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Debates about Liberalism in imperial Germany have focused almost exclusively on the national level. This book investigates liberal politics in local government; the only sphere in which liberals had direct access to power throughout Germany. Through the study of one of Germany's most progressive cities, Frankfurt am Main, Jan Palmowski examines more generally the processes of politicization and policy formulation at the local level. He argues that in Frankfurt as elsewhere, local affairs had become politicized not around 1900, as is generally assumed, but by the 1870s. Once in power, the liberals' concern for religion, social policy, and education, as well as their skilful use of fiscal policy shows that liberals in Germany were as sophisticated as liberals in Britain or France. Even in the face of an authoritarian state structure, German liberals received and made use of freedom for renewal and reform. German liberalism was not inherently weak. Instead, the crucial problem lay in the country's complicated federal structure, which made it impossible to transfer innovations from the local level to the state and national levels.
Although often viewed as ineffectual intellectuals, or a spent political force, Left Liberals had become the third largest party in German politics by 1914 and in the German Revolution of 1918/19 it was Left Liberals who effectively wrote the new Weimar constitution. This study, based on extensive original research, investigates Left Liberals in the locality, as well as at the national level, with case studies ranging from Kiel to Kattowitz. Overturning old notions of German liberalism as the helpless victim of mass mobilization and political polarization, it is central to understanding both increasing left liberal influence and support on the eve of the First World War, and why liberal values could not be consolidated after 1918. This study has powerful general implications for the history of imperial Germany, reassessing the role of political parties, public perceptions of politics, and the impact and character of the state.
"Bibliographical notes": p. 205-218.
This study recreates the intellectual climate and transatlantic setting of turn-of-the-century American reform. It examines the influence and meaning of German social thought and reform in the American Reform Movement prior to World War I. The American Progressives used the German theories in order to develop and establish new concepts of reform and to base democracy on principles other than possessive individualism, utilitarian ethics, and market ideology that liberalism held in stock. However, due to the war these reforms lost their radical character. In the end, the progressive quest for a broader sphere of public control, participatory models of reform, and social ethics yielded to the liberal model of regulation, business co-operation, and administrative efficiency, and to the moralistic agenda of prohibition and immigration control. "Axel R. Sch�fer's fine study of what American progressives learned from their German counterparts adds to the growing literature illuminating the cosmopolitan breadth and ideological daring of turn-of-the-century reform. [�] It is a testament to the argumentative force of this insightful work that it so clarifies and deepens the vital debate over the progressive legacy in our new Gilded Age." The Journal of American History "Sch�fer did not intend to offer an exhaustive treatment; instead, he wished to show that part of progressive thought was not merely home grown, ,a relection of narrow, moralistic Protestantism� (220), but had some German roots, too. This he did well, and readers may mine his chapters for other insights�" German Studies Review "Axel R. Sch�fers kenntnisreiche, methodisch reflektierte und quellenges�ttigte Untersuchung legt die bis vor kurzem nur wenig beachteten transatlantischen Bezuege der ,progressiven Bewegung� an der Wende vom 19. zum 20. Jahrhundert frei und bettet dieses, als ,sehr amerikanisch� geltende Reformph�nomen st�rker in seinen weltlichen Gesamtzusammenhang ein. Sch�fer wird daher nicht nur von Amerikaspezialisten mit Gewinn gelesen werden, sondern auch von Historikern, die sich mit interkulturellen Austauschprozessen besch�ftigen." Das Historisch-Politische Buch "Selten jedenfalls ist die Krise des Progressivism im Ersten Weltkrieg so klar analysiert worden wie hier�" Historische Zeitschrift "Anachronismen vermeidend und mit gro�er F�higkeit zur Empathie zeichnet Sch�fer die Motive und Vorstellungswelten der Akteure nach, ohne sie von vornherein zu verurteilen. Auf diese Weise gelingt ihm eine sehr differenzierte Darstellung�" Neue Politische Literatur.
In a work based on new archival, press, and literary sources, the author revises the picture of German imperialism as being the brainchild of a Machiavellian Bismarck or the "conservative revolutionaries" of the twentieth century. Instead, Fitzpatrick argues for the liberal origins of German imperialism, by demonstrating the links between nationalism and expansionism in a study that surveys the half century of imperialist agitation and activity leading up to the official founding of Germany's colonial empire in 1884.
'A rare and welcome addition to the current historiography.' -English Historical Review'Broad scope is one of the ways in which the book differs from other studies on the subject... Based on a truly impressive amount of archival research.' -HistoryAlastair Thompson here challenges the view of German Liberalism as the helpless victim of mass mobilization and political polarization in Wilhelmine Germany. He reveals the influence of a party that was the third largest in German politics by 1914 and which effectively wrote the Weimar Constitution. His study is central to understanding increasing Left Liberal support on the eve of war, and why liberal values could not be consolidated after 1918.
Germany's imperial era (1871-1918) continues to attract both scholars and the general public alike. The American historian Roger Chickering has referred to the historiography on the Kaiserreich as an 'extraordinary body of historical scholarship', whose quality and diversity stands comparison with that of any other episode in European history. This Companion is a significant addition to this body of scholarship with the emphasis very much on the present and future. Questions of continuity remain a vital and necessary line of historical enquiry and while it may have been short-lived, the Kaiserreich remains central to modern German and European history. The volume allows 25 experts, from across the globe, to write at length about the state of research in their own specialist fields, offering original insights as well as historiographical reflections, and rounded off with extensive suggestions for further reading. The chapters are grouped into five thematic sections, chosen to reflect the full range of research being undertaken on imperial German history today and together offer a comprehensive and authoritative reference resource. Overall this collection will provide scholars and students with a lively take on this fascinating period of German history, from the nation’s unification in 1871 right up until the end of World War I.
An important examination of the colorful histories of urbanization and social reform in Imperial Germany
’Long live liberty, equality, fraternity and dynamite’ So went the traditional slogan of the radical liberals in Greater Swabia, the south-western part of modern Germany. This book investigates the development of what the author terms ’popular liberalism’ in this region, in order to present a more nuanced understanding of political and cultural patterns in Germany up to the early 1930s. In particular, the author offers an explanation for the success of National Socialism before 1933 in certain regions of South Germany, arguing that the radical liberal sub-culture was not subsumed by the Nazi Party, but instead changed its form of representation. Together with the famous völkish fraction and the leftist fraction within the chapters of the Nazi Party, there were radical-liberal associations, ex-members of radical-liberal parties, sympathizers with these parties, and notables with a radical orientation derived from family and regional traditions. These people and associations believed that the Nazi Party could fulfil their radical - liberal vision, rooted in the local democratic and liberal traditions which stretched from 1848 to the early 20th century. By looking afresh at the relationship between local-regional identities and national politics, this book makes a major contribution to the study of the roots of Nazism.
How workers fought for municipal socialism to make cities around the globe livable and democratic - and what the lessons are for today. For more than a century, municipal socialism has fired the imaginations of workers fighting to make cities livable and democratic. At every turn propertied elites challenged their right to govern. Prominent US labor historian, Shelton Stromquist, offers the first global account of the origins of this new trans-local socialist politics. He explains how and why cities after 1890 became crucibles for municipal socialism. Drawing on the colorful stories of local activists and their social-democratic movements in cities as diverse as Broken Hill, Christchurch, Malmö, Bradford, Stuttgart, Vienna, and Hamilton, OH, the book shows how this new urban politics arose. Long governed by propertied elites, cities in the nineteenth century were transformed by mass migration and industrialization that tore apart their physical and social fabric. Amidst massive strikes and faced with epidemic disease, fouled streets, unsafe water, decrepit housing, and with little economic security and few public amenities, urban workers invented a local politics that promised to democratize cities they might themselves govern and reclaim the wealth they created. This new politics challenged the class power of urban elites as well as the centralizing tendencies of national social-democratic movements. Municipal socialist ideas have continued to inspire activists in their fight for the right of cities to govern themselves.