Weimar Republic Vs Germany Essay

The Weimar Republic would have continued to be a functional government far longer than achieved if not for the defeat of WWI, the economic burdens imposed by the Versailles Treaty, and the flawed Article 48 which all contributed to the down fall of Germany’s first attempt at a legitimate Democracy. This paper will argue that the societal, economical, and constitutional aspects all played a role in the hopeless Democracy Germany attempted which ultimately lead Germany into a totalitarian state that would further shake the world with the rise of the NSDAP and Adolf Hitler.

Thus, a series of parties against the Weimar gained power, although through coalition, reducing the power of the already fragile Republic. Here we can see the system of parliamentary democracy was a factor in the collapse of the Weimar. The series of economic crisis’ which affected post World War One Germany assisted in both the fall of the Weimar and the rise of Hitler. The Treaty of Versailles left the country with extremely large debts and when Germany did not keep up with payments, the French responded by invading the Ruhr, an industrial region in Germany, resulting in a general strike and ruining the middle class who would eventually make up the foundation of Nazi supporters.

In addition to the damaging consequences of the First World War with the requirements of the Treaty of Versailles, certain features of Germany caused the state to be susceptible to the influence of this dangerous ideology. Along with the damage to the national ego as a result of the First World War, Germany had co-existing and conflicting highly modern strands of development forced to integrate with powerful remnants of archaic values and social structures, and had a deeply fractured parliamentary political system, and the weaknesses of this system reflected the social and political differences within the population. This shame and failure after World War I was superimposed onto a modern country which once had an advanced economy, a sophisticated state

With incompetent leadership and an unhappy nation, the German people began to realize that their country was in a vulnerable situation and began to look for stable alternatives to democracy. Hitler’s

It led to economic problems and a lack of food or jobs. These in turn

1) Germany before the Fuhrer. Germany’s defeat at the end of World War I left the nation socially, politically, and economically shattered. The reparation agreements inflicted upon Germany without its’ consent at the end of the war meant that the nation was in complete financial ruin. In the wake of Germany’s defeat, public decent climaxed on the 9th November 1918 during the revolution that took place on Berlin’s Postdamer Platz. This revolution transpired as a result of the public’s culminating discontent towards the imperial monarchy, and lasted up until August 1919, which saw the establishment of the Weimar Republic. In attempts to guide Germany out of economic

The collapsement of the Weimar Republic was due to many social, political and economical issues within. From its birth it faced numerous political problems, for which the causes were many and varied. These problems included political instability, deep divisions within society and economic crisis; problems were constantly appearing for the new government. The Weimar Republic never really had a stable political party, having a whole six different parties between 1924-1928 does not create stability. Many of these parties were also narrowly sectioned, with messed up

When Germany lost World War I, they were expected to sign the Versailles Peace Treaty which was filled with harsh demands and punishments. More importantly, it was not the kaiser who signed the treaty, but rather the Weimar Government. Because they accepted such horrible war guilt, it caused several all over Germany to look down upon this group that was running the government. Fortunately enough, the economy was getting better and most Germans were okay with how things were going. One man in particular, however, was trying to come up with someone to blame for the loss of World War I. His name was Adolf Hitler. In his mind, Germany had been betrayed by none other than the Weimar Government. But instead of blaming the whole government, he looked

Since the Weimar Republic was established in the aftermath of World War One, it was almost inevitable that it would be blamed for Germanys surrender and the Treaty of Versailles. The supposed surrender was even harder to accept since in 1918 Germany had signed an armistice with Russia. Weimar was in essence ‘brought about by defeat’ . The ‘November Criminals’ who signed the armistice were always associated with Weimar, thus making it difficult for Weimar to be associated with anything but defeat and humiliation. The war guilt clause was also difficult to accept because it lay all the blame on Germany for starting the First World War. This along with reparations were crippling not only the economy but German society itself

was in the summer an they had to pay £50,000. But in 1922 they had

she will be able to start to make a full recovery but in the long run

The Weimar Constitution was strongly associated with the Versailles Treaty, a treaty that had forced Germany to accept full responsibility for the devastating war that had been experienced in Germany. Germany was also forced to compensate the allied and associated powers for the damage caused to their civilian populations. The international and socioeconomic constraints as well as persistence of anti-democratic forces and ideologies; therefore, contributed to the failure of Germany to transit to full democracy. The foundation of the Republic of Germany thus became complicated, and Hitler came to power. In the Weimar Constitution, the authors failed to break up the state of Prussia. The proportional representation voting system and the powers

The collapse of the Weimar Republic can not be seen as solely indebted to the severe economic problems faced during the period of its rule, but consequently it was the economic issues that became a footstep to the ultimate demise of the Republic. Subsequent to Germany’s defeat in the First World War and German Emperor Kaiser’s abdication from power, the Weimar Republic was proclaimed. The Republic that had emerged from the German Revolution of November 1918 would inevitably fall as a result of numerous issues. However, the extent of which economic problems had in the dissolution of the republic, and how these issues caused or came about due to separate concerns faced by the new democratic system became a major contributing factor.

Before the Terror in Revolutionary France, poor people who made up the eighty percent of the French population were starving and dying. However, the nobles and the king were living the life. The poor seeing this, had such anger and vengeance that they planned and successfully overthrew the throne. Overthrowing of the throne led to many changes that eventually led to the terror of the Revolutionary France. In Weimar Germany, similar circumstances happened in Germany like it did in France. The poor were starving and dying, however it was due to World War I that this was happening. Germany became slow going in trying to get themselves back up. When Weimar Germany was doing well, poor loved democracy, when their country wasn’t doing well, they hated democracy. Politics were ran by the rest of the population’s emotions, with that, the authoritarian party slowly persuaded the poor to see their side in taking over the Social Republic government in Germany. Both countries had similarities where they succumbed to tyranny when most of the population were unemployed, broke and wanted a change so they economy could run again. However, what led to the terror of revolutionary France was that there was too much internal and external opposition on how they wanted France to be ran. While in Weimar Germany, the Nazis was able to take over slowly without anybody knowing any the wiser.

The Versailles Settlement was more significant in shaping the history of the Weimar Republic overall, however other prevailing conditions worsened the effects of the Versailles Settlement to a lesser extent. From 1919 to 1921, the Versailles Settlement was less significant, as the instability of the German people was able to be stopped. From 1921 to 1923, the Versailles Settlement was more significant due to the inability of the Weimar Republic to recover its economy from the effects of the Settlements terms. From 1923 to 1929, the Versailles Settlement was less significant as due to the complying of terms, Germany was made more respected internationally. From 1929 to 1933, the Versailles Settlement was more significant as the restrictions of the Settlement terms resulted in a weak economy leading to the Nazi’s taking advantage to exploit the Settlement to influence the public.