Max Julius Friedrich Brauer (3 September 1887 – 2 February 1973) was a German politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the first elected First Mayor of Hamburg after World War II.

[1] On 16 October 1949, the second Hamburg Parliament election [de] took place where Brauer's party, the SPD, received 65 of the 120 seats.

His new Hamburg government ("Senat Brauer II [de]") started February 1950.

Brauer had promised to Paul Nevermann (born 1902) that he would transfer power to him before the end of the term.

He was not a candidate for the next federal election in 1965; his successor in his electoral ward Hans Apel (1932–2011) became an important SPD politician and minister (finance, defence).