The specific flow is as follows
- Legitimate acquisition of power through elections
- The Nazi Party (NSDAP), led by Hitler, became the leading party in the 1932 German parliamentary elections and gained significant political support. Based on this support, Hitler was legally appointed Chancellor in January 1933.
- Passage of the Plenipotentiary Act
- In March 1933, Hitler passed the “Plenipotentiary Law” (Ermächtigungsgesetz) through parliament, giving the government legislative power. This legislation, which was approved as part of the democratic process, gave the government the power to enact laws without going through parliament, thereby acquiring de facto dictatorial powers.
- Concentration of Power and Political Repression
- With the Plenipotentiary Act, Hitler centralized legislative, executive, and judicial power and suppressed opposition and political opponents. He also dissolved political parties and labor unions, eliminating political forces other than the Nazi Party. These processes were carried out through a series of legal procedures and with the support of public opinion, and the democratic system itself was transformed into a dictatorship.
- Public support and “general will”
- Hitler’s concentration of power was supported by the people because of the economic turmoil of the time and their dissatisfaction with the Treaty of Versailles. The expectation of strong leadership in a “state of exception,” as Schmidt had argued, was given legitimacy to the dictatorship in the form of a general will embodied in it.
Thus, Hitler’s dictatorship can be said to have been one in which he legitimately gained power through the democratic process and then established a dictatorship through subsequent policies and legislation. This process is also a historical example of the danger of democracy turning into dictatorship.
Then isn’t it a mistake to think of democracy and autocracy as symbols, as if they are opposites, and mathematically they are just a movement in a continuous manifold?
From a mathematical point of view, political regimes are not seen as fixed, oppositional concepts, but as existing on a “manifold” that changes continuously as certain parameters change. Specifically, the following points are suggested
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continuum of concentration and dispersion of power.
- The difference between democracy and dictatorship is really a difference in the concentration of power, the changes of which are continuous. A lower concentration of power is closer to a decentralized democracy, while a higher concentration is closer to a dictatorship. In between, however, there are various forms of political regimes, which can vary continuously between full democracy and full dictatorship.
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Dynamic movement of exception states - Applying Schmidt.’s state of exception concept, democratic procedures in normal times and dictatorial procedures in exceptional times can shift continuously depending on the situation. There can be a dynamic shift, such that the need for strong leadership in emergency situations increases autocracy, while in peacetime it reverts back to democratic procedures.
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Variety of forms of realization of “the general will”.
- The realization of Rousseau’s “general will” can also take a variety of forms, from direct democracy to representative government to even dictatorship. It varies according to how the will of the people is expressed and the degree to which leaders embody that will. Democratic expression of the will and the exercise of autocratic leadership can be seen as manifestations of different aspects of the same general will.
From the above perspective, democracy and dictatorship can be seen not simply as opposites, but as something that can shift continuously, depending on circumstances and conditions. Such a manifold view is useful in understanding the complexity and dynamic changes of real political regimes, and it also makes it easier to explain the fluidity of the transition from democracy to dictatorship and vice versa.
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