Abstract

This article gives a survey of factors that could be relevant for the explanation of behaviour under the nazi-regime with reference to the study by Ch. Browning. Instead of causal explanations we suggest ‘how-possible explanations’. These explanations should make plausible how behaviour could come about taking into consideration intentional, normative and narrative aspects. Brutalization of the prepetrators, the psychological mechanism of distancing oneself, antisemitism, bureaucratization, carrierism, interest in power and conventionalist tendencies are discussed as relevant explanatory factors. Milgram’s analyses of obedience and group-conformity are brought into perspective within a wider-ranging culturalist approach.