Editing Peer pressure (section)

=== Holocaust ===
[[The Holocaust]] is one of the most well-known of genocides. In the 1940s, Nazi [[Germany]], led by Adolf Hitler, began a systematic purge against the Jewish people living in Europe, killing around [[Holocaust victims|six million]] Jews by the end of [[World War II]]. It is clear that some Germans are culpable for the Holocaust; SS officers and soldiers clearly bought into the Jewish genocide and participated as executioners, jailers, and hunters (for hiding Jews).<ref name=":2" /> However, not all Germans wanted to kill the Jews. When bringing the concept of peer pressure into the [[The Holocaust|Holocaust]], German culpability is even harder to decide.

The primary issue revolves around collective responsibility and beliefs. As such, there are two positions, most notably held by Christopher Browning and David Goldhagen.

==== Browning's ''Ordinary Men'' ====
[[Christopher Browning]], most known for his book ''Ordinary Men: [[Reserve Police Battalion 101]]'', relies on an analysis of the men in Reserve Police Battalion 101. The men of the 101st were not ardent Nazis but ordinary middle-aged men of working-class backgrounds from Hamburg. They were drafted but found ineligible for regular military duty. Their test as an Order Police battalion first came in the form of Jozefow, a Jewish ghetto in Poland. The Battalion was ordered to round up the men in the ghetto and kill all women, children, and elderly on sight. During the executions, a few dozen men were granted release of their execution tasks and were reassigned to guard or truck duty. Others tried to stall as long as possible, trying not to be assigned to a firing squad. After the executions were completed, the men drank heavily, shaken by their ordeal.<ref name=":3">{{Cite book|title=Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland|last=Browning|first=Christopher|publisher=Penguin|year=1998|isbn=978-0060995065|location=London}}</ref>

At the end of his book, Browning supplies his theory on 101's actions: a combination of authoritative and peer pressure was a powerful coercive tool. First, the Nazi leadership wanted to keep the country's soldiers psychologically healthy, so soldiers were not forced to commit these murders. Throughout the German ranks, nothing negative happened to the soldiers and policemen who refused to join in on a firing squad or Jewish search party. They would simply be assigned other or additional duties, and perhaps subject to a little verbal abuse deriding their "cowardice". For the officers, no official sanction was given, but it was well known that being unable to carry out executions was a sign of a "weak" leader, and the officer would be passed for promotions.<ref name=":2">{{Cite book|title=The Good Old Days: The Holocaust as Seen by Its Perpetrators and Bystanders|last1=Klee|first1=Ernst|author1-link=Ernst Klee|last2=Dressen|first2=Willi|last3=Reiss|first3=Volker|publisher=The Free Press|year=1996|isbn=978-1568521336|location=New York}}</ref> Second, Major Trapp, the head of Battalion 101, consistently offered protection from committing these actions, even so far as supporting one man who was blatantly and vocally against these practices. He established "ground" rules in which only volunteers were taking on 'Jewish Hunts" and raids.

Browning relies on [[Milgram experiment|Milgram's experiments]] on authority to expand his point. Admitting that Trapp was not a particularly strong authority figure, Browning instead points to the Nazi leadership and the orders of the "highest order" that were handed down. Furthermore, according to Browning's analysis, one reason so few men separated themselves from their task was peer pressure—individual policemen did not want to "lose face" in front of their comrades. Some argued that it was better to shoot one and quit than to be a coward immediately. Some superior officers treated those who did not want to execute Jews with disdain; on the other hand, those selected for the executions or Jewish hunts were regarded as real "men" and were verbally praised accordingly. For some, refusing their tasks meant that their compatriots would need to carry the burden and the guilt of abandoning their comrades (as well as fear of ostracization) compelled them to kill.<ref name=":3" />

==== Goldhagen's ''Hitler's Willing Executioners'' ====
[[Daniel Goldhagen]], disagreeing with Browning's conclusion, decided to write his own book, ''[[Hitler's Willing Executioners]]''. Its release was highly controversial. He argues that the Germans were always anti-Semitic, engaging in a form of "[[eliminationism]]". Taking photos of the deceased, going on "Jew-Hunts", death marches near the end of the war, and a general focus on hate (rather than ignorance) are points Goldhagen utilizes in his book.<ref name="Goldhagen 32–37">{{Cite journal|last1=Goldhagen |first1=Daniel Jonah|author1-link=Daniel Goldhagen|last2=Wohlgelernter|first2=Maurice|title=Hitler's willing executioners|journal=Society |volume=34|issue=2|pages=32–37|doi=10.1007/BF02823096|issn=0147-2011|year=1997|s2cid=189886623}}</ref>

He does not believe that peer pressure or authoritative pressure can explain why ordinary Germans engaged in these actions. He believes that in order for the policemen in Battalion 101 (and those in similar situations) to kill, they must all be fully committed to the action—no half-heartedness. As he notes,<blockquote>"For that matter, for someone to be pressured into doing something, by peer pressure, everyone else has to want to do it. Peer pressure can, of course, operate on isolated individuals, or small groups, but it depends upon the majority wanting to do it. So the peer pressure argument contradicts itself. If the majority of the people hadn't wanted to kill Jews, then there would have been peer pressure not to do it" (37).<ref name="Goldhagen 32–37"/></blockquote>Instead, he places a significant emphasis on the German people's anti-Semitism, to the extent of drawing ire from other historians. Browning notes Goldhagen's "uniform portrayal" of Germans, dehumanizing all of the perpetrators without looking at the whole picture.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Browning|first=Christopher|year=1996|title=Daniel Goldhagen's Willing Executioners|journal=History and Memory|volume=8|issue=1|pages=88–108|jstor=25618699}}</ref> For example, in the town of Niezdow, the Police Battalion executed over a dozen elderly Poles in retaliation for the murder of a German policeman. It is less clear, then, if the Germans in the Police Battalion are antagonistic only towards Jews. The German-Canadian historian [[Ruth Bettina Birn]] has—in collaboration with Volker Rieß— checked Goldhagen's archival sources from Ludwigsburg. Their findings confirm the arbitrary nature of his selection and evaluation of existing records as opposed to a more holistic combination of primary sources. Furthermore, [[Konrad Kwiet]], a Holocaust historian, argues that Goldhagen's narrow focus on German anti-Semitism has blinded him to other considerations. He points to the massacres of non-Jews as an example:<blockquote>"[Goldhagen does not shine light] on the motives of "Hitler's willing executioners" in murdering disabled people within the so-called "Euthanasia Program", in liquidating 2.7 million Soviet prisoners of war, in exterminating Romas or in killing hundreds of thousands of other people classified as enemies of the "German People and Nation". The emphasis on German responsibility allows Goldhagen to push aside the willingness of genocidal killers of other nationalities [such as Latvians] who, recruited from the vast army of indigenous collaborators, were often commissioned with the task of carrying out the 'dirty work', such as the murder of women and children, and who, in many cases, surpassed their German masters in their cruelty and spontaneous brutality".<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Kwiet|first=Konrad|author-link=Konrad Kwiet|year=1997|title=Goldhagen, the Germans, and the Holocaust|journal=Gesher. Journal of Jewish Affairs|volume=133|pages=7–39|via=<!-- related: http://web.ceu.hu/jewishstudies/pdf/01_kwiet.pdf -->}}</ref></blockquote>