History of Germany

In January 1933, Adolf Hitler, leader of the Nazi Party, used the economic hardships of the Great Depression along with popular resentment over the terms imposed on Germany at the end of World War I to establish a totalitarian regime.

[63] The Merovingians placed the various regions of their Frankish Empire under the control of semi-autonomous dukes – either Franks or local rulers,[64] and followed imperial Roman strategic traditions of social and political integration of the newly conquered territories.

[69] The Catholic Franks, who by 750 controlled a vast territory in Gaul, north-western Germany, Swabia, Burgundy and western Switzerland, that included the alpine passes allied with the Curia in Rome against the Lombards, who posed a permanent threat to the Holy See.

During the reign of Conrad II's son, Henry III (1039 to 1056), the empire supported the Cluniac reforms of the Church, the Peace of God, prohibition of simony (the purchase of clerical offices), and required celibacy of priests.

[90] Beginning with an agreement of the cities of Lübeck and Hamburg, guilds cooperated in order to strengthen and combine their economic assets, like securing trading routes and tax privileges, to control prices and better protect and market their local commodities.

[109][110] The failure of negotiations between Emperor Louis IV and the papacy led to the 1338 Declaration at Rhense by six princes of the Imperial Estate to the effect that election by all or the majority of the electors automatically conferred the royal title and rule over the empire, without papal confirmation.

[119] Benedictine abbess Hildegard von Bingen wrote several influential theological, botanical, and medicinal texts, as well as letters, liturgical songs, poems, and arguably the oldest surviving morality play, Ordo Virtutum, while supervising brilliant miniature Illuminations.

[135] From 1438 the Habsburg dynasty, who had acquired control in the south-eastern empire over the Duchy of Austria, Bohemia and Hungary after the death of King Louis II in 1526, managed to permanently occupy the position of the Holy Roman Emperor until 1806 (with the exception of the years between 1742 and 1745).

Although perhaps not Luther's chief concern, he received popular support for his condemnation of the sale of indulgences and clerical offices, the pope's and higher clergy's abuse of power and his doubts of the very idea of the institution of the Church and the papacy.

The ideas of the reformation spread rapidly, as the new technology of the modern printing press ensured cheap mass copies and distribution of the theses and helped by the Emperor Charles V's wars with France and the Turks.

Although occasionally assisted by war-experienced noblemen like Götz von Berlichingen and Florian Geyer (in Franconia) and the theologian Thomas Müntzer (in Thuringia), the peasant forces lacked military structure, skill, logistics and equipment and as many as 100,000 insurgents were eventually defeated and massacred by the territorial princes.

After imperial triumph at the Battle of White Mountain and a short-lived peace, the war grew to become a political European conflict by the intervention of King Christian IV of Denmark from 1625 to 1630, Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden from 1630 to 1648 and France under Cardinal Richelieu from 1635 to 1648.

[219] After the last-minute relief of Vienna from a siege and the imminent seizure by a Turkish force in 1683, the combined troops of the Holy League, that had been founded the following year, embarked on the military containment of the Ottoman Empire and reconquered Hungary in 1687.

A number of legal reforms (e.g. the abolition of torture and the emancipation of the rural population and the Jews), the reorganization of the Prussian Academy of Sciences, the introduction of compulsory education for boys and girls and promotion of religious tolerance, among others, caused rapid social and economic development.

[232] Prussia underwent major social change between the mid-17th and mid-18th centuries as the nobility declined as the traditional aristocracy struggled to compete with the rising merchant class,[233] which developed into a new Bourgeoisie middle class,[234][235][236] while the emancipation of the serfs granted the rural peasantry land purchasing rights and freedom of movement,[237] and a series of agrarian reforms in northwestern Germany abolished feudal obligations and divided up feudal land, giving rise to wealthier peasants and paved the way for a more efficient rural economy.

France took control of the Rhineland, imposed French-style reforms, abolished feudalism, established constitutions, promoted freedom of religion, emancipated Jews, opened the bureaucracy to ordinary citizens of talent, and forced the nobility to share power with the rising middle class.

Domination by France during the French Revolution (1790s to 1815), however, produced important institutional reforms, that included the abolition of feudal restrictions on the sale of large landed estates, the reduction of the power of the guilds in the cities, and the introduction of a new, more efficient commercial law.

[263] The takeoff stage of economic development came with the railroad revolution in the 1840s, which opened up new markets for local products, created a pool of middle managers, increased the demand for engineers, architects and skilled machinists and stimulated investments in coal and iron.

In opera, a new Romantic atmosphere combining supernatural terror and melodramatic plot in a folkloric context was first successfully achieved by Carl Maria von Weber and perfected by Richard Wagner in his Ring Cycle.

But the 1848 revolution turned out to be unsuccessful: King Frederick William IV of Prussia refused the imperial crown, the Frankfurt parliament was dissolved, the ruling princes repressed the risings by military force, and the German Confederation was re-established by 1850.

In sharp contrast, Jonathan Steinberg decided he was basically a traditional Prussian whose highest priorities were to reinforce the monarchy, the Army, and the social and economic dominance of his own Junker class, thereby being responsible for a tragic history after his removal in 1890.

[298][299] Bismarck further won the support of both industry and skilled workers by his high tariff policies, which protected profits and wages from American competition, although they alienated the liberal intellectuals who wanted free trade.

"[371] The Weimar Constitution established a federal semi-presidential republic with a chancellor dependent on the confidence of the Reichstag (parliament), a strong president who had considerable powers to govern by decree,[372] and a substantial set of individual rights.

The tide began to turn in December 1941, when the invasion of the Soviet Union hit determined resistance in the Battle of Moscow and Hitler declared war on the United States in the wake of the Japanese Pearl Harbor attack.

[455] He was the first chancellor (top official) of the FRG and until his death was the founder and leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), a coalition of conservatives, ordoliberals, and adherents of Protestant and Catholic social teaching that dominated West Germany politics for most of its history.

[457] Norbert Walter, a former chief economist at Deutsche Bank, argues that "Germany owes its rapid economic advance after World War II to the system of the Social Market Economy, established by Ludwig Erhard.

[469] Led by Finance Minister Otto Graf Lambsdorff the FDP adopted the market-oriented "Kiel Theses" in 1977; it rejected the Keynesian emphasis on consumer demand, and proposed to reduce social welfare spending, and try to introduce policies to stimulate production and facilitate jobs.

Otto von Habsburg's idea developed the greatest mass exodus since the construction of the Berlin Wall and it was shown that the USSR and the rulers of the Eastern European satellite states were not ready to keep the Iron Curtain effective.

[489] On 8 April 2022 just after the first two years of pandemic, Germany joined France, Italy, Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Austria, Switzerland, Greece, Turkey, and Cyprus were lifted all COVID-19 restrictions, measures, and state of emergencies up in the future.

[493] Following concerns from the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Germany announced a major shift in policy, pledging a €100 billion special fund for the Bundeswehr – to remedy years of underinvestment – along with raising the budget to above 2% GDP.