Identity And Social Norms In The Weimar Republic

Identity and social norms during the Weimar Republic had changed a lot since the start of the war. These changes were extremely necessary because of the post-war turmoil. Regardless of the negatives of the Weimar Republic, it gave people new perspectives. Paul Bookbinder agreed in his point that, “the fourteen years of the Weimar Republic were a weigh station on the road to genocide, and yet they also witnessed the struggle of many decent, sincere people to create a just and humane society in a time of great artistic creativity.” There was a significant amount of political disagreement and negative reactions from the people but that could be argued about any modern form of democratic government today. Democracy is shaped around the inclusion of every individual’s personal opinion under one leading power. It would be impossible for everyone under the Weimar Republic to agree on the same policies on all levels. The weigh station that was the Weimar Republic, which

New ideas about civil liberties were popping up everywhere. On top of it all, the recovery from World War I was a slower process than they had imagined, especially due to the pressure of the Versailles Treaty. Overseas colonies were lost. Germany basically had to rely on its own resources, the same resources that were fully depleted during the war. Payment of war reparations devastated Germany’s wore-torn economy, and the result was hyperinflation. Citizens who were taught to save their money, who were living off of pensions, or any compensation for their services in the war went bankrupt. However, Achilles also said that although “the birth of the Weimar democracy in the aftermath of war and defeat was no glorious start, it was a start nonetheless. In the poignant words of Vorwärts, the writing of the constitution marked a new beginning that confirmed once more the right of all Germans to “plant hope over graves”