German nationalism

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The national allegory Germania , the black, red and gold flag and the imperial eagle are among the symbols of German nationalism

The term German nationalism is today summarizes a variety of nationalisms together, focusing on the ethnic sense of belonging to the Germans justified and that began to 1770th Today he becomes the ethnic, i.e. that is, counted among the “ people-related ” nationalisms.

Early nationalism

Wolfgang Hardtwig describes early German nationalism , the development of which began around 1495 ( imperial reform ) and which lasted until the revolution of 1848 . He divides this into three phases. In the first, which stretched from the beginning of the early modern period to the 1760s, nationalism was only carried by tiny - albeit growing - elites, but already developed forms of organization that can be assigned to the "'modern" type of associative volunteer association . Hardtwig describes the nationalism of this phase as "pre-political", since belonging to the nation was not thought of in connection with political participation rights, but rather through an "ascribed equality of characteristics with the entirety of Germans". The creation of a German nation-state played no role in thinking at the time. However, the link between the German nation and the Holy Roman Empire was taken for granted and indissolubly. Hardtwig lets the second phase range from the time after the Seven Years' War to the Napoleonic Wars (around 1810); the third phase finally up to the time before the 1848 revolutions .

The development of an actual German nationalism in the modern sense is mostly assumed from around 1770. Hans-Ulrich Wehler described for 1770er- and 1780 years "precursor phenomena" of German nationalism, which he calls the "debate over a German national literature, a German National Theater, the care of a German national language" and the cult of personality to Frederick the Great one who showed "protonational traits". The nationalism of this phase was primarily a linguistic and cultural nationalism, which was shown, among other things, in the thesis of the “purity” of the German language and its superiority over the Romance languages, as represented by Johann Gottfried Herder and Johann Gottlieb Fichte .

Freedom or unification nationalism

The German Fatherland by Ernst Moritz Arndt

Wehler described the emergence of a “- in the strict sense - modern German nationalism” as a reaction to the “fundamental shocks” of the French Revolution and the coalition wars that followed (1789–1815). This must be strictly separated from the “pre-national, regional sense of belonging” in earlier phases (although this continued to exist afterwards).

From the beginning, this German nationalism was characterized by a duality of participation and aggression ( Dieter Langewiesche ): On the one hand, it propagated the inclusion and equality of all Germans, on the other hand, it called for a territorial expansion of Germany and drew enemy stereotypes of other peoples. For example, the work of Ernst Moritz Arndt already stands for this in the early 19th century ; But also the advocacy of many revolutionaries from 1848 for the Greater German solution up to the striving for great or world power, which at the end of the 19th century also represented social liberals like Friedrich Naumann and social democrats like Ferdinand Lassalle .

Until the German Empire was founded in 1871, however, the element of national freedom dominated. The German national movement was closely linked to liberalism in this phase . Its left wing in particular was aiming for a national democracy: what was perceived as anachronistic and reactionary small states was to be replaced by a liberal nation-state with equal citizens.

Imperial nationalism

In contrast, after the establishment of the small German nation-state in 1871, German nationalism predominantly assumed the character of a political and socially conservative, often also illiberal, defensive ideology. In addition to defending the status quo, he also joined forces with expansion efforts. The aggressive element of nationalism increased from the 1870s onwards. This "imperial nationalism" - unlike the liberal "unification nationalism" directed against the rule of princes - glorified the emperor, the military and also the charismatic, albeit conservative, "empire founder" Otto von Bismarck . With the cultural struggle against the Catholic Church and the socialist laws , this German Reich nationalism also got an exclusionary element: Catholic and Social Democratic Germans were labeled as "enemies of the Reich" whose loyalty to the ultramontane church leadership or party and class was greater than to the nation. On the other hand, the Protestant educated and property citizen was considered an exemplary type of nationally-minded German.

Volkish nationalism

An even more radical idea of ​​exclusion formed the basis of the emerging racial anti-Semitism, which not only denied German Jews their Germanness, but even declared them to be its opponents. Here imperial nationalism was combined with the idea of ​​a "purified nation". It spread from the anti-Semite parties founded in 1878 to the conservative and national liberal camps and the academic milieu. From the late phase of Bismarck's government (mid-1880s) to the First World War, German nationalism became increasingly radical - a development that can also be observed in other western nation-states during this phase.

Contrary to the "saturation" of the German Reich proclaimed by Bismarck, the German question was once again addressed, and the "completion" of the founding of the Reich through the inclusion of Austria and the German " Volkstum " in Eastern and Southeastern Europe was called for. The radical, exclusive, racist and anti-Semitic currents of German nationalism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries are summarized as a völkisch movement . Even within the German national movement in Austria-Hungary there was a radical-ethnic and anti-Semitic wing at this time, for which the Pan-German movement founded by Georg von Schönerer stood.

See also

literature

  • Stefan Berger : British and German nationalism in comparison. Problems and Perspectives. In: Ulrike von Hirschhausen, Jörn Leonhard (ed.): Nationalisms in Europe. Western and Eastern Europe in comparison. Wallstein Verlag, 2001, pp. 96-116.
  • Jörg Echternkamp : The Rise of German Nationalism (1770-1840). Campus Verlag Frankfurt / New York 1998, ISBN 3-593-35960-X .
  • Jörg Echternkamp, ​​Sven Oliver Müller (Hrsg.): The politics of the nation. German nationalism in war and crises, 1760–1960. R. Oldenbourg Verlag, Munich 2002.
  • Dieter Langewiesche : Nation, Nationalism, Nation-State in Germany and Europe. CH Beck, Munich 2000.
  • Ute Planert : Nation and Nationalism in German History. In: From Politics and Contemporary History , B 39/2004. Federal Agency for Civic Education, pp. 11–18.
  • Hans-Ulrich Wehler (ed.): Crossroads of German history. From the Reformation to the turn of 1517–1989. Beck'sche Reihe, Verlag CH Beck, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-406-39223-7 .
  • Hans-Ulrich Wehler: Nationalism. History, forms, consequences. 4th edition, CH Beck, Munich 2011, section Der deutsche Nationalismus , pp. 62–89.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Wolfgang Hardtwig: From elite consciousness to mass movement. Early forms of nationalism in Germany 1500–1840. In: Ders .: Nationalism and Citizen Culture in Germany 1500–1914. Selected essays . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1994, ISBN 3-525-01355-8 , pp. 34-54.
  2. ↑ Jörg Echternkamp : The rise of German nationalism (1770-1840). Campus Verlag, Frankfurt / New York 1998.
  3. ↑ Hans-Ulrich Wehler: Nationalism. History - forms - consequences. 4th edition, CH Beck, Munich 2011, pp. 63-64.
  4. ^ Ludwig Stockinger: Concept of language and cultural nationalism. Comments on the theory of the “purity” of the German language in Herder and Fichte. In: Volker Hertel u. a. (Ed.): Language and communication in a cultural context. Frankfurt a. M. 1996, pp. 71-84.
  5. ^ Hans-Ulrich Wehler: German history of society. Volume 1: From Feudalism of the Old Empire to the Defensive Modernization of the Reform Era, 1700–1815. 4th edition, CH Beck, Munich 2006, p. 506.
  6. ^ A b Hans-Ulrich Wehler: Nationalism. History - forms - consequences. 4th edition, CH Beck, Munich 2011, p. 76.
  7. ↑ Hans-Ulrich Wehler: Nationalism. History - forms - consequences. 4th edition, CH Beck, Munich 2011, pp. 77-78.
  8. ↑ Hans-Ulrich Wehler: Nationalism. History - forms - consequences. 4th edition, CH Beck, Munich 2011, p. 78.