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Reasons for the collapse of the Weimar Republic up to Jan 30 1933 (1 Viewer)

Rhanoct

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Need historical debate/historians (sources would be great)

If you could pair historians with certain dot points it'd be much appreciated, but historians on their own are fine.

Ty!
 

Kujah

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Well basically, you can aim to divide the historiography into the "structuralists" and "intentionalists". Historians such as Ian Kershaw, Alan Bullock, AJP Taylor and Joachim Fest would be useful. From my essay, I used:

Article 48 and the Constitution: The Article "provided the enemies of the constitution with a deadly flaw which could be used to squeeze the life out of the Republic. Article 48 is rightly called the “suicide clause”’- (Synder, L. 1966, The Weimar Republic, Corkery and Stone London p 14-5)

Rising success of the Nazi party and the role of Hitler Here is where the debate between the intentionalists and structuralists is most prevalent. The intentionalists believe that Hitler was at the centre of the regime and everything revoled around him (eg- Alan Bullock, Joachim Fest, Kershaw, Bracher, Hildebrand). The structuralists, on the other hand, believe that the structure of the Nazi state was more significant and essentially, Hitler was a "weak" dictator (eg- Broszat, Mommsen).

Hitler “symbolised the various facets of Nazism which they [the people] found appealing”. ( Mason, K.J. 2003, Republic to Reich: A History of Germany 1918-1945, McGraw-Hill Australia, Australia p98)

The attitudes of the German population and conservatives towards the Weimar Republic: The link of humiliation and shame on the Republic due to the signing of the ToV is summed up by Kurt Sontheimer, who wrote that “The German democracy of Weimar was a product of defeat and always, even unjustly, associated with defeat.” (Synder, L. 1966, The Weimar Republic, Corkery and Stone London p 14-5)

He also wrote “How can a democracy exist without democrats?” (Sontheimer, K. 1973, Upheaval and Continuity, Corkery and Stone London p 101).

For the economic problem, you could use Stresemann's quote: "Germany is dancing on a volcano. If the short term credits are called in, a large section of our economy would collapse.”
 

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