A History of Modern Germany is a well-established text that presents a balanced survey of the last 150 years of German history, stretching from nineteenth-century imperial Germany, through political division and reunification, and into the present day.
Beginning in the early 1870s and covering topics such as Wilhelmenian Germany, the World Wars, revolution, inflation and putsches, the Weimar Republic, the Federal Republic and the German Democratic Republic, the book offers a comprehensive overview of the entire period of modern German history. Fully updated throughout, this new edition details foreign policy, political and economic history and includes increased coverage of social and cultural history, and history ‘from the bottom up’, as well as containing a new chapter that brings it right up to the present day.
The book is supported by full discussion of past and present historiographic debates, illustrations, maps, further readings and biographies of key German political, economic and cultural figures within the Im Mittelpunkt feature. Fully exploring the complicated path of Germany’s troubled past and stable present, A History of Modern Germany provides the perfect grounding for all students of German history.
LIST OF FIGURES
LIST OF MAPS
PREFACE
1 THE FOUNDERS’ GENERATION, 1871–1890
The Road to Unification
After Unification: Economic and Political Power Structures
The Kulturkampf
Im Mittelpunkt: Ludwig Windthorst (1812–1891)
Economic and Social Developments
Im Mittelpunkt: Gerson Bleichröder (1822–1893)
Social Legislation and Antisocialist Laws
Foreign Relations
The End of the Era and Bismarck’s Dismissal
2 WILHELMENIAN GERMANY, 1890–1914
The Structures and Personalities of Modern Politics
Economic and Social Developments
Literature, Art, and Society
Im Mittelpunkt: Heinrich (1871–1950) and Thomas Mann (1875–1955)
Im Mittelpunkt: Karl May (1842–1912)
Foreign Relations
Germany on the Eve of World War I
3 WORLD WAR I, 1914–1918
The Debate over the Outbreak of the War
Military Developments
Im Mittelpunkt: Erich Ludendorff (1865–1937)
Domestic Politics: Reform, Repression, and Revolution
War and Society
Conclusion: The Long-Term Impact of the War
4 REVOLUTION, INFLATION, AND PUTSCHES:
THE SEARCH FOR A NEW CONSENSUS, 1918–1923
Revolution
Im Mittelpunkt: Rosa Luxemburg (1870–1919)
Im Mittelpunkt: Friedrich Ebert (1871–1925)
The Weimar Constitution
The Treaty of Versailles
Economic and Social Problems
Im Mittelpunkt: Walther Rathenau (1867–1922)
Everyday Life under Extreme Duress
Counterrevolution
Foreign Relations
Conclusion
5 FOOLS’ GOLD: THE WEIMAR REPUBLIC, 1924–1930
The Search for the Elusive Political Consensus
Economic and Social Developments
Weimar Culture
Im Mittelpunkt: Marlene Dietrich (1901–1992)
Im Mittelpunkt: Kurt Weill (1900–1950)
Foreign Relations
The Depression and the End of Parliamentary Democracy
6 FROM AUTHORITARIANISM TO TOTALITARIANISM, 1930–1938
The Rule of the New Conservatives
Im Mittelpunkt: Heinrich Brüning (1885–1970)
Im Mittelpunkt: Franz von Papen (1879–1969)
The Nazis’ Rise to Power
Gleichschaltung: The Establishment of Nazi Totalitarianism
Social Life and the Concept of the Volksgemeinschaft
Foreign Relations
Conclusion
7 CONQUEST, DEATH, AND DEFEAT, 1938–1945
Further Growth of the Nazi Führer State
Im Mittelpunkt: Reinhard Heydrich (1904–1942)
The Road to War
Nazi Rule in Europe
The Holocaust
Im Mittelpunkt: Viktor Klemperer (1881–1960)
Economy and Society
The End of the Third Reich
8 "CONDOMINIUM OF THE ALLIED POWERS," 1945–1949
The German Resistance: Strengths and Delusions
Im Mittelpunkt: Claus von Stauffenberg (1907–1944)
Allied Visions and Plans, 1941–1945
The Immediate Legacy of the Third Reich: The Reality of "Zero Hour"
Reparations and Economic Recovery
"Exorcising the Evil": De-Nazification and Reeducation
Revival of Administrative, Political, and Cultural Life
The Cold War and the Division of Germany
Conclusion
9 THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY, 1949–1990
The Adenauer Era, 1949–1963
Im Mittelpunkt: Konrad Adenauer (1876–1967)
The Changing of the Guard, 1963–1974
Im Mittelpunkt: Helmut Schmidt (1918–2015)
Culture and Society
Im Mittelpunkt: Günter Grass (1927–2015)
1968 and Beyond: Troubled 1970s and 1980s
Conclusion
10 THE GERMAN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC, 1949–1990
The Quest for Viability
Im Mittelpunkt: Erich Mielke (1907–2000)
East Germany in the 1960s
Culture and Society
Im Mittelpunkt: Wolf Biermann (1936–)
Conflicting Signals: East Germany under Erich Honecker, 1971–1989
1989: The Year of the Ultimate Crisis
Im Mittelpunkt: Kurt Masur (1927–2015)
Conclusion
11 EUPHORIA AND DISILLUSIONMENT, 1990–2005
Political Developments
Im Mittelpunkt: Gerhard Schröder (1944–)
The End of the Kohl Era
Economic and Social Developments
Foreign Policy
German Society Fifteen Years after Reunification
Problems and Prospects
12 THE NEW NORMAL, 2005 to the Present
Im Mittelpunkt: Angela Merkel (1954–)
Parties, Politics and Elections
Foreign Relations
Im Mittelpunkt: Ursula von der Leyen (1958–)
The Refugee Crisis of 2015/16 and the Rise of Anti-Establishment Groups
Culture
Im Mittelpunkt: Herta Müller (1953–)
Problems and Prospects
13 CONCLUSION
SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING
INDEX
Biography
Dietrich Orlow is Professor (emerit.) of History at Boston University. He has taught and written extensively on contemporary German and European history. His recent books include Common Destiny: A Comparative History of the Dutch, French, and German Social Democratic Parties, 1945-1969 (2000) and Socialist Reformers and the Collapse of the German Democratic Republic (2015).