Well we just began to learn about the various issues and social problems with the German confederation and many thoughts crossed my mind. During our lectures, discussions, and readings I’ve been very interested in how the people of these areas must have perceived the events unfolding around them. The more we have learned of their social structure has only served to interest me further.
The beliefs of the various groups (i.e. conservatives, liberals, etc.) were very interesting to me not because of how they conflicted, but because of how the groups seemed to cancel one another out on nearly every issue that was presented. Something about our country’s governmental structure (keeping the obvious differences in mind) is that regardless of what group you may belong to, your voice must usually be at least acknowledged. The various complaints of one group against the government structure, be it conservative or liberal, is not only acknowledged in many cases but acted on.
Forgive me for being scattered, but it’s been a long 7 days and I’m doing my best to form coherent thoughts. It seemed to me throughout the various readings that governments did so much to avoid uprisings or the loss of power that they not only prevented any progress from occurring, but also managed to force regression. As time passed in the German states, the balance of power (along with progression) went wildly up and down like a came of Chutes and Ladders.
Then again, who am I to say that this isn’t just how progress is made? A continual back and forth that leaves one hoping that the scale will eventually tilt towards the betterment of the society. I understand that in many cases throughout history progress has been hampered or altogether stopped because a monarch refuses to give up power. What amazes me about the German timeline, however, is that the different groups seemed to be more of a hindrance to progress that many of the monarchs. Instead of little advancements being made here and there over the course of time, each group stood in the way of good that could be done in order to make their own version of “good” while the monarch of the time, for fear of losing his power, scrambled around to keep everyone at bay. This of course just made everyone unhappy and created more issues for the people to argue about.
As frantic and aimless as my thought process may be in this first blog (please continue to bear with me), my central aim in this rambling is to express how baffled I became with how every group down to the smallest role in German history was so concerned with their own power, wellbeing, survival, etc. that it seemed the only thing that had been accomplished was a complete standstill among the groups, monarch, and lower classes.
But hey, this is why we have uprisings and revolution! Whenever everything gets just a bit too far off base, we just shake it up and seem to start from scratch with glorious and inspired goals. I suppose that’s how the German countries made the tiny bits of progress that they did. One turn up the tall ladder, another down the short slide, and then eventually you find yourself in a better position.Let’s hope my rambling in the future finds more interesting targets, shall we?
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Your comments about how the different social groups seem to be out for themselves plays into some larger debates about German history. To paraphrase a complicated debate, there is a school of thought that argues that because the German middle classes failed to have a successful revolution in 1848 and failed to break the power of the aristocracy, they laid the groundwork for the emergence of Nazism. Some historians argue that rather than defeating the aristocracy, the German bourgeoisie mimicked their values and became more feudalistic rather than liberal. I will be curious to see what you think when we talk about this question in class next week.
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