Elite immigrants are frequently highly influential.
Consider the case of Austria. After World War II, the occupation zones looked like this:
In 1945, this split between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. was not something people in the region expected; it was a surprise! In Upper Austria, that surprise came right down the Danube river.
The Nazis who found themselves in the zone north of the Danube feared for their lives. They were aware of the barbarity of Soviet POW camps, Gulags, reprisals, and so on, and they wanted none of it. So, they fled. And, more elite Nazis feared this more, so they fled disproportionately.
The result of this attempt to get away from the approaching Soviet lines was that just south of the Danube, there were 53% more Nazis and 182% more elite Nazis per capita in 1947.
The Nazis who fled were spared their lives and given the ability to resettle where they ended up. Many of them did, but that did not mean they became reformed people. The fear of Soviet murder didn't change them, it just made them flee, that's all.
An interesting consequence of that fact is that they were able to keep being themselves, politically, albeit without being overt Nazis, as that had become illegal. So, despite not being able to vote in their own right at the time, they managed to greatly increase far-right vote shares in subsequent elections, as early as the first ones in the late-1940s:
There was no such north/south patterning to far-right vote shares prior to the splitting across the Danube, but afterwards, it was very prominent. It's tied to where Nazis—and especially elite ones—chose to resettle. Migrating extremists matter, and even their descendants matter. Consider the results of a more recent election:
Even generations after the fall of the Nazis and the deaths of practically all of the leadership who existed in the region, there's still an effect. Their kids and the people they influenced are still pushing up far-right vote shares today. We can also be sure that it's the kids directly involved, because the surnames of those elite Nazis who fled the Soviets came to be overrepresented among politicians in the American zone.
Keep in mind that this effect is not actually due to any sort of Soviet policy or actions. Why? Because they didn't do much of anything here. They had little time for that, and they wanted to keep up appearances to the Western Allies, before withdrawing after just one decade.
Elites matter—they really do! They matter whether their influence is good or bad. As the authors concluded:
"[Not] only [do] migrating extremists themselves but also particular institutions founded by migrating extremists… have persistent effects in the long term. Our study on local party branches shows that extremist communities can preserve ideologies even when outside conditions temporarily change. We find stronger effects in remote and larger municipalities that indicate anonymity and segregation—something that applies to many European suburbs [today]…. [Societies] might well seek to prevent the infiltration of extreme ideologists, for example, fighters returning from the so-called ‘Islamic State’, who are able to share and spread their beliefs."
But isn't this obvious? I'd say 'yes' for 'migrating extremists have political effects'—just examine the records of people like Che Guevara, Mikhail Bakunin, or Trotsky—but 'no' for the level of persistence in spite of either not influencing, or being explicitly forbidden from influencing policy that would've led to these effects.
In any case, if you would like to learn more or see far more examples of elite migrant effects, go check out my article: cremieux.xyz/p/the-cultural…
Consider the case of Austria. After World War II, the occupation zones looked like this:
In 1945, this split between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. was not something people in the region expected; it was a surprise! In Upper Austria, that surprise came right down the Danube river.
The Nazis who found themselves in the zone north of the Danube feared for their lives. They were aware of the barbarity of Soviet POW camps, Gulags, reprisals, and so on, and they wanted none of it. So, they fled. And, more elite Nazis feared this more, so they fled disproportionately.
The result of this attempt to get away from the approaching Soviet lines was that just south of the Danube, there were 53% more Nazis and 182% more elite Nazis per capita in 1947.
The Nazis who fled were spared their lives and given the ability to resettle where they ended up. Many of them did, but that did not mean they became reformed people. The fear of Soviet murder didn't change them, it just made them flee, that's all.
An interesting consequence of that fact is that they were able to keep being themselves, politically, albeit without being overt Nazis, as that had become illegal. So, despite not being able to vote in their own right at the time, they managed to greatly increase far-right vote shares in subsequent elections, as early as the first ones in the late-1940s:
There was no such north/south patterning to far-right vote shares prior to the splitting across the Danube, but afterwards, it was very prominent. It's tied to where Nazis—and especially elite ones—chose to resettle. Migrating extremists matter, and even their descendants matter. Consider the results of a more recent election:
Even generations after the fall of the Nazis and the deaths of practically all of the leadership who existed in the region, there's still an effect. Their kids and the people they influenced are still pushing up far-right vote shares today. We can also be sure that it's the kids directly involved, because the surnames of those elite Nazis who fled the Soviets came to be overrepresented among politicians in the American zone.
Keep in mind that this effect is not actually due to any sort of Soviet policy or actions. Why? Because they didn't do much of anything here. They had little time for that, and they wanted to keep up appearances to the Western Allies, before withdrawing after just one decade.
Elites matter—they really do! They matter whether their influence is good or bad. As the authors concluded:
"[Not] only [do] migrating extremists themselves but also particular institutions founded by migrating extremists… have persistent effects in the long term. Our study on local party branches shows that extremist communities can preserve ideologies even when outside conditions temporarily change. We find stronger effects in remote and larger municipalities that indicate anonymity and segregation—something that applies to many European suburbs [today]…. [Societies] might well seek to prevent the infiltration of extreme ideologists, for example, fighters returning from the so-called ‘Islamic State’, who are able to share and spread their beliefs."
But isn't this obvious? I'd say 'yes' for 'migrating extremists have political effects'—just examine the records of people like Che Guevara, Mikhail Bakunin, or Trotsky—but 'no' for the level of persistence in spite of either not influencing, or being explicitly forbidden from influencing policy that would've led to these effects.
In any case, if you would like to learn more or see far more examples of elite migrant effects, go check out my article: cremieux.xyz/p/the-cultural…
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