Sophisticated rational forecasting proved systematically blind to Fascism’s rise

Evidence

Totalitarian movements use socialism and racism by emptying them of their utilitarian content, the interests of a class or nation. The form of infallible prediction in which these concepts were presented has become more important than their content. The chief qualification of a mass leader has become unending infallibility; he can never admit an error. The assumption of infallibility, moreover, is based not so much on superior intelligence as on the correct interpretation of the essentially reliable forces in history or nature, forces which neither defeat nor ruin can prove wrong because they are bound to assert themselves in the long run. Mass leaders in power have one concern which overrules all utilitarian considerations: to make their predictions come true. The Nazis did not hesitate to use, at the end of the war, the concentrated force of their still intact organization to bring about as complete a destruction of Germany as possible, in order to make true their prediction that the German people would be ruined in case of defeat. — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 816 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: The Italian Communist leadership gravely underestimated fascism’s significance for years; Totalitarian ideology values the form of infallible prediction over its content — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 816; Even sharp intellectuals treated fascism’s rise as less real than sensational crimes — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom,…, 256

Broader Connections

• The Italian Communist leadership gravely underestimated fascism’s significance for years #exemplifies (0.88)
• Totalitarian ideology values the form of infallible prediction over its content #complicates (0.72) — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 816