Talk:Weimar Republic

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Contents

[edit] Archives

1, 2,

[edit] Call for polish

Am I the only one who feels that the writing could be tweaked/polished beginning from the section "Franz von Papen calls new elections? I would do it myself, but I came looking because I don't know much about Weimar Germany. Oh, and I'm lazy. 09:52, 8 February 2006 unsigned by 64.180.47.30

[edit] Freistaat (Free State)

I have just copied a map onto the article page from the article States of Germany. I have left the caption alone. "The Länder of the Weimar Republic, with the Free State of Prussia (Freistaat Preußen) as the largest". But were the federal parts of the Weimar Republic called Länder in the constitution or some other name?

Articles like Free state (government)#Germany also use the term Länder,"In Germany the term free state (in German, Freistaat) was part of the full names of most Länder (federal states) during the inter-war period." is the term correct for the Weimar Republic?

In the article States of Germany has another map with "The Provinces of the Kingdom of Prussia (green) within the German Empire (1871-1918)" Was East Prussia a province of Prussia the Weimar Republic or did it have some other designation? --Philip Baird Shearer 11:37, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

The Weimar Constitution called the states "Länder", much to the dismay of the states. This is one example of centralizing effects of the Weimar Constituion, which is an often overlooked problem of the new system. However, the various Länder all had names of their own and most of them called themselves Freistaat (Free state), Hessen was a Volksstaat (Popular state) and Baden a Republic. As for Prussian provinces. Everything that was Prussian under the Kaiser was also Prussian under the Weimar Republic (with the exception of the territories ceded to other nations, most notably Poland). The only change in provinces was that the remnants of the Provinces of Western Prussia and Posen were merged into a new province. Some parts of Western Prussia were also merged into Eastern Prussia. All other provinces remained the same. Str1977 (smile back) 00:08, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

NB: The terminus "Freistaat" is an attempt to render into german the latin "res publica". Thus "Freistaat" is to be considered a synonyme to "republic" in the german context.

[edit] Zweites Reich

I wasn't a fan of the part that glosses over the political structure of Germany prior to WWI. I was under the impression that while the ministers in the Kaiser's government were ultimately answerable to the Kaiser, the Bundestag had control of the purse strings. Historically, this arrangement typically leads to parlimentary democracies (I think...like in Britain?). I usuallly think that the Zweite Reich gets treated too much as a totalitarian regime that was an enemy of democrcy, while in reality it was probably on a course to eventual parliamentary democracy. But, I'm not a student of Germany history...So feel free to enlighten me. 67.160.235.243 06:09, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

To call any German state prior to 1933 totalitarian is just ridiculous. Those who do probably haven't considered what the term actually means.
In the Kaiserreich, there actually were no ministers as such. There was the Chancellor appointed by the Kaiser. The Chancellor had his sub-secretaries that later developed into something like ministers but these were never politically responsible to anyone.
The Reichstag (=parliament) had legislative powers and budget power, though that was limited regarding the military budget (and that was the largest part of the budget): the military budget was voted every seven years - the Reichstag was elected every three years.
The Bundesrat (=states' representation) was in the beginning the central body and it was more powerful than the Reichstag.
In 1918 however, the constituion was changed, under the pressure of World War I (especially the US and the German military leaders that wanted to shift the blame): ministers were introduced and made politically responsible and the Chancellor needed parliament's approval. Members of parliament (Social Democrats, Centre Party, Left-wing Liberals) became ministers. But this arrangement was short-lived because of the revolution in November.
However, it should be clear that it were these changes and not the revolution that turned Germany into a parliamentary system. Ebert would have preferred a parliamentary monarchy with a different Emperor.
How things would have unfolded without the war, we cannot tell. Str1977 (smile back) 00:02, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Forgive me, it's a while since I have studied German history, but I seem to remember a school of thought (Fisher, Berghan?) which argued that the contradictions and tensions within the Kaiserreich between feudal/militaristic and parliamentary elements made it inherently unstable? The war, this thesis continues, was in some respects a consequence of these contradictions. I doubt very much if the Prussian Junkers around Wilhelm would ever willingly have surendered power-and control of the military-to the Reichstag. You are right, though, to dismiss any suggestion that the Second Reich was 'totalitarian'; but does any state-with the possible exception of Stalin's Russia-come anywhere near this model? Hitler's Reich was such a bundle of madly competing interests that it cannot really be described as totalitarian in any meaningful sense. White Guard 02:50, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

You are right about this school of thought.
I also doubt that a parlamentarisation would have easily happened. There certainly would have been conflicts about that, the outcome of which we can never know.
About "totalitarian":
The difference between "totalitarian" and "authoritarian" is that the latter merely demands obedience from its subjects (and to the extent that any state does that, any state is authoritarian). The former however is not content with mere obedience, it wants complete internal assent, in a way, it wants to be loved. You could grumble about politics under the Kaiser and thought this didn't change anything, you were free to do it. You couldn't under Hitler.
Now, there were a couple of totalitarian regimes: you mention Stalin (but let us not forget, that the Soviet Union was already totalitarian under Lenin and remained totalitarian under Stalin's successors), but there's also Nazi Germany, Mao's China, the Khmer Rouge, or to go back in time, the French Republic under Robespierre. And certainly various revolutions (or wannabe revolutions) have created an totalitarian environment, but as they were short-lived I won't go into details.
One more thing: the totalitarian nature of a regime does not depend on whether it actually has the means to implement its totalitarian objectives - yes, there were niches under Hitler and also in the Soviet Union but they existed because the regime could not (yet) remove them.
Str1977 (smile back) 13:23, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] GA status

  • Send it to peer review now for more insights. Lincher 03:20, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Constitution

Does anyone out there have the text of the constitution of the Republic? It seems like a relevant issue to me.

EDIT: Found it and put it in "see also"

King ofall1 13:51, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reich or state?

To translate 'Reich' as 'Empire' is far too precise: it can indeed mean 'empire', but it also means 'realm', which is, I think, a far more accurate rendition for the Weimar Republic. White Guard 22:25, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I would suggest not to translate it at all. Whenever it is necessary to use the official name say "Deutsches Reich" (with possibly an explanation), otherwise say Germany. Str1977 (smile back) 23:52, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

My view also. White Guard 00:53, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

See official use of "German Reich" in an official document (Kellogg-Briand Pact (AKA Pact of Paris)) on Talk:Deutsches Reich. --Orangerider 21:33, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Weimar stamp

Hi this might not be appropriate to ask.. but i was just wondering if you guys knew where the weimar republic stamp was (ie the ink rubber stamp, and it was black on white paper. on its own) . I'm sure i have seen it on one of the articles about weimar etc, 2-3 weeks ago. But now i cant find it. Would any of u hava clue.? please help thanx

[edit] Vandalism

"And They Liked Balls" has been shoved at the bottom of the page, I am putting this here so you know its happened once - if this happens again, you may need to lock the article... —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.145.242.86 (talk) 22:39, 31 January 2007 (UTC).

[edit] References

For this article to reach a rating higher than GA, it needs to be correctly cited. The references at the bottom of the article are not actually cited anywhere within the text. Does anyone have access to these publications? - 52 Pickup 09:24, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] merge proposal

Similar to the entry on the German Empire, I propose the incorporation of List of Weimar states into this article. That particular article is just a list that is only linked to from the member states themselves (probably just via the navbar {{States of the Weimar Republic}}). This article, at the moment, focusses heavilly on the historical aspects of the Weimar Republic, but not so much on the geographical. Information about the states that made up Germany at this period in time would round out the article more. - 52 Pickup 11:54, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Since there were no objections, I've gone ahead with the merge. - 52 Pickup 11:39, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Too much information in article on the rise of Hitler, not enough on ther Weimar Republic itself

While the rise to power of Hitler was a major event in the Weimar Republic's dissolution, there are other topics that should be added to give a full picture of the Weimar Republic such as more information about the "golden era" under Stressman, as well as culture and society during the time. User:R-41

[edit] Ruling onself?

The lead claims that the Weimar Republic ruled Germany 1919-33, but this is rather nonsensical. A country is ruled by one or more of its citizen in the form of dictators, political parties, juntas, etc, but the country doesn't rule itself. Could someone tweak this to make it seem less illogical?

Peter Isotalo 23:46, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] GA Review

In light of a near complete lack of inline citations, I am taking this article to GA Review. --Lenin and McCarthy | (Complain here) 19:08, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

The result of the review was to Delist the article. An archive of the review can be found here. However, since the only issues seem to be lack of in-line citations, we encourage editors of this article to resubmit the article to WP:GA/R if the article is ever improved. Drewcifer 21:01, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Brüning a "conservative"?

I don't think it's OK to denote Brüning a "conservative". Brüning was Zentrum, i.e. Christian Democrat. The label "conservative" in the german pre-33 context would apply to DNVP and their ilk, i.e. monarchistic and nationalistic. In contrast to todays CDU, which combines a christian democrat (predominatly catholic) and a conservative wing (predominatly protestant), the Zentrum party was largely christian democrat and predominatly catholic. German protestants before 33 voted monarchistic, liberal or social democrat, but not Zentrum. Personally, I think that Brüning was a honest man, and his attemps to save democracy were earnest. The tragedy was that he attempted his noble goal via with anti-parlamentary means, thus paving the way for authoritarian regimes like Papen and Schleicher, and finally Hitler. In this sense, there may be paralleles to Dollfuss in Austria.

[edit] Edit summary for intro

I'm about to make what I think is a pretty minor edit for the introduction, but I wanted to provide an explanation here in case it turns out to be contentious. In the sentence "Despite its political form, the new republic was still officially known as the Deutsches Reich in German, rendered as "German Empire" or the half-translated term "German Reich" in English", I'm removing the words "the half-translated term". First, because the reader can see the words "German Reich" there on the screen, so doesn't need to be told it's half-translated; second because it's not half-translated, since "Reich" is a word in the English language, appearing in English-language dictionaries (including wiktionary); and third, because it comes across as dismissive (whether or not that was the original intent) and therefore POV, as if the author is looking down on people who use "German Reich" instead of "German Empire" (which is odd since, as noted in an earlier section of this talkpage, the original German "Reich" has connotations that are lost if it's translated as "Empire"). Binabik80 (talk) 13:20, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

No problem. This all came up from a rather lengthy debate a while ago regarding the name, which I hope I managed to settle a while ago when I clarified the German Reich article. After going through a swathe of documents, it became clear to me that "Empire" is officially correct only for 1871-1918 Germany. I can't remember if I wrote the "half-translated" bit or not: I think I did, if only to stop people from incorrectly using "Empire" - the same can be said for the Nazi Germany article. - 52 Pickup (deal) 18:13, 15 February 2008 (UTC)


[edit] External link to Weimar Germany by Eric Weitz

I would like to add a link to the radio interview I did with cultural historian Eric Weitz about his 2007 book Weimar Germany: Promise and Tragedy. I've been working on a book about a resistance group in Occupied Holland that was led by a writer who came out of the disparate currents of Weimar (he was a gay, philosemitic, conservative tangentially linked to the circle of Stefan George who published a book called der Dritte Humanismus)and so the cultural history of Weimar has figured significantly in my research. I only mention this as a bona fide to say that Weitz' book is an excellent treatment of the period and our interview would add, I think, to the knowledge of people visiting this article. The link to the interview is [1] --Francesca Rheannon (talk) 19:22, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Weimar-Bonn-Berlin Republics

Concept calling the different German Republics after towns (it's relativly often used by German media, don't know if it's used outside Germany)
Weimar Republic
Bonn Republic (West Germany)
Berlin Republic (Reunited Germany) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.164.208.244 (talk • contribs)

I've never seen these Bonn/Berlin names used in English. Not very often in German, either. - 52 Pickup (deal) 15:58, 5 April 2008 (UTC)