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State Autonomy or Class Domination: Approaches to Administrative Politics in Wilhelmine Germany

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2011

Gary Bonham
Gary Bonham
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, University of California
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Extract

Despite increased interest in the political role of the state, attention is currently shifting away from the state's contribution to political development in Wilhelmine Germany. There are, however, a number of unresolved questions concerning the Wilhelmine state bureaucracy's role in German politics that make the abandonment of political analyses of the state premature. Earlier approaches to the Wilhelmine administration have argued that it was either insulated from society or subordinate to dominant social classes. Such monolithic analyses are unable to account for bureaucratic commitments to competing, substantive interests and goals as well as for administrative conflict over such commitments. This problem can be avoided through hypotheses that explain bureaucratic political behavior in terms of class, administrative structure, or ideology. These hypotheses may be of general use for future research on administrative politics in other societies as well as in Wilhelmine Germany.

Type
Review Articles
Information
World Politics , Volume 35 , Issue 4 , July 1983 , pp. 631 - 651
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 1983

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References

1 This perspective is clearly stated in Evans's Introduction. For a similar view, see Eley, Geoff, Reshaping the German Right (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980), 1–16.Google Scholar

2 See Hintze, , “Das monarchische Prinzip und die konstitutionelle Verfassung” [The Monarchical Principle and Constitutional Government], in Hintze, Otto, Staat und Verfassung [State and Constitution] (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1962)Google Scholar; originally published in 1911. On the position of the conservative academic reformers, see Lindenlaub, Dieter, Richtungskämpfe im Verein für Sozialpolitik [Programmatic Conflicts in the Association for Social Policy] (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1967), 239Google Scholar, 242–45, 394, 408–9.

3 Hintze, , Der Beamtenstand [Officialdom] (Leipzig: Verlag B.G. Teubner, 1911), esp. 10, 15–16Google Scholar, 45–46.

4 See Schmoller, Gustav, “Graf Posadowsky als Sozialpolitiker” [Count Posadowsky as a Social Reformer], in Schmoller, , Zwanzig Jahre deutscher Politic (1897–1917) [Twenty Years of German Politics (1897–1917)] (Munich: Duncker & Humblot, 1920), 59–60Google Scholar; originally published in 1909. Also Hintze, Otto, “Das Verfassungsleben der heutigen Kulturstaaten” [The Constitutional Life of Contemporary Civilized States], in Hintze, (fn. 2), 401–5Google Scholar; originally published in 1914.

5 Actually, these views were mainly expressed in his political writings after World War I. In his earlier political essays of the 1890s, Weber stressed the close connections between bureaucrats and the landed nobility. For more details on Weber's two views of the bureaucracy, see Bonham, Gary, “Bureaucratic Modernizers and Traditional Constraints: Higher Officials and the Landed Nobility in Wilhelmine Germany, 1890–1914,” Ph.D. diss. (Department of Political Science, University of California, Berkeley, forthcoming).Google Scholar

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7 See, for example, Dahrendorf, Ralf, Society and Democracy in Germany (Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, 1967)Google Scholar, esp. chaps. 3, 4, and 13.

8 The contrast between this class-based view and the older views stressing a political-administrative elite that was separated from society has been most clearly stated in a series of three articles by Barraclough, Geoffrey, in New York Review of Books 19, October 19, 1972, pp. 37–43Google Scholar; November 2, 1972, pp. 32–38; and November 16, 1972, pp. 25–31.

9 This “new” view has long been familiar to American social scientists. Scholars such as Alexander Gerschenkron and Hans Rosenberg have argued since the 1940s that the Junkers were able to use their political power through an alliance of “rye and iron” to maintain their economic and social position and to prevent democratization. See, for example, Gerschenkron, , Bread and Democracy in Germany (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1943), esp. 24–25Google Scholar, 45, 55–57, 65–67; and Rosenberg, Hans, “Political and Social Consequences of the Great Depression of 1873–1896 in Central Europe,” in Sheehan, James J., ed., Imperial Germany (New York: New Viewpoints, 1976), esp. 42–52Google Scholar; based on a paper dated 1940.

10 For a discussion of the vast amount of literature associated with this school of thought, see Geoff Eley (fn. 1), esp. 1–8; Eley, , “Capitalism and the Wilhelmine State: Industrial Growth and Political Backwardness in Recent German Historiography,” Historical Journal 21 (No. 3, 1978), 737–50CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Eley, , “Recent Work in Modern German History,” Historical Journal 23 (No. 2, 1980), 463–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11 See the recently published English version of Kehr's major work dating from 1930, Battleship Building and Party Politics in Germany 1894–1901, esp. 334–47. See also his articles which originally appeared in 1927–1928, and have now been published in English as Economic Interest, Militarism, and Foreign Policy: “Anglophobia and Weltpolitik,” esp. 22–49; “The Genesis of the Prussian Bureaucracy and the Rechtsstaat,” esp. 160; and “The Social System of Reaction under the Puttkamer Ministry,” esp. 109–31.

12 Böhme, , Deutschlands Weg zur Grossmacht ‘Germany's Path to Becoming a World Power’ (Cologne: Kiepenheuer & Witsch, 1966), 420, 580–84.Google Scholar

13 Wehler, , Das deutsche Kaiserreich [The German Empire] (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1975), 46–47Google Scholar, 53–54.

14 This term was originally applied to followers of Kehr's approach in Mommsen, Wolfgang J., “Domestic Factors in German Foreign Policy before 1914,” Central European History 6 (March 1973), 3–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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16 Wehler (fn. 13), 78–80, 90–94.

17 Puhle, Hans-Jürgen, “Zur Legende von der ‘Kehrschen Schule’“[On the Legend of the “Kehr School”], Geschichte und Gesellschaft 4 (No. 1, 1978), 108–19.Google Scholar

18 This argument is strongest in Berghahn, Volker R., “Flottenrüstung und Machtgefüge” [Naval Armaments and Power Structure], in Stürmer, Michael, ed., Das kaiserliche Deutsch-land [Imperial Germany] (Kronberg: Athenaeum-Verlag, 1977), 378–96Google Scholar; Witt, Peter-Christian, “Innenpolitik und Imperialismus in der Vorgeschichte des 1. Weltkrieges” [Domestic Politics and Imperialism Preceding World War I], in Hall, Karl and List, Günther, eds., Liberalismus und imperialistischer Staat [Liberalism and the Imperialist State] (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1975), 7–34Google Scholar; Sheehan, James J., “Conflict and Cohesion among German Elites in the Nineteenth Century,” in Sheehan (fn. 9), 77–84Google Scholar; Wehler (fn. 13), 11–18, 227–39.

19 See Witt (fn. 18), throughout, and Berghahn (fn. 18), throughout.

20 For the argument concerning authoritarian continuity, see esp. Fischer, Fritz, War of Illusions (London: Chatto & Windus, 1975), viii, 8–22Google Scholar; Fischer, , Bündnis der Eliten [Alliance of the Elites] (Düsseldorf: Droste Verlag, 1979), 11–17Google Scholar, 28–29, 63–65, 72–74, 93; Stegmann (fn. 15), 519ff.; and even Puhle, Hans-Jürgen, “Parlament, Parteien und Interessenverbände 1890–1914” [Parliament, Parties and Interest Groups 1890–1914], in Stürmer (fn. 18)Google Scholar, throughout.

21 As James Sheehan has noted in contrasting Kehr with Hintze, the former's “point of departure was not the transcendence of the state over society, but rather the deep involvement of the bureaucracy in the defense of certain socio-economic interests against the forces of social and political democratization.” Sheehan, , “The Primacy of Domestic Politics: Eckart Kehr's Essays on Modern German History,” Central European History 1 (June 1968), 168.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

22 The following discussion will also include authors not normally considered to be Kehrites, but whose views—especially concerning the partisan role of the bureaucracy—agree with the Kehrite perspective.

23 Gillis also maintains that generational conflict declined as a result of “bureaucratic modernization”—that is, as bureaucratic functions became increasingly specific and the expectations of administrators stabilized, thereby reducing the potential for frustration and conflict (pp. 195–96).

24 Gillis, John R., “Aristocracy and Bureaucracy in Nineteenth-Century Prussia,” Past & Present, No. 41 (December 1968), 127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar A more extreme position is taken by John A. Armstrong, who argues that officials were “assimilated into the aristocracy” and adopted the latter's “antimaterialistic” values opposed to “developmental interventionism” and entrepreneurial profit making. Armstrong, , The European Administrative Elite (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973), esp. 77–83Google Scholar, 284–86, 300–301.

25 On the purge of the judicial administration, see Kehr, , “The Social System …” (fn. 11)Google Scholar, throughout; and Wehler (fn. 13), 72–78. On the purge of the ministerial bureaucracy, see Böhme (fn. 12), 451ff.

26 Ullmann, , Der Bund der Industriellen [The Federation of Industrialists] (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1976), 110–111CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 117, 120.

27 For this argument, see Schücking, Lothar Engelbert, Die Reaktion in der inneren Verwaltung Preussens [Reactionary Forces in the Domestic Administration of Prussia] (Berlin: Buchverlag der “Hilfe,” 1908), 31–34Google Scholar, 46–47; Kehr, , “The Social System …” (fn. 11), 113–17Google Scholar; and Wehler (fn. 13), 76.

28 See Röhl, John C. G., “Higher Civil Servants in Germany, 1890–1900,” in Sheehan (fn. 9), 130–33Google Scholar; and Sheehan (fn. 18), 72–74. Fritz Hartung cites complaints about the bureaucrats' ignorance of socioeconomic issues, and especially of the needs of industry, as early as the 1840s. See his “Studien zur Geschichte der preussichen Verwaltung” [Studies on the History of the Prussian Administration], in Hartung, , Staatsbildende Kräfte der Neuzeit [State-Building Forces of Modern Times] (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1961), 244–45Google Scholar; originally published in the 1940s.

29 An implicit contrast between early 19th-century bureaucrats who were politically active and reformist and late 19th-century bureaucrats who were pliable and used by conservative interests is apparently the basis of Gillis's argument that Wilhelmine bureaucrats were “politically inert”: they were inert insofar as they no longer assumed an active reformist role. His discussion becomes confusing, however, when he simultaneously maintains that they were politically partisan. See The Prussian Bureaucracy in Crisis, pp. 2i5ff.

30 The argument that bureaucrats became partisan tools of conservative interests by means of executive political controls curtailing independent bureaucratic activity has been made most clearly by Hartung (fn. 28), 251ff. He also suggests a continuity in German bureaucratic partisanship (in contrast to bureaucratic political neutrality in England) which became most pronounced under the Nazis. For information on the specific political controls used to constrain the bureaucracy in the 19th century, see Horn, Hannelore, Der Kampf um den Bau des Mittellandkanals [The Struggle over the Construction of the Mittelland Canal] (Cologne: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1964), 64–69Google Scholar, 75–79.

31 Eley (fn. 10, 1978), 743; emphasis in original. For the Leninist view from the Federal Republic, see Machtan, Lothar and Milles, Dietrich, Die Klassensymbiose von Junkertum und Bourgeoisie [Class Symbiosis of Junkerdom and Bourgeoise] (Frankfurt: Ullstein, 1980), esp. 8–14.Google Scholar For the East German version of this approach, see Baudis, Dieter and Nussbaum, Helga, Wirtschaft & Staat in Deutschland vom Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts bis 1918/19 [Economy and State in Germany from the End of the 19th Century until 1918/19] (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1978), esp. 3–50.Google Scholar

32 Calleo, in fact, fails to see any national political differences: “I wonder if Imperial Germany's political system was, in truth, so radically different from those of Britain and France” (p. 59).

33 Witt, , “Der preussische Landrat als Steuerbeamter 1891–1918” [The Prussian Landrat as Tax Assessor 1891–1918], in Geiss, Imanuel and Wendt, Bernd Jürgen, eds., Deutschland in der Weltpolitik des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts [Germany in the International Politics of the 19th and 20th Centuries] (Düsseldorf: Bertelsmann Universitätsverlag, 1973), 206.Google Scholar For discussions of the class origins of bureaucrats, see Wehler (fn. 13), 76; Sheehan (fn. 18), 120; and Witt (fn. 18), 13.

34 Muncy, , The Junker in the Prussian Administration under William II, 1888–1914 (New York: Howard Fertig, 1970), 58Google Scholar, 81, 111–13, 224–26; originally published in 1944.

35 Ullmann (fn. 26), 117.

36 Forbes, , “Social Imperialism and Wilhelmine Germany,” Historical Journal 22 (No. 2, 1979). 340.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

37 See Jacob, , German Administration Since Bismarck (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1963), esp. 35, 63–64Google Scholar; and Rohl, , Germany Without Bismarck (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967), esp. 147, 241–46Google Scholar, 271ff. Although Gillis discusses rank and functional differences as bases for conflict within the Prussian bureaucracy in the 1840s, he sees such conflict as mainly a result of incomplete “bureaucratic modernization” (e.g., functional diffuseness). By the Wilhelmine period, bureaucratic modernity had ostensibly been achieved, and thus the basis for internal conflict was removed. Cf. fn. 23.

38 See, for example, Witt (fn. 33); also Duggan, Paul Robert, “Currents of Administrative Reform in Germany, 1907–1918,” Ph.D. diss. (Department of History, Harvard University, 1968).Google Scholar

39 See Mommsen (fn. 14), 27ff.; Witt (fn. 18),17ff.; and Berghahn, Volker R., “Politik und Gesellschaft im Wilhelminischen Deutschland” [Politics and Society in Wilhelmine Germany], Neue politische Literatur 24 (No. 2, 1979), 167–73.Google Scholar

40 On the state's intervention to promote economic growth, see Wehler, Hans-Ulrich, “Der Aufstieg des organisierten Kapitalismus und Interventionsstaates in Deutschland” [The Rise of Organized Capitalism and the Interventionist State in Germany], in Winkler, Heinrich August, ed., Organisierter Kapitalismus. Voraussetzungen und Anfange [Organized Capitalism. Preconditions and Beginnings] (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1974), 36–57CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kocka, Jürgen, “Vorindustrielle Faktoren in der deutschen Industrialisierung” [Preindustrial Factors in German Industrialization], in Stürmer (fn. 18), 265–68Google Scholar; and Puhle, Hans-Jürgen, “Vom Wohlfahrtsausschuss zum Wohlfahrtsstaat” [From the Welfare Committee to the Welfare State], in Ritter, Gerhard A., ed., Vom Wohlfahrtsausschuss zum Wohlfahrtsstaat (Cologne: Markus Verlag, 1973), 41–44.Google Scholar On social and economic “revolution from above” in a comparative context, see Moore, Barrington Jr, Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy (Boston: Beacon Press, 1967), esp. 253, 418–42Google Scholar, and Landes, David S., “Japan and Europe: Contrasts in Industrialization,” in Lockwood, William W., ed., The State and Economic Enterprise in Japan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965), esp. 174–82.Google Scholar All these works stress the state's commitments both to industrialization and to the Junkers, while minimizing possible conflicting imperatives for officials. Needless to say, they also disagree with Armstrong's extreme position that the German state was anti-interventionist.

41 Bonham (fn. 5) examines bureaucratic conflicts over the following policies of interest to dominant elites: the Caprivi tariff treaties, the Mittelland canal bill, the Bülow tariff, and the Imperial finance reform of 1908/09.