Week 8

1
Week 8

• Modernity and its Discontents

Stab in the Back Legend
2
The Crisis of Classical Modernity
3
Societal Changes

• Urban Expansion
• Class
• Gender

4
Youth

• New sensitivity to lack of proper supervision of
  youth and too much freedom for jugendliche
• 1922 Reich Youth Welfare Law Every German child
  has the right to an upbringing that will ensure
  physical, intellectual and social fitness.
• Boy subcultures
• Youth unemployment

5
The Upper Classes

• The aristocracy (at least temporarily) dislodged
  from their dominant position.
• Aristocratic ranks and titles banned after 1918
  many families incorporate their titles into their
  surnames.
• Nevertheless, industrialists and landowners still
  powerful and the old elites represented in the
  Reichstag by the DVP and DNVP.
• The Officer Corps of the Reichswehr more
  aristocratic than the old Imperial Army
• 25 of regular officers came from old military
  families in 1913,
• this number had risen to 67 by 1929.

6
The Middle Classes

• Small businesses struggled to survive in the
  difficult economic climate of the 1920s and early
  30s.
• Many middle class families continued to fear a
  loss of status and the threat of revolution and
  the extreme left.
• Also a lack of identification with the new
  Republic.
• Even those who came to accept it often had little
  love for it (Vernunftrepublikaner)

Family of the Lawyer Dr Fritz von Glaser (1920)
by Otto Dix.
7
The Working Classes

• Shorter working day, legal Union representation
  and higher wages.
• Slow improvement in living standards after 1924.
• SPD government in Prussia invested in public
  works affordable housing, increased benefits,
  education etc.
• Extension of adult education aimed at workers.
• But curriculum designed to raise class
  consciousness, not improve employment prospects
  or provide re-training.

8
The New Woman!
9
Inflation

• 1914-1918
• Wartime inflation caused by
• Issuing of war bonds
• Increased circulation of paper money
• Shortage of consumer goods
• Black market price hiking
• By the end of the war, the German mark held less
  than half of its prewar purchasing power.

10
Economic Instability Crisis

• 1921 German reparations set at 132 billion gold
  marks accompanied by a complicated yet arguably
  tenable payment plan.
• Resulting anxiety over debt slavery and
  widespread dissatisfaction w/ Versailles Treaty

11
Inflation

• 1919 Demobilization
• Reluctance to introduce austerity measures and
  reliance on a cheap money policy meant that
  within the year, the mark fell another 50 in
  value.
• The following year, it was further devalued to
  less than 1/3 of this value.

12
German Policy

• Erfüllungspolitik (Policy of Fulfillment)
• vs.
• Katastrophenpolitik (Catastrophe Policy)

13
Katastrophenpolitik

• End of 1922 Germany claims it cannot make
  reparations payments and asks for temporary
  moratorium
• 11 January 1923 French march into the Ruhr
• German govt. calls for passive resistance

14
Inflation

• 1922
• Currency circulation Erfüllungspolitik pushed
  economic stability. Marks value plummeted.
• 1 prewar mark 341.82 marks in 1922

15
Stand-off in the Ruhr
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Hyperinflation

• By mid-1923 the German mark was losing value by
  the minute
• A loaf of bread that cost 20,000 marks in the
  morning cost 5,000,000 marks by nightfall
• Restaurant prices went up while customers were
  eating.
• Workers were paid twice a day.
• When economic collapse finally came on November
  15, 1923
• 4.2 trillion German marks 1 American dollar.

17
Hyperinflation
18
Winners Losers?
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Meanwhile
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The Munich Beer Hall Putsch (1923)
Defendants at the treason trial following the
Munich Beer Hall Pustsch. Ludendorff is in The
centre. Hitler is to the right.
21
New Statesmanship
22
New Statesmanship

• Gustav Stresemann (1878-1929)
• Opposed new German constitution Versailles
  Treaty
• Post -23 Vernunftrepublikaner
• Chancellor (1923) and Foreign Minister (1923-29)

23
Turning Point

• 26 November 1923 German govt. concedes policy
  failure and Stresemann concedes to French demands
• German economic collapse draws in Americans.
• 30 November 1923 Reparation Committee chaired by
  American Charles Dawes reassess Germanys
  reparation plan.
• April 1924 Dawes Plan created new payment scale
  offered American credits and put in place a
  system of reparations supervision. Plan puts
  intl pressure on France to withdraw from Ruhr
• August 1925 French began withdrawal

24
Rentenmark

• Hyperinflation and subsequent collapse make new
  fiscal reforms palatable.
• 1924 Shortly after the signing of the Dawes
  Plan, a new German currency, the Rentenmark, was
  issued backed by German property assets and tied
  to a gold exchange standard.

25
Post-23 Developments

• Withdrawal of French and Belgium troops from the
  Ruhr
• Locarno Treaty of 1925
• Negotiated the end of the Inter-Allied Military
  Control Commission
• September 1926 Germany became a member of the
  League of Nations and given a permanent seat on
  its Council
• Early withdrawal of Allied troops from the west
  bank of the Rhine in 1930(5 years before the
  original date)
• Dawes Plan followed in 1929 by the Young Plan

26
Legitimacy of the Weimar State

• General understanding of the situation
• Psychological impacts
• Shifts in perception values from the Wilhelmine
  Era