Weimar Republic

Question 1

Who were the allied coalition in WW1

Answer 1

France, Britain and Russia

Question 2

Who was General Lundendorff?

Answer 2

The head of the German Army in WW1

Question 3

Define Autocracy

Answer 3

A system of government in which supreme power was concentrated on one individual

Question 4

Why did Lundendorff turn towards democracy after WW1 before signing peace terms?

Answer 4

• By doing so it would allow Germany to gain more favorable peace terms in the armistice
• Prevent a communist revolution occurring in Germany
• Save the Imperial army by providing a scapegoat for Germany’s defeat. It was the new leadership that would absorb the blame for the loss of the war, which would later be know as the “Stab-in-the-back” myth

Question 5

What was the German Revolution ?

Answer 5

When German sailors, ordered by officers a suicide attack against the Royal Navy, rebelled and refused to obey their orders. Sailors and civilians protested in
favor of a fairer, socialist system of government for Germany and an increase in freedom of speech and
civil liberties.

Question 6

What is proportional representation ?

Answer 6

an electoral system in which parties gain seats in proportion to the number of votes cast for them

Question 7

What was a problem with proportional representation ?

Answer 7

there were many small parties in parliament, and so it was necessary for several parties to join forces and form coalition governments.

Question 8

How does the Chancellor get elected

Answer 8

To head the Reichstag a chancellor was selected by the president to act as a chairman and to lead the government. For a government to be
effective it was necessary for the chancellor to have the support of the majority of the Reichstag and so he
was usually selected from the party that had the most votes.

Question 9

Who were the Reichsrats ?

Answer 9

the Reichsrat was made up of elected representatives that dealt with issues concerning the governance of the 17 states

Question 10

What is Article 48 ?

Answer 10

To pass laws without the Reichstag

Question 11

What were the major issues with the constitutions ?

Answer 11

• Proportional representation ; The problem with this
  system was that it created a lot of very small political parties in parliament, many of which had extremist views. This made it hard for parties to form coalitions in order to become governments as they often had to create broad coalitions between lots of small parties. The extremist views of these small parties made it unlikely that they would ever agree on key issues of government and so no new laws could be passed and very little could get done.

-The power of the President ; Among
the extraordinary powers of the president were: the supreme command of the armed forces, the
ability to appoint the chancellor of the Reichstag and to completely dissolve the Reichstag should he
wish. Most important of these powers was his ability to completely bypass the Reichstag in order to
pass new laws. This meant that the democratic system of electing a Reichstag could be completely
overruled by the president.

Question 12

what was the stabbed in the back theory

Answer 12

Instead they remained steadfast in the belief that the army had been betrayed by the
revolution at home and had been sold out by the new democratic government that had been established
in their absence. They believed that if it was not for the ‘November Criminals’ who had signed the
armistice in 1918 the German Army would have gone on to defeat the allies and win the war. Instead the
republic had been responsible for handing over Germany to her enemies, a betrayal that right-wing
groups, who wanted to see a return to an autocracy in Germany, would not soon forget.

Question 13

What were the impact of TOV

Answer 13

‘War Guilt Clause’ of the document. Because of this guilt, Germany would have to pay considerable amounts of money to the countries damaged by the war. The total cost of these payments, called reparations, was a staggering 132 billion marks, the German system of currency.

Question 14

who were the left wing extreme groups

Answer 14

KPD - Inspired by the communist revolution in Russia in 1917 the KPD wanted a full Marxist revolution to happen in Germany that would completely change the nature of German society and economics.

Spartacist - The Spartacists were an extreme left-wing group, Deeply influenced by the Communist theories of Lenin and Bolshevism they sought to create a soviet
republic in Germany run through workers and soldier’s councils

Question 15

who were the right wing extreme groups

Answer 15

DNVP - largest party of the extreme right and contained extremist right-wing and racist elements.

Freikorps - – The demilitarization of Germany, enforced as a clause of the Treaty of Versailles, meant that many of Imperial Germany’s soldiers found themselves out of work in the Weimar Republic. Many of these formed into their own paramilitary groups lead by their old regimental officers who were staunch advocates of the
conservative right wing and unquestioning believers in the ‘stab-in-the-back’ myth. These Freikorps (Free Corps) became practically a law unto themselves carrying out numerous political assassinations and acts of violence on behalf of the extreme right. Though they were often employed by the government to help crush
revolts from the extreme left, they bore absolutely no allegiance to the republic or to its leaders.

Question 16

Impact of War on German economy

Answer 16

destroyed world trade networks and exports from Germany had ground to a halt. The war had been an immensely costly affair for Imperial Germany and the kaiser, rather than increase the amount of taxation on the people, had instead borrowed the money needed to fund the war effort. steady rate of inflation had continued to rise throughout the war, and general goods had increased in price by nearly four times what they had been in 1914.

Question 17

what were the effects of hyperinflation on Germany 1923 ?

Answer 17

By continuing to print off money to pay reparations to France the Weimar government had caused the mark’s value to plummet, and this rapid decline soon spiraled out of control with the value of the mark decreasing more and more every day. A pair of shoes that cost 12 marks in 1913 cost 1,000,000 marks in the summer of 1923 and then 32,000,000,000,000 marks by that November. Ruhr was then occupied by France who though Germany were avoiding paying war reparations, invaders
occupied coal mines and steel factories in a desperate attempt to extract some profitable goods from Germany. The loss of this region massively expedited the hyperinflation of the German Mark, completely collapsing the economy. To buy a loaf of bread, German citizens would have to carry mountains of practically worthless banknotes in wheelbarrows

Question 18

During 1924-28 how did Germany try to recover their economy ?

Answer 18

Introduced Stresemanns 100 day plan;

• Calling off the Policy of ‘passive resistance’ in the Ruhr
• Promising to continue to make reparation payments
• Establishing a new system of currency, the Rentenmark
• Cutting the government’s expenditure and firing over 700,000 public employees

Question 19

What was the Dawes plan ?

Answer 19

The plan was that America would loan significant amounts of money to Germany so that she might be able to pay France her reparations. In doing so America could invest in the renewed German economy and could also ensure that enough money was flowing through Europe to allow France both to rebuild her country, and to repay America the debts she owed her for
the war

Question 20

What was the golden age of Weimar ?

Answer 20

‘Golden Twenties’ which saw a cultural
renaissance in German cinema, art and music. Berlin became the central hub of this new atmosphere of artistic expression with popular jazz bands and street theater drawing large crowds and women would dress in the fashions of New York with short hair and beads and many right-wing groups denounced this culture as an abandonment of traditional German values.

Question 21

What were the impacts of the Great depression ?

Answer 21

The Wall Street Crash of 1929 (the collapse of share prices on the New York stock exchange) sent most of the world into what is now known as the Great Depression. Germany was hit particularly hard by the depression as its economy was so dependent upon the incoming loans from America. When the market crashed, these loans stopped being granted and American investors began demanding
their immediate repayment. This loss of investment resulted in a severe increase in unemployment that rapidly rose to the height of 6.1 million by 1932. Unlike the hyperinflation of 1923, the Great Depression affected everyone in German
society from working-class industrial labourers to middle-class shopkeepers with even highly-paid professionals such as doctors facing the prospect of long-term unemployment. With no income and the
closure of banks, people could afford neither rent nor mortgage payments and so were evicted, resorting to living in tents erected in rows on streets in order to maintain a resemblance of normality.
In the wake of such disaster German people began to lose faith in the indecisive Weimar coalition government

Question 22

How did living standards change within Germany from 1918-32 ?

Answer 22

The living standards of people in Weimar Germany fluctuated in the years 1918–1932. To begin with the war had seen the continued deterioration of living standards for both civilians and the members of the armed forces. By 1918 the economy was already in bad shape and the stark divisions in quality of life between rich and poor became all the more conspicuous. New legislation was passed that aimed to improve quality of life for industrial workers. A maximum 48-hour workweek was implemented, with limitations on night-time work and a required 36-hour minimum continuous rest period per week. Improvements were also made in unemployment benefits, and medical insurance was offered to increasingly more people who could otherwise not afford it. However, these advances were soon deemed as worthless as the mark when hyperinflation hit. In the chaos of 1923 many workers found that their wages became worthless shortly after they earned them; those without any savings of their own found themselves in a dire situation, and traded what possessions they had for food. It was not until the Great Depression and the total crash of the economy that the class divide was to be effectively levelled, with all Germans sharing in the squalor and desperation of poverty

Question 23

What were the political effects of the Great Depression ?

Answer 23

Confidence in government that had been only slightly knocked during the crisis of hyperinflation a decade ago was all but
destroyed when the depression struck. People had no confidence that the government, now under the presidency of Paul Von Hindenburg, would be able to resolve the crisis. To make matters worse the government was distracted from addressing the crisis by the untimely re-emergence of the issue of reparations. Young Plan, suggested a new scheme of payment. Germany would continue to pay
war reparations although the overall amount they would have to pay was reduced. Right-wing advocates saw it as yet another betrayal by the republic, by agreeing to pay money for a war that Germany was not to blame for

Question 24

How many votes did the Nazi Party win after Bruning had Hindenburg dissolve the Parliament ?

Answer 24

The Nazi Party won 18% of the total vote, marking an astonishing increase from their previous 2.6% and establishing them as a formidable political party in the Reichstag

Question 25

Due to reelections in July 1932 how many votes did the Nazi Party win ?

Answer 25

Nazi Party that had emerged from the election as the most powerful party in the Reichstag, winning 37% of the votes. Majority had instead voted for extremist parties that wanted some other, new form of government to take over. In this way it can be seen that the German people rejected democracy as a form of gov, looking instead for a stronger more decisive form of leadership. Hitler therefore joined a coalition with the former biggest right wing party the DNVP.