<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

<p>How can the individual preserve his identity within a crowd? How can he/she counter the threats and the temptations of the mass phenomenon? In the following, these questions are answered, correctly based on two contrasting and complementary situations and approaches: on the one hand, the beginnings of the Soviet Union in the 1920s as manifested in everyday life in Moscow (journalistic-systemic view). On the other hand, on biographies of NSDAP members in Germany in the 1920s (biographical approach). The theoretical background provides philosophical treatises from this period (Elias Canetti, José Ortega y Gasset, and Karl Jaspers). Because the situations characterize starting points of totalitarian system (Sowjet-Union/Nazi-Regime), they allow transformations into current and future experiences of collective and group pressure in private and business life, where people experience similar challenges and temptations that are more elementary.</p>
</abstract>

How can the individual preserve his identity within a crowd? How can he/she counter the threats and the temptations of the mass phenomenon? In the following, these questions are answered, correctly based on two contrasting and complementary situations and approaches: on the one hand, the beginnings of the Soviet Union in the 1920s as manifested in everyday life in Moscow (journalistic-systemic view). On the other hand, on biographies of NSDAP members in Germany in the 1920s (biographical approach). The theoretical background provides philosophical treatises from this period (Elias Canetti, José Ortega y Gasset, and Karl Jaspers). Because the situations characterize starting points of totalitarian system (Sowjet-Union/Nazi-Regime), they allow transformations into current and future experiences of collective and group pressure in private and business life, where people experience similar challenges and temptations that are more elementary.

How Can I Maintain my Own Identity Within a Crowd? Suggestions From Totalitarian Experiences

Discourse and Communication for Sustainable Education

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

How can the individual preserve his identity within a crowd? How can he/she counter the threats and the temptations of the mass phenomenon? In the following,...

How Can I Maintain my Own Identity Within a Crowd? Suggestions From Totalitarian Experiences

Published Online: Nov 15, 2022

Page range: 91 - 107

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/dcse-2022-0021

Keywords
collective, individual, mass, person, national-socialism, soviet union Philosophical Remarks

© 2022 Geert Franzenburg, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

How Can I Maintain my Own Identity Within a Crowd? Suggestions From Totalitarian Experiences

Published Online: Nov 15, 2022

Page range: 91 - 107

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/dcse-2022-0021

Keywordscollective, individual, mass, person, national-socialism, soviet union Philosophical Remarks

© 2022 Geert Franzenburg, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Keywords
collective, individual, mass, person, national-socialism, soviet union Philosophical Remarks