very much to broadcast Hitler’s sp...

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... Hitlerjugend members and their actions even in the situation when the war was clearly lost were a clear proof of that. As to their parents, however, one cannot be so certain.

When looking at the degree of efficiency of Nazi propaganda, another aspect one must consider is, that Germans were quite well educated people and generally it is assumed that the higher the level of education, the more difficult it is to manipulate people with lies, as educated people should be used to critical thinking. Therefore, it is difficult to differentiate, to what extent was propaganda really successful in getting such people on Nazi’s side and to what extent they simply stayed silent even though not ideologically agreeing with the regime. One could look at records and see whether propaganda did or did not have large effect in individual cases but one can not generalize the findings.