Inner founding of an empire

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The establishment of an inner empire is a controversial term used in historical studies to characterize the political and social changes in the German Empire after 1878/79 . This includes, for example, the protectionist protective tariff policy or the repressive measures against the labor movement within the framework of the Socialist Law .

Main features of the concept

Contemporaries such as Heinrich von Treitschke saw the change in policy of 1878/79 as a profound change in German domestic politics. While the latter rated the turnaround as positive, recent research assesses it negatively as a long-term strengthening of the anti-liberal forces in the German Empire. In order to characterize Otto von Bismarck's change of policy in 1878/79 and the associated long-term consequences, the historian Helmut Böhme coined the term of the establishment of an internal empire in the 1960s. "The formation of the conservative-agrarian-heavy industrial solidarity as a new German force for integration, which took the place of the fading free-trade, liberal community of interests of the time of the establishment of the Reich, signified the conclusion of the unification epoch and the creation of Prussian hegemony in the German-conservative state." Since then, instead of Bismarck's alliance with the National Liberals, politics has formed an alternating alliance of the Conservatives with the Center or the National Liberals as well as heavy industry and agriculture. Since then, the German special path between Russian autocracy on the one hand and Western democracy on the other has been paved. In terms of domestic politics, there was then a continuity from the cartel parties to the collection policy of the 1890s to anti-Western German World War II propaganda.

Boehme's theses had a considerable influence on recent research on the empire, especially in the context of the newly emerging historical social science . In his Kaiserreichbuch from 1973 , Hans-Ulrich Wehler spoke of a "collection policy in the cartel of state-sustaining and productive estates 1876-1918 (...) which, despite occasional cracks, formed the foundation of imperial policy until 1918". In 1967, Hans Rosenberg saw a "causal, functional and meaningful connection between the long periods of change in the economy [founder crisis as part of a great depression from 1873 to 1896] and the long-term trends in political structural and economic development." Bismarck had cleverly used these framework conditions. With that he actually founded the empire again. It was Bismarck who "adapted the new national economic and social policy to the antiquated class hierarchy of the domestic political system of rule: the maintenance of the political and social primacy of his peers." Rosenberg expanded the thesis to include the foreign policy aspect. Since then, this has been dependent on the primacy of militant conservative-authoritarian domestic politics.

criticism

Recent research has criticized some of the basic conditions of Rosenberg's ideas. Thus, Hans-Peter Ullmann made to point out that the existence of a great depression from 1873 to 1896 was economic history is not saved, so stood the conclusions on shaky foundations. He is just as skeptical about the deterministic effectiveness of the decisions of 1878/79. It is true that there was a cartel of conservatives and national liberals in the 1880s as well as the concept of collection policy. But wasn't this "more a slogan than politics, more wish than reality"?

Research on Otto von Bismarck also raised considerable doubts about the thesis of a long-term strategy. In the last few decades, the interpretation that prevailed here was that Bismarck was an experienced political tactician on the basis of a conservative basic conviction, who always pursued several alternatives and often made decisions based on the situation. Above all, Otto Plant did not see the decision of 1878 as an ingenious plan for a permanent alliance between heavy industry and agriculture, but it was simply an "act of sheer opportunism" in the specific situation.

In its original form, the concept of the founding of an inner empire is considered largely out of date in recent research, even if Hans-Ulrich Wehler adhered to it in a modified form in his social history. Sometimes the argument is actually turned around. At the beginning of the empire, Bismarck profited from an unstable balance between the liberal bourgeoisie and the traditional ruling classes. With the ongoing industrialization, the social equilibrium dwindled. The change of policy of 1878 was not an internal founding of an empire, but a momentous act of political self-defense that largely failed to secure power.

Nevertheless, Boehme's thesis was not fruitless. They exaggerate the change and the long-term consequences. It is undisputed that the policy change of 1878/79 was based on a change in the economic and social environment and was not an autonomous decision by Bismarck. The new policy marked a turning point in the unification and establishment of an empire, which was initially dominated by liberals. After 1878, liberalism was split and irreparably weakened. Since then, a permanent change in political culture began.

literature

  • Helmut Böhme (ed.): Problems of the time when the Reich was founded 1848 to 1879. Kiepenheuer u. Witsch, Cologne et al. 1968 ( New Scientific Library 26 History ).
  • Ewald Frie : The German Empire. Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt 2004, ISBN 3-534-14725-1 ( controversies about history ).
  • Hans Rosenberg : Great Depression and Bismarckian Period. Economic process, society and politics in Central Europe. de Gruyter, Berlin 1967 ( publications by the Historical Commission in Berlin at the Friedrich Meinecke Institute of the Free University of Berlin 24, ISSN  0440-9663 = publications on the history of industrialization 2).
  • Hans Peter Ullmann: The German Empire 1871-1918. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1995, ISBN 3-518-11546-4 ( New historical library = Edition Suhrkamp 1546 = NF 546).
  • Hans-Ulrich Wehler : The German Empire 1871-1918. Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, Göttingen 1973, ISBN 3-525-33542-3 .
  • Hans-Ulrich Wehler: German history of society. Volume 3: From the “German Double Revolution” to the beginning of the First World War. 1849-1914. Beck, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-406-32263-8 .

Remarks

  1. ↑ Heinrich von Treitschke: Our prospects (PDF; 1.2 MB) In: Prussian year books vol. 44/1879 (from p. 570)
  2. ↑ Heinz Böhme: Introduction. In the S. (Ed.) Problems of the time when the empire was founded 1848–1879. Cologne, 1968 (quoted from Frie, p. 33)
  3. ↑ Hans-Ulrich Wehler: The German Empire 1871-1918. Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, Göttingen 1973, ISBN 3-525-33542-3 . P. 100.
  4. ↑ cit. after Frie, p. 33f.
  5. ^ Hans-Peter Ullmann: The German Empire 1871-1918. Frankfurt 1995. p. 62, p. 148
  6. ↑ Fries, p. 36
  7. ^ Hans-Ulrich Wehler: German history of society. Vol. 3: From the German double revolution to the beginning of the First World War. 1849-1914. Munich 1995, ISBN 3-406-32490-8 . P. 871f.
  8. ↑ Fries, p. 37
  9. ↑ Fries, p. 37