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Hitler's RISE TO FAME
Political issues with the weimar republic
Political issues with the weimar republic
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In the following investigation, the following question will be addressed: In what ways did economic and political issues in Germany between 1922 and 1932 contribute to Hitler's rise to power? The scope of my research will fall between the years of 1922-1932, the start of Hitler’s attempt to run for office. A variety of primary and secondary sources will be used to answer the question. The bitterness caused upon the change of government systems in Germany will be analyzed, along with his childhood that all primarily drove Hitler to run for power. Then, the harsh effects World War I had on Germany along with the Great Depression that followed as a result will also be looked at. Finally, a conclusion will be reached. From the very beginning of the Weimar Republic established in Germany, it was destined to fail. The new change in government was new to the people of Germany and brought about a lot of unease and discomfort within the country. Not used to the new ruling style this new republic created, Germany remained vulnerable that could have called for the chance of many different parties at the time wanting to take over Germany. Not only were they used to being controlled or dictated in the start, suddenly being free from that can bring lots of confusion. No harsh government existed and neither was there a supreme leader to order people around. In the new democracy that existed with the Weimar Republic, rules were mainly up to the people and decided upon together as a community. The people, or the whole population, were the rulers of such a place now who had to decide on how to work together to make it work. Besides waking up every day getting screamed at by a dictator of what to do and how to do a certain thin... ... middle of paper ... ...in a desperate situation as Germany was would know a time like this was in no way time to get picky, therefore they had no remaining choice left but to accept the upcoming leader and hope he would deliver them from their misery. However, despite this situation, there are still more to come that would prove very behooving for Hitler’s rise. Works Cited http://www.johndclare.net/Weimar7.htm http://www.ithaca.edu/history/journal/papers/fa03Hitler.htm http://www.infoplease.com/encyclopedia/people/hitler-adolf-hitler-rise-to-power.html http://www.icrc.org/eng/resources/documents/misc/68ujy5.htm http://history1900s.about.com/od/worldwari/p/World-War-I.htm http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/treaty_of_versailles.htm http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/weimar_impact_world_war_one.htm http://history1900s.about.com/cs/hitleradolf/p/hitler.htm
Exploring the Reasons Behind Public's Discontent with the Weimar Government There were a number of reasons why the German people were unhappy with the Weimar government. One of the main reasons for this was the signing of the Treaty of Versailles. The result of this was that Germany has to take the war guilt, Germany had to pay reparations of 6,600 million marks to the allies in particular France, Germany lost its colonies, it lost its air force & tanks, and its soldiers were restricted to 100,000. The Ruhr was demilitarised. Also they lost their colonies and its land was cut up such as the Polish Corridor and Alsace Lorraine.
The Weimar constitution was forced into creation by the German desire to sign an armistace with the Allied forces after significant defeats on the Western front. Not only were the Allies demanding a democratic governing style in Germany, but there was also a strong desire to move away from the autocratic state that had existed under the Kaiser. Although the new constitution outwardly appeared to be democratic, there were several internal factors that severely undermined the democratic integrity of the new constitution, and made it almost indistinguishable from its autocratic predecessor.
The first major reason that the Weimar republic failed was that it was extremely inefficient and did not have clear goals set within the government. All the different ideas coming from the parties in the republic, created a situation where the people of Germany were getting very unclear, vague messages. This problem can be seen in the struggle between the German Democratic Party and the Communist Party. Troeltsch, a theologian and leader of the German Democratic Party said, “The development will not stop at democracy, and a ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ will assume the form of terrorist domination by a minority” (Doc 1). This statement is only somewhat reliable because Troeltsch was a politician, and he would benefit from over exaggerating what would happen if the opposing party were to gain control.
This investigation will address the research question, to what extent was Germany’s post-World War I economic depression a causal factor in Hitler’s rise to power from 1919 to 1934? With the Treaty of Versailles, the German government was required to pay 132 billion gold marks of war reparations, drastically worsened with the US Wall Street crash. This effectively crippled the German economy and created a desperate people. For this investigation, Hitler’s private life history and pre-military career will not be analyzed. His political rise will be examined from the perspective of economic and social factors. Several primary sources will be explored, including the Hitler’s Mein Kampf and Hitler’s 25-Point Program. In addition, tertiary sources covering Hitler’s non-personal life and rise to power will be studied.
The historical field concerning the Weimar Republic, Germany's parliamentary government during the interwar years, is not only an extremely sophisticated area of study, but an extremely competitive one as well. In the early eighties, a much heated and unprecedented scholarly dispute arose surrounding The Collapse of the Weimar Republic, written by David Abraham - at the time, a fledgling historian and assistant professor at Princeton University. Nazi seizure of power from the Weimar Republic has long intrigued scores of historians. Various models have been constructed in an attempt to explain how an entity such as the Nazi movement came to power over such an industrially, culturally, and socially advanced society such as Germany's (Notes from Jamie van Hook 2/14).
Hitler’s rise to power can be attributed to a series of events occurring both in Germany and the rest of the world in the mid 20th century. In the year 1929, due to the collapse of the American Stock Exchange the economic situation in Germany terribly worsened. “’I see myself as Chancellor and I will be Chancellor,’ Hitler told Hans Frank, who by then had become his lawyer.” (P.64) Hitler believed in himself and eventually received the power he aimed for. Unemployment was at around 6 million and people were desperate for a quick ...
Richard Bessel’s article stresses the political structure of Weimar Germany as the cause of its failure. Its structure was flawed in numerous ways, all of which contributed to its inevitable failure. First of all, the problems within Germany due to the First World War were massive. This caused economic, political and social problems which first had to be dealt with by the new Weimar government. The loss of the war had left Germany with huge reparations to pay, and massive destruction to repair. In order to gain the capital needed to finance efforts to rebuild, and repay the Allies, the economy had to be brought back to its prewar levels. This was not an easy task.
On the right they faced opposition from Kapp Putsch and Munich Putsch who were very much nationalistic and believed that Germany should be ruled the way in which the Kaiser use to rule Germany. These uprising basically took place in order to take control and to gain power; the Germans believed that this new government was very weak and that they were guilty of how they handled the treaty of Versailles. The Germans also believed that the Weimar constitution were incompetent. The Weimar government were also classed weak
The main reason was that people were discomposed that Germany had lost a war and most of the people blame for the defeat. On the other hand, during 1929-1933, the worldwide Great Depression, which impacted Germany, and there was no leader of Weimar could solve the economic problem.
Hitler was their "last hope". We can see clearly a distinct link between german unemployment figures and a rise in nazi seats in the Reichstag. People turned to Hitler for help due to the depression and the failure of the Weimar republic to cope with the ongoing problems in germany. In my opinion this is the main factor to why Hitler finally came about to doing a political deal.
The German people felt that with the Nazis in control they could overcome the problems caused by the Treaty of Versailles. Nazi militarism would restore the armed forces to their greatest capability. Nazi mobilization would create employment and new economic opportunities. Nazi expansionism would claim new territories for the German people to inhabit. Nazi racism would rid German society of those elements that weakened it. Nazi ultra-nationalism would restore a sense of identity and pride in a greater German nation. After great suffering as a result of the harsh terms of the Treaty of Versailles, a majority of Germans felt at the time that Nazi rule would bring them the most cherished thing of all, hope.
After World War I, the social climate in Germany was depressing. The German people were humiliated by their country's defeat and by the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. The financial depression that resulted left millions of individuals out of work. The German government was weak, and the people sought new leadership. These conditions provided an opportune setting for a new leader, Adolf Hitler, and his party, the National Socialist German Workers Party. Hitler, reckless and powerful, was able to fan the flames of an ancient hatred into a wild and out of control holocaust (Altman 12).
The German Weimar Republic was an attempt to make Germany a more democratic state. While this was a very good idea in theory, the Weimar Republic was ineffective due to the instability that came with it. Several factors contributed to the instability of Germany’s Weimar Republic, such as the new political ideals brought forward and the government’s hunger for war.
Germany was in need of a democratic government in order to meet the harsh provisions of the Treaty of Versailles. Established by members from the Social Democrat Party in 1919, the Weimar Republic became the central power in Germany for the following years. The republic was found in the city of Weimar and was a replacement, so to say, for the imperial government that had previously stood as the central authority. Even though the Weimar Republic managed to lead Germany for 15 years, it experienced devastating drawbacks such as hyperinflation, lack of support from the public, and the constant efforts from different groups to overthrow the government; because of these factors, different political groups sought a resolution, such as overthrowing the government and pushing for a strong leader. Severe economic problems arose in Germany essentially due to the punitive provisions of the Treaty of Versailles.
German people were unused to a democracy and blamed the government “November criminals”, for signing the Treaty of Versailles. From the very beginning, the new Weimar government faced opposition from both sides of the political spectrum. The Left wing Spartacist group, lead by Liebknecht and Luxemburg, looked up to the new Soviet councils in Russia, wanted to place Germany into a similar system.