Statistical Data of German Reichstag's Elections 1928-32 and the Behavior of the NSDAP, KPD and SPD Electorate

The article is devoted to the analysis of statistical data of elections to the Reichstag of the Weimar Republic during 1928-32 in order to detect the basic scenarios of electoral behavior of the late Weimar Republic's main competing parties, the reasons and routes of electorate flows, the reasons and regularities of the growth and fall in the rating of NSDAP, KPG and SPD and limit opportunities of these processes - questions which make up the basis in the complex of problems about changes in social expectations of Germans and the reasons of Nazis' victory in struggle for power. The data of the German Statistical Bureau published in the annual statistical collection Statistisches Jahrbuch fur das Deutsche Reich for 1932 and 1933 with amendments made by the recent research are analyzed. The author uses several levels of the comparative analysis of absolute figures and percentage data between the results of the parties generally on the country and on certain lands, the comparative analysis of results on lands with the average result on the country for identification of locomotive, standard electoral and problem regions. The method of scenarios allowed detecting the basic scenarios of behavior of NSDAP, KPG and SPD electorate. On the basis of these data, the author creates the electoral map according to lands (or constituencies), from the point of view of the general result, of the most successful, less successful and failure districts for each of the three parties - NSDAP, KPD and SDPG, and also determines various scenarios of the results of vote in the designated elections by 18 constituencies. The analysis gives evident results on the distribution of votes between the main parties of the late Weimar Republic, the flow of voters between the parties, the dynamics of the growth and fall of electoral results, the electoral core and potential of these parties. The author comes to conclusions about the regularity of falls in the rating of SDPG, the limit of the electoral growth of KPD and the inaccuracy of the opinion that in November, 1932, NSDAP reached the limit of opportunities in electorate acquisition. The revealed scenarios of vote on districts show the relationship of the parties in terms of electoral behavior and give grounds for conclusions about the flow of electorate between the parties. Various data show that the growth of the electorate of NSDAP was also at the expense of the voters of SPD, not only of right-wing parties (contrary to the most widespread point of view). In the context of fighting for votes, NSDAP, SPD and KPG could co-exist safely in the same territories and drag votes of the central and right-wing parties, but such constituencies were limited to Thuringia, and Hamburg and Saxony on one occasion. The conclusions and the provided statistical data allow to understand the growth of voters' support of NSDAP and CPG, the relationship of these parties from point of view of fight for electorate, to make the behavior of this electorate clear and to form the basis for research on the reasons of support of the Nazi in the German society.

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