Bismarck reducing or increasing divisions 1870-79 Flashcards
Points raised in introduction
Bismarck was unsuccessful in reducing social and political divisions in 1870, as he relied on oppression and hatred of minority groups like catholics and socialists to increase unity, which only made matters worse
-little economical success not enough to be considered successful
Factor 1- promoting nationalism
- Primary, secondary, uni level education taught nationalism and encouraged loyalties to the Kaiser, through teaching in German language and Sedentag day; military parade celebrating victory over France. Limited success as the south weren’t involved and didn’t accept the militaristic ideas well.
1878- Bismarck use 2 assassination attempts on the king to highlight socialists threat to nationalism, he passed anti socialist laws and imprisoned 1500 socialists. Tried to reduce division by reducing opponents numbers, but in long term SPD party gained millions of votes
Emphasis of Kaiser loyalty and army didn’t work in the south and he was too aggressive towards socialists, so he further divided the north and south, and divided him from alternative political groups who grew stronger instead of getting rid of them
Factor 2- religious oppression
Bismarck also used oppressive measures against the catholics following papa infallibility in 1870, which gave the pope power over state teachings. Bismarck introduced the kulturkampf; set of laws to reduce catholic power, he exiled 1800 priests, seized 16 million marks of church land and withdrew priest funding, in an attempt to stop the catholics who opposed unification.
However he didn’t help unity, instead he fuelled hatred between himself and another group of society who went on to grow 10% in size (z party) and therefore increased the number of opposers to unification. He couldn’t simply reduce divisions by reducing opposition, because in the long term it not only turned more catholics against him, but the Kaiser, Junkers and left wing liberals disliked the KK too.
Factor 3- The reichstag
reichstag had limited power, could only approve or deny legislation instead of initiating it. The power was in the hands of the Kaiser and Junkers in the Bundesrat instead. Because they had no power, they couldn’t put forward laws that all Germans would follow and approve of because they elected the reichstag.
-Dominance of Prussia in the Bundestag undermined the limited benefits that the reichstag had and meant that Prussian favoured government was always set up
-Kaiser held the power over the army and the ability to dissolve the reichstag whenever it was necessary
The reichstag gave the illusion of democracy and being a unifying political factor, but in the short term it wasn’t used to it’s full potential and German people had no chance to get laws passed to benefit the Masses through the reichstag. The small powers it did have regarding legislation was not enough to reduce the political divisions that existed between Germanic states.
factor 4- lander / states/ economy
One area of success for Bismarck was reducing economic barriers between states with standardised measures, currency and laws; including reducing freedom of trade and movement restrictions between states and creating the Reichsmark currency. His pro tariff agenda (which led to his split with NL) was seen as patriotic by peasants and farmers, who voted for the conservative party at the next election, whilst the vote of the NL, who were against unification, fell..
Although state loyalties remained on the whole through 1870’s, Bismarck was successful in encouraging unity through economics. Although the effects may not have been felt in the short term, Bismarcks policies were the basis of the 1890’s boom, which shows that it was a long term unifying factor that had widespread financial benefits across all of Germany.
Conclusion
despite some socio- economical success at the end of 1870’s, Bismarck was too focused on reducing competition to himself rather than reducing political and social divides in Germany. Because of his emphasis on hatred of minoritiy groups, he increased long term divisions because these groups, like the Z party and socialists grew in support over time, and were against unification. By 1880, Germany more politically and socially divide than ever, limiting Bismarcks success
