Learn about the establishment of the Weimar Republic government and the fall of the Weimar Republic. Analyze what were its strengths and weaknesses.
Updated: 11/21/2023
Weimar Republic History, Definition & Fall
Table of Contents
- What Was the Weimar Republic?
- Weimar Republic Government: Background and Context
- Weimar Republic Government: History
- Characteristics of the Weimar Republic Government
- The Significance of the Fall of the Weimar Republic Government
- Lesson Summary
Frequently Asked Questions
When was the Weimar Republic formed?
The Weimar Republic was formed in 1918 and 1919 after World War 1 ended and the German Empire was crumbling. Some German politicians wanted to establish a democratic government modeled after the countries which were victorious in the war.
Why was Germany called the Weimar Republic?
Germany was called the Weimar Republic because Weimar is the city where the constitution was drafted. This was the first democratic government in Germany and so the name was an attempt to show Germany was in a new chapter.
Who was the last leader of the Weimar Republic?
The last leader of the Weimar Republic was President Hindenburg. Once he died in 1934, Hitler was able to completely consolidate power and this ended the Weimar Republic.
What was the Weimar Republic blamed for?
The Weimar Republic was blamed by Hitler for accepting the Treaty of Versailles. This treaty harmed the German economy and, once the Great Depression hit, it was easy for Hitler to gain support by suggesting the treaty should be ignored.
What type of government was the Weimar Republic in Germany?
The Weimar Republic was a parliamentary democracy. This meant that the government had one democratic legislative body and one body appointed by the German states. This was the first time German people could vote for their leaders.
What is the Weimar Republic and why did it fail?
The Weimar Republic was the country that was established after the German Empire crumbled when it lost World War I. It failed largely due to the Treaty of Versailles and the harsh terms placed on Germany.
Table of Contents
- What Was the Weimar Republic?
- Weimar Republic Government: Background and Context
- Weimar Republic Government: History
- Characteristics of the Weimar Republic Government
- The Significance of the Fall of the Weimar Republic Government
- Lesson Summary
The Weimar Republic was the government established in Germany after the end of World War I. By the early 1900s, the German country Prussia had united many of the German-speaking peoples into a single country, the German Empire. However, because the country lost in World War I and because of its actions during the war, the victors decided they wanted to completely dissolve this government and have the Germans create a new one founded on democratic principles.
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The Weimar Republic is defined as the area that the German area occupied, minus some regions which were given to bordering nations to weaken the new nation. The goals of this republic were to re-establish order in Germany, create a democratic tradition in the region, and rebuild the country's economy. The period following the end of World War I was a time of chaos in Germany. The German Emperor left the throne and a constitution was drafted in the city of Weimar, marking the beginning of the German Republic.
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The Weimar Republic's government was modeled around ideas of democracy because, after World War I, it was clear that the world was democratizing. All of the countries that won in this war were democratic nations, which only bolstered the idea that this form of government strengthened a country. Germany had only united in the 1870s and so was still a relatively new political entity. Regardless, in 1919 the Weimar Republic was established and relied on representative democracy, similar to the way people are represented in the United Kingdom.
The German Empire and World War One
The German Empire was founded in 1871 as the result of Prussia rapidly expanding. This was made possible through advanced military tactics and strategic decisions made by the Prussian general Otto von Bismarck. Germany had never been unified like this before; however, once unification was achieved, German leaders wanted to compete around the world just as other European countries did. During the late 1800s, European nations were scrambling to subjugate the continent of Africa and all other regions not already claimed. Because the German Empire was late to form, Bismarck tried to quickly seize as much land as possible.
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By the beginning of the 20th century, the German emperor was still concerned with competing with the rest of Europe. When World War I began, Germany joined on the side of the Austrians in order to maximize its influence in Western Europe. The main example of this was the German involvement in Belgium. The border between Germany and France was so well defended that the German emperor Kaiser Wilhelm II decided to conquer Belgium in order to gain easier access to France. During the period of German occupation, much of the Belgian farmland was destroyed and millions of Belgians were starving as a result. The Germans refused to feed them and the British refused to let ships through to provide food relief. Eventually, the future American president Herbert Hoover was able to broker a deal between these countries and send food to Belgium since the German government refused to help.
Actions such as this encouraged the victors at the end of the war to place severe restrictions on the new German country.
The Treaty of Versailles
World War I had led to the death of millions of people. Trench warfare led to many deaths and a high number of injuries, especially on the Western Front. While this war was the result of the actions of numerous countries and could not be blamed solely on a single country, with the Treaty of Versailles the victors decided Germany would pay for its role in the war. The Treaty of Versailles dictated how the war was going to end, what the victors would get, and how the losers were going to pay. The other members of the Central Powers were Austria and the Ottoman Empire, which both suffered due to this treaty; however, Germany was the main target of this treaty. Because German leaders like Bismarck had been so ambitious and aggressive decades earlier, it was thought that this was simply an extension of the desire of Germany to control as much territory as possible. Regardless of the German leaders' motives for joining the war or how much blame the country deserved, this treaty restricted the country, limited its economic growth, and made Germans resentful towards Western Europe.
The Treaty of Versailles had several aspects which directly impacted the new Weimer Republic:
- Germany could only have a small standing military.
- The German border with France could not be militarized.
- Germany was required to pay reparations totaling around $44 billion dollars in 1920 money, which is over $600 billion today.
The limitations on the military made German citizens resentful towards the victors. However, the massive reparations were seen by most as unnecessarily excessive, even by some in the United States like President Woodrow Wilson and future president Herbert Hoover. Reparations are payments required by the winner of the war from the loser to pay for damage done and the cost of fighting. This large amount of money (scheduled to be paid out over decades) severely limited the ability of the Weimer Republic to succeed as a country.
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The Weimar Republic's government had a bicameral legislature with one house elected by citizens and another with representatives appointed by German states. This republic also had a president and a chancellor who both led the country and shared many of the powers the American president has. However, unlike other countries, the new German president and legislature had to navigate the fledgling country through this chaotic period and decide how they would achieve the goals of the Weimar Republic in spite of the Treaty of Versailles.
The Establishment of the Weimar Republic
On November 9, 1918, the Weimar Republic was announced as the successor to the German Empire after the German emperor abdicated the throne. After the initial years of chaos, German politicians were able to guide the Weimar Republic into a short period of prosperity. While the German government did not originally want to approve the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, politicians recognized it was their only choice. By the second half of the 1920s, the country was managing to make reparation payments and grow the economy.
Some of the major political figures during this period were:
- Frederich Ebert, president from 1919-1925
- Paul von Hindenburg, president from 1925-1934 and a prominent general
- Philipp Scheidemann, chancellor of Germany in 1919, resigned in protest of the Treaty of Versailles
The most significant action the Weimar government pursued was creating the Dawes Plan. Germany began to experience a period of hyperinflation after the government decided to print large amounts of money to pay back the war reparations. This caused the German currency to become worthless. The Dawes Plan slowed the reparation payments and gave the country the economic space needed to begin to grow again.
The Weimar Republic During the Great Depression
The Weimer Republic failed largely due to the Great Depression coupled with the Treaty of Versailles. Once the Wall Street stock market collapsed and the Great Depression began, the international flow of money was disrupted. During World War I, France and Great Britain had taken out loans from the United States in order to pay for the cost of war. Additionally, by the 1920s the United States was loaning the Weimer Republic money in order to pay its reparations to France and Great Britain. These reparation payments were, in turn, being used by France and Great Britain to pay back the money it owed the U.S. This cycle of money was sustainable until the Great Depression when none of these countries had any money to spare and needed to use it to revive the domestic economy.
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During this period, the leader of the National Socialist German Workers' (Nazi) Party, Adolf Hitler, ran for office to become chancellor of Germany. He was appointed to the chancellor position because his message was compelling to many German citizens who were suffering from economic collapse. Hitler said:
"The treaty was made in order to bring twenty million Germans to their deaths, and to ruin the German nation...." - Hitler, 1923
Hitler had been spreading this message for many years; however, once unemployment skyrocketed and France and Great Britain were demanding repayments, this message resonated more than ever. This is how he came to become chancellor of Germany in 1933.
Fall of the Weimar Republic
The fall of the Weimar Republic centers around the ascent of Adolf Hitler. Once he came to power in 1933 as chancellor, Hitler was able to convince the German government and a majority of the country that the only way to respond to the economic crisis was to consolidate power in a single person, him. Several other countries responded to the Great Depression in this way; however, for the Weimar Republic, it was difficult for politicians to argue that the Treaty of Versailles was good for the German economy. During this period of economic depression, Hitler's message convinced so many that by 1934 he was able to declare that the Nazi Party was the only party in Germany. He did this once the German president Hindenburg died, effectively ending the Weimar Republic.
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The Weimar Republic's government was a genuine attempt by German politicians to create a democratic nation in the wake of World War I. This government had many good features. However, several weaknesses existed which made the destruction of this government nearly inevitable.
Weaknesses of the Weimar Republic
The weaknesses of the Weimar Republic surrounding the signing of the Treaty of Versailles include:
- This democratic republic was never united behind a single view of the Treaty of Versailles, so the government was susceptible to nationalistic leaders who called for the destruction of the agreement.
- The economy was never going to be prosperous for decades because of the repreparation payments.
- There was no democratic tradition anywhere in Germany, so many German people did not desire this form of government. After seeing how Bismarck was able to bring Germany to global prominence, they were inclined to think that powerful leaders could do more good for the country.
Strengths of the Weimar Republic
The Weimar Republic also had several strengths which, had it not been for the Great Depression, could have enabled the government to succeed.
- It granted more individual freedoms than had existed in the German Empire.
- The republic practiced effective democracy, which could have convinced German citizens it was valuable.
- It was able to respond to economic issues strategically and restructured the currency in the 1920s to help grow the economy.
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While the Weimar Republic's government had several strengths, Adolf Hitler was able to leverage the weaknesses of the country to his advantage. The fall of the Weimar Republic was directly the result of the harsh measures of the Treaty of Versailles. These allowed nationalistic leaders like Hitler to convince Germans that the solution to their problems was to militarize and expand Germany once again.
The rise of Nazi Germany likely could have been avoided by making the Treaty of Versailles less harsh; however, at the time the leaders of the victorious countries wanted to ensure Germany could never engage in a war like World War I again. Despite the temporary success of the Weimar Republic, the goals of both the Treaty of Versailles and the democratic government failed once Hitler consolidated power and created Nazi Germany.
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The Weimar Republic was a democratic German government that was ultimately ineffective because of its crippling war debt and political instability. The Treaty of Versailles required Germany to pay war reparations and, in the early 1920s, the Weimar Republic began printing large amounts of money to pay its debt. This, however, made the currency worthless. The Dawes Plan restructured the German currency and gave the republic the space it needed to grow economically before continuing payments.
These operations continued until 1929, when the Wall Street stock market collapsed, leading to the Great Depression . This spurred foreign countries to stop lending Germany money. During this period, Adolf Hitler was able to rise from political obscurity and become chancellor of Germany. Eventually, he was able to declare that the Nazi Party was the only party in the country because he was able to convince enough Germans he would reverse the Treaty of Versailles. Most people agreed that the treaty was the root cause of Germany's economic issues.
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Video Transcript
Weimar Germany
Often in history, periods and figures can get lost in the shuffle, especially if they are surrounded by even larger and more important events. Perhaps there is no better example of this than the Weimar Republic in Germany, which lasted from 1919 to 1933. Bookended by World War I and the rise of the Nazis and World War II, this lesson examines that curious time in Germany between the two most momentous wars of the previous century.
Background and Early Republic
Prior to World War I, Germany had been a relatively democratic federal republic, ruled by a triumvirate of the Kaiser, the Bundesrat, and an Imperial Diet that was elected via universal male suffrage. Unfortunately, defeat in World War I in 1918 and the terms imposed upon the German Empire by the victorious allies caused economic hardship in Germany and soon after, the collapse of the government.
For example, in order to pay the massive debt the allies imposed upon the German government, the German government resolved to simply print more money. This caused rampant hyperinflation, which made the German currency, the Deutschmark, virtually worthless, and horror stories emerged of men and women carrying wheelbarrows full of money to the store to simply buy a loaf of bread.
In the midst of the chaos, several factions vied for political power. For example, a strong communist movement named the Spartacists controlled Berlin, forcing the centrist German nationalists to declare the German Republic in Weimar, Germany, hence giving the period and the republic its name. The institution of the Weimar Republic in 1919 intended to create the best democracy possible in Germany.
It gave both men and women over the age of 20 the right to vote on a president and a representative assembly, named the Reichstag. Unfortunately, the nature of the voting system made the Reichstag home to an enormous number of political parties and platforms and very little could actually be achieved as a result. By 1923 Weimar Germany was nearing total collapse, as economic problems and rival political guerrilla movements persisted, all the while Germany's new democracy proved unable to achieve anything of substance.
Successes
In 1923, however, several events coalesced to give Weimar Germany its most prosperous period. In 1923, the German statesmen Gustav Stresemann amalgamated many of the centrist parties within the Reichstag to form the Great Coalition. Though the Coalition lasted less than a year, it was able to finally achieve several positive reforms to help the ailing German people and economy, including providing government funds to help the unemployed pay their bills and find new jobs. Unfortunately for Stresemann and Germany, the coalition was short-lived and the Reichstag returned to its prior intransigence soon after the Coalition collapsed.
While Stresemann could do his best to achieve reform in the Reichstag, there was little he could do about Germany's crippling war debt and the resultant economic problems. This required outside financial assistance, which Germany found in 1923 through Charles Dawes and the United States. Dawes was Director of the U.S. Bureau of the Budget, and after President Herbert Hoover appointed Dawes to the Allied Reparations Committee, he formulated a plan to help the ailing nation.
The program, now known as the Dawes Plan, aimed to help boost the German economy. Through his position on the committee Dawes called for Germany to recall the old Deutschmarks, burn the currency, and essentially start their monetary system from scratch. Additionally, he got allied governments to agree to lend approximately 200 million dollars to the German government, and also give Germany a longer period of time to repay its debt. The plan allowed the German economy to get back on its feet and gave the German government some breathing space when it came to reparation payments.
Failure and Nazism
The successes of the Dawes Plan, however, were short-lived. It soon became apparent that the German economy depended entirely on infusions of cash from foreign governments. In 1929, shortly after the death of Stresemann, the Wall Street market collapse caused economic ruin throughout the Western world, but most significantly at the collapse's epicenter, the United States. The U.S. had been Germany's largest loaner in the 1920s, and after the market collapse the U.S. government and private banks could not afford to lend money to Germany.
With the constant infusions of foreign cash removed, the fragile German economy unraveled. Factories shut down and workers were laid off by the thousands, unemployment soaring to over six million by January 1933. Indeed, many of the same problems which Weimar Germany had faced in its infancy cropped up again, and Germans threw their support behind rival, extremist political factions.
In the 1930 election, only a year after the collapse of the stock market, both the Communist and Nazi parties of Germany made significant advances, each picking up over 100 seats in the Reichstag. In 1932, the Nazi party picked up even more seats and became the largest party in the German Reichstag.
With these successes at the ballot box, Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party began to consolidate power over the German government and slowly unravel the democratic practices of the Weimar Republic. The Nazi party pushed through several decrees which gave both Hitler and the presidency more power over the German government, and in July of 1933 the Weimar Republic was effectively over when the Reichstag declared the Nazi party as the only legal political party in Germany. When the German president died the following year, the office was abolished and its powers absorbed by the chancellor, Adolf Hitler.
Lesson Summary
The Weimar Republic that ruled Germany after World War I until the rise of Nazi Germany in 1933 was faced with the enormous task of simultaneously stabilizing post-war Germany and paying debilitating reparations to its former enemies. Unfortunately, its nobly democratic political system created gridlock at a time when Germany needed firm economic direction to address its problems. Weimar Germany was able to succeed for a short time, but only with constant infusions of foreign cash. When the Wall Street collapse and the ensuing Great Depression eliminated this supply, the Weimar Republic unraveled as everyday Germans flocked to political extremists who promised to solve Germany's problems - namely, Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party.
Learning Outcomes
After completing this lesson, you should be able to:
- Understand the political climate in Germany from 1919 to 1933
- Identify measures taken by the Weimar Republic in Germany
- Describe the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party
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Weimar Republic History, Definition & Fall
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