The role margin as the site for moral and social intelligence: The case of Germany and National Socialism

Abstract

This study traces the origins and development of the crime of genocide using the Holocaust and its absolutist ideology and racist myth systems -s as developed by Nazi geneticists and sociologists – which has lead to euthanasia, killing squads and extermination camps such as Auschwitz-Birkenau, as a frame of reference. This inquiry further investigates how seemingly ``ordinary,'' indoctrinated and often intimidated people acted upon biddings of an unscrupulous leader assisted by cohorts who uncritically assumed assigned roles and externalized discretion in a totalitarian system. Individual discretion was externalized and delegated to the leader, Adolf Hitler, or to their immediate superiors. Following the orders of these leaders gradually paved the process of an escalation of violence into genocide. Reasons for this process are not merely politically and/or economically motivated, but are also to be sought in the society's pool and level of moral and social intelligence, as well as in frustrated expectations experienced by large segments of the populous. Individual and group response to powerful situational forces are examined. Human behavior is found to be represented on a broad spectrum ranging from altruism on one hand of the scale to authoritarianism and extreme destructiveness on the other. Special attention is given to moral integrity and accountability, its development and application.