A society lacking a consensus is a dangerous place

Photo courtesy of Eric Weitz

The Weimar Republic enabled the building of public housing that vastly improved the life circumstances of so many people. Jews had more freedom to move in society than under the Kaisers. Yes, Weimar was always tense and conflicted, and the promises of the revolution could not all be fulfilled. But one should not only focus on the sense of humiliation and loss.

The republic’s first government, which was formed by Friedrich Ebert on November 11th 1918, introduced policies that were primarily aimed at restoring peace. Under his leadership a number of social reforms were introduced to improve people’s lives. Convinced that this was a better way to democracy than revolution, Ebert was yet called a traitor by his contemporaries from the left and heavily criticised by the right. Why did he as chancellor, and later president, become such a controversial figure?

For the right, he was “just” a saddle maker. The right always despised Ebert’s working-class origins and thought that the great nation of Germany needed at least aristocratic if not monarchical rule. Even though the Social Democrats pursued moderate policies that satisfied the right only when it feared a more radical revolution in Germany – something on the order of the Bolshevik Revolution, although that was hardly a real possibility in Germany. The Social Democratic Party’s slogan in the winter of 1918-19 was “No Experiments!” The party then pursued a series of deals with elite sectors of society, namely, the army, business and the state bureaucracy. In return for recognition of Ebert’s government, the SPD agreed not to dismantle the army officer corps, socialise property and purge the bureaucracy. For that reason, the left correctly criticised the SPD-led governments as much too timid.

You said that unlike other states, such as Russia, Germany did not complete its revolution and much of the elements of the old imperial order remained intact. If that was not the case, would the fate of the republic, as well as its political life, be different?

The republic’s fate would have been different, that is for sure, but how it would have turned out one can, of course, never know. Revolutions provide brief openings that allow a radical restructuring of state and society. The Weimar governments in 1918-19 did not pursue those openings in a more complete manner and that weakness would come back to haunt the republic in its later years, opening the path to the Nazi seizure of power. Ultimately, those same elites would make their peace with Adolph Hitler and the Nazi Party.

Moving on to the tragedy of the Weimar republic, which is also referenced in the subtitle of your book, the conventional understanding is that its best illustration was Hitler’s democratic election victory. And yet in the book you write: “No historical event is predetermined and most certainly not the Nazi victory. The conflict and constraints of the Weimar republic surely helped fuel the Nazi movement, but it is a travesty to see Weimar only as a prelude to the Third Reich.” Why?

Although the Nazis won a significant segment of the electorate in free elections in 1932 (roughly one-third), they never won a majority. They were not elected to power. In the end, they were placed in power by a small cabal of powerful people around President Paul von Hindenburg. The republic, until its defeat (or at least until late 1929 and the onset of the world economic crisis), accomplished great things. Germans lived in more democratic conditions than they had ever experienced before. Public health clinics, including sex counselling, improved the health conditions of working-class Germans, especially women. Public housing vastly improved the daily living conditions of many people. “Light, sun, and air” was the motto of the housing settlements built by cooperatives, unions and municipalities. Jews had greater social opportunities than under the Kaisers. Modernist culture flourished in all branches of the arts. For all these reasons, it is a mistake to focus only on the conflicts and tensions and the ultimate defeat of Weimar.

The achievements of liberal democracy were nonetheless challenged and the republic was ultimately destroyed. In the book you state that “politically, the republic had been overthrown well before Hitler came to power”. Why couldn’t the republic, in the end, be defended?

In the so-called Golden Years of the Weimar Republic (1924-29), there was some movement toward the centre of the political spectrum. One can imagine the possibility that, over time, the deep conflicts and tensions in Weimar might have eased. But then the world economic crisis threw Germany into depression. The political system proved unable to manage the crisis and Weimar’s most stalwart supporters were exhausted by years of attacks from the right. The right used the final crisis to destroy the republic, as it had wanted to do from the very beginning. Moreover, all along the strictures of the Versailles Peace Treaty gave the political right unlimited ammunition to attack the republic for betraying the nation.

The Weimar Republic is often presented as a lesson on what can happen when societies get excessively polarised and minorities become scapegoats for anti-democratic forces. You seem to share this view when you say that “a society lacking consensus is a dangerous place”. Who, in that case, bears the greatest responsibility that history does not repeat itself and the lessons of Weimar do not go in vain?

That responsibility lies with all of us. All across the globe we see a surge of right-wing populism, more than I could have imagined in 2007 when the book was first published. The oldest political game is to blame outsiders for whatever problems exist (even when those outsiders may, in fact, be long-standing members of society). Democracy is fragile. It needs to be constantly defended against those who would destroy its institutions from within and especially from those who claim that the members of only one particular nation or race deserve to be rights-bearing citizens.

Eric Weitz is a distinguished professor of history at the City College of New York. He is the author of the book Weimar Germany. Promise and Tragedy,which was first published in 2007 by Princeton University Press.

Iwona Reichardt is the deputy editor in chief of New Eastern Europe.

Weimar Republic