The great depression hit Germany hard. Loans from America dried up and were soon followed by demands for repayments. As well as this prices for food and raw materials declined rapidly as industrialised countries. During the winter of 1929-30, unemployment rose to above 2 million, 12 months after the crash it stood at 3 million. It peaked in early 1933 when it was 6.1 million. Due to unemployment peoples respectability and pride suffered. Due to this people lost faith in the Weimar republic, which offered no end to the misery and unemployment. People began to look towards political extremes such as far left and far right political parties.
In September 1930, after the Reichstag was in crisis, Hindenburge called an election, which saw the NAZI part, increase their vote from 810000 to 64096000. This made the Nazis the second largest political party in Germany. Despite this Hitler and the Nazis never gained the overall majority in Reichstag elections, although they were the biggest party with 37.4% of the votes.
What made the NAZI party different from the other extreme right parties were their revolutionary political style, the way that thy presented them selves and they way thy went about it. Early on Hitler knew about the power of propaganda and used it to its full advantage all throughout the Nazi’s road to power. From 1930, Joseph Goebbels was pt in charge of the NAZI propaganda machine. He used a range of techniques and sophistication on a grand electoral scale, whilst showing an understanding of psychology. Leaflets, posters, loudspeakers, radio, film and records were all being used. It was at the party rallies were the propaganda was most used. The idea was to make the speeches so emotional that the crowd would "succumb to the collective will". Every kind of device was used to heighten the effect; uniforms, torches, music, salutes, flags, songs, anthems and speeches were all used.
On 28 January 1933 Hitler was appointed chancellor of Germany after long discussion between Hindenburge, Hitler and other party leaders. It was decided that the best way to keep Hitler’s party happy and to stop the violence by the SS was to make him Hitler. The believed that this would make him happy and would stop him from progressing much further as he still had to have the support from the government before making decisions. This did not work and Hitler did not rest until he got absolute power, the dictatorship that he was striving for. This marked the start of Hitler becoming dictator of Germany.
