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Frequently asked questions

Why does this article say that the Nazis were right-wing?

Because that is the consensus of reliable sources, in this case historians and political scientists.

But the word "socialist" is right in their name!

Many political entities have names that can be misleading. Consider, for example, the Holy Roman Empire (a confederation of mainly German territories during the Middle Ages and the early modern period) and North Korea's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (a totalitarian dictatorship). The usage of the word "socialism" by the Nazis is different from the common usage of the term "socialism" to refer to an economic philosophy involving advocacy for social ownership of the means of production. The phrase "national socialist" was a nationalist response to the rise of socialism in Europe by offering a redefinition of "socialism" to refer to the promotion of the interests of the nation, as opposed to ideas of individual self-interest. But there was no policy of social ownership of the means of production. The Nazis did talk about capitalism being bad, but they defined it as a Jewish-originated economic philosophy based on individualism that promoted plutocracy in the interest of the Jews, at the expense of non-Jewish nations and races. This was put in contrast to the Nazis' conception of socialism, which was done in order to win over people attracted to anti-capitalist and socialist ideas to their cause. They rejected ideas of equality and working class solidarity, instead advocating for social hierarchy and national strength. This article sums it up well.

I made an offhand comment about it and somebody just came along and deleted it! What should I do?

Nothing. See this discussion where the community came to a consensus that we have entertained the numerous questions and claims about the Nazis being left-wing enough, and that continued engagement with people pushing this line of reasoning is not helpful to the article.

That doesn't seem very fair. Don't Wikipedia policies require editors to assume good faith? What if somebody posts that position here with a really good argument?

See the following links, all of which are to discussions about this very question over time. If any novel argument is proposed, it has already been made, responded to and failed to convince anyone. [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23], [24], [25], [26], [27], [28]

But what if I find a large number of very reliable sources all claiming that Nazism is left-wing?

Then you will be more than welcome to show them to us, so that we can see that they are very reliable and that they assert that Nazism is a left-wing ideology. If they are, then we will change the article.

Nazism is a former featured article candidate. Please view the links under Article milestones below to see why the nomination failed. For older candidates, please check the archive.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
August 6, 2004	Featured article candidate	Not promoted
July 11, 2005	Peer review	Reviewed

Current status: Former featured article candidate

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Nazism is a right-wing ideology.

The consensus of political scientists, historians, and other reliable sources is that Nazism is a right-wing ideology and not a left-wing one. This has been discussed numerous times. Please see this FAQ and read the talk page archives.

Please do not request that "right-wing" be changed to "left-wing"; your request will be denied, and you may be blocked from editing if you persist in doing so.

"Nazi Party" is the English-language common name for the National Socialist German Workers Party.

Per our policy, WP:COMMONNAME, English Wikipedia uses the common name in English for the titles of our articles, and in most references to that subject. Thus "Nazi Party" and "Nazism" are the names of our articles on those subjects, and in most instances the National Socialist German Workers Party is referred to as the Nazi Party, but occasionally, to avoid repetition, by the full English-language name, or by its German acronym, NSDAP.

Please do not request that the name of this article be changed, such requests are routinely turned down.

Daily pageviews of this article

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Section sizes

Section size for Nazism (28 sections)
Section name	Byte count	Section total
(Top)	10,564	10,564
Etymology	4,060	4,060
Position within the political spectrum	18,543	18,543
Origins	1,446	46,343
Völkisch nationalism	18,411	18,411
Racial theories and antisemitism	14,506	15,699
Use of the American racist model	1,193	1,193
Response to World War I and Italian Fascism	10,787	10,787
Ideology and programme	2,604	103,670
Nationalism and racialism	2,414	31,422
Irredentism and expansionism	10,720	10,720
Racial theories	18,288	18,288
Social class	10,596	10,596
Sex and gender	11,673	13,662
Opposition to homosexuality	1,989	1,989
Religion	8,454	8,454
Economics	15,043	30,096
Anti-communism	5,730	5,730
Views of capitalism	9,323	9,323
Totalitarianism	6,836	6,836
Classification: Reactionary or Revolutionary	7,426	14,358
Contemporary events and views	6,932	6,932
Post-war Nazism	1,117	1,117
See also	482	482
References	17	33,631
Notes	27,156	27,156
Bibliography	6,458	6,458
External links	1,412	1,412
Total	234,180	234,180

Archives

Index 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10
11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20
21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30

This page has archives. Sections older than 30 days may be automatically archived by when more than 3 sections are present.

Please add dates to first paragraph.[edit]

Should have dates of origin & dates in power in 1st or 2nd paragraph. 87.223.101.43 (talk) 00:10, 23 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Semi-protected edit request on 28 April 2024[edit]

This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

‹ The template Edit semi-protected is being considered for merging. ›

In the description, the NAZI party is described as “far-right”. They were, in fact, the National Socialist Party. Factually speaking, they were “far-left”. They only became “far-right” because the Left wanted to disassociate themselves from the NAZI origins. BobTheLibertarian (talk) 22:03, 28 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Not done: See the #FAQ. — Czello ^(music) 22:04, 28 April 2024 (UTC)nt[reply]

Ahistorical nonsense. See the FAQ at the top of this page. Acroterion (talk) 22:06, 28 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Nazis were not right leaning[edit]

It's literally in the name: national SOCIALIST party. The nazis were not right leaning at all! They were socialist, which would be left winged. 2601:CE:8200:4960:6952:D1:BFF4:F863 (talk) 00:20, 14 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Incorrect. See the FAQ near the top of the page. O3000, Ret. (talk) 00:25, 14 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

What FAQ are you referring to?

Socialism is widely accepted as left-wing. NSDAP was a socialist workers party. They kept the red from the tri-color standard specifically to represent the partys socialistic ideology.

While they might have regarded themselves as neither left north right, they were most definitely left-wing, at best/worst centre-left. 213.238.201.221 (talk) 08:57, 16 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

See #FAQ, it's at the top of this page.

The Nazis weren't actual socialists, they appropriated the trappings of socialism to win over working class supporters. — Czello ^(music) 09:13, 16 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

So is the site broken or am I missing something? There is no visible FAQ section on my end and clicking the bookmark link leads nowhere.

But doesn't that mean they effectively had to adopt socialist policies to keep up façade, so as to not lose support? Meaning, technically they're left-leaning socialists? 213.238.201.221 (talk) 13:19, 16 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Are you on mobile? It might not be showing in the case; it's visible on desktop. — Czello ^(music) 13:26, 16 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Correct, but it doesn't show up when requesting desktop site either. So I guess it's browser dependent. 213.238.201.221 (talk) 13:50, 16 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Copied from the FAQ:

Why does this article say that the Nazis were right-wing?

Because that is the consensus of reliable sources, in this case historians and political scientists.

But the word "socialist" is right in their name!

Many political entities have names that can be misleading. Consider, for example, the Holy Roman Empire (a confederation of mainly German territories during the Middle Ages and the early modern period) and North Korea's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (a totalitarian dictatorship). The usage of the word "socialism" by the Nazis is different from the common usage of the term "socialism" to refer to an economic philosophy involving advocacy for social ownership of the means of production. The phrase "national socialist" was a nationalist response to the rise of socialism in Europe by offering a redefinition of "socialism" to refer to the promotion of the interests of the nation, as opposed to ideas of individual self-interest. But there was no policy of social ownership of the means of production. The Nazis did talk about capitalism being bad, but they defined it as a Jewish-originated economic philosophy based on individualism that promoted plutocracy in the interest of the Jews, at the expense of non-Jewish nations and races. This was put in contrast to the Nazis' conception of socialism, which was done in order to win over people attracted to anti-capitalist and socialist ideas to their cause. They rejected ideas of equality and working class solidarity, instead advocating for social hierarchy and national strength. This article sums it up well.

O3000, Ret. (talk) 13:41, 16 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry but that doesn't make complete sense to me. Reliable sources means nothing, when the victor writes history.

Furthermore you're ignoring every other point I made except having 'socialism' in their name. To confuse the discussion even more, you argued before that their views on socialism included property ownership, as opposed to Marxism, which was "anti-property". Now you paste text from the FAQ that states their version of socialism is "different from the common usage of the term 'socialism' to refer to an economic philosophy involving advocacy for social ownership of the means of production"? 213.238.201.221 (talk) 13:56, 16 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The reason the other user likely ignored your other points is because we don't make our own interpretations on Wikipedia - that's considered original research. Instead we say what reliable sources say. Historians largely agree that the Nazis weren't socialist in the commonest use of the word. — Czello ^(music) 14:04, 16 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Again, see the FAQ. This isn't a forum for your own analysis of hostory. Acroterion (talk) 14:06, 16 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

In 1930, Hitler said: "Our adopted term 'Socialist' has nothing to do with Marxist Socialism. Marxism is anti-property; true Socialism is not." O3000, Ret. (talk) 10:43, 16 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]