Germany
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Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany (German: Bundesrepublik Deutschland, pronounced [ˈbʊndəsʁepuˌbliːk ˈdɔʏtʃlant] (
listen)),[6] is a federalparliamentary republic in western-central Europe. It includes 16 constituent states and covers an area of 357,021 square kilometres (137,847 sq mi) with a largely temperate seasonal climate. Its capital and largest city is Berlin. With 80.7 million inhabitants, Germany is the most populous member state in the European Union. After the United States, it is the second most popular migration destination in the world.[7]
Various Germanic tribes have occupied northern Germany since classical antiquity. A region named Germania was documented before 100 CE. During the Migration Period the Germanic tribes expanded southward. Beginning in the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire.[8] During the 16th century, northern German regions became the centre of the Protestant Reformation.
The rise of Pan-Germanism inside the German Confederation, which had been occupied by France, resulted in the unification of most of the German states in 1871 into the Prussian-dominated German Empire. After World War I and the German Revolution of 1918–1919, the Empire was replaced by the parliamentary Weimar Republic.The establishment of the Third Reich in 1933 eventually led to World War II and the Holocaust. After 1945 Germany lost some of its territory and evolved into two states,East Germany and West Germany. In 1990, the country was reunified.
In the 21st century, Germany is a great power and has the world's fourth-largest economy by nominal GDP and the fifth-largest by PPP. As a global leader in several industrial and technological sectors, it is both the world's third-largest exporter and importer of goods. It is a developed country with a very high standard of living, and it maintains a comprehensive social security and a universal health care system.
Germany was a founding member of the European Communities in 1957, which became the European Union in 1993. It is part of the Schengen Area, and became a co-founder of the Eurozone in 1999. Germany is a member of the United Nations, NATO, the G8, the G20, and the OECD. Known for its rich cultural history Germany has been continuously the home of influential artists, philosophers, musicians, entrepreneurs, scientists and inventors.
The Nebra sky disk is dated to c. 1600 BC.
The discovery of the Mauer 1 mandible shows that ancient humans were present in Germany at least 600,000 years ago.[11] The oldest complete hunting weapons found anywhere in the world were discovered in a coal mine in Schöningen where three 380,000 year old wooden javelins 6–7.5 feet long were unearthed.[12] The Neander Valley was the location where the first ever non-modern human fossil was discovered, the new species of human was named Neanderthal man. The Neanderthal 1 fossils are known to be 40,000 years old.
Evidence of modern humans, similarly dated, has been found in caves in the Swabian Jura near Ulm. The finds include 42,000 year old bird bone and mammoth ivory flutes which are the oldest musical instruments ever found,[13] the 40,000 year old Ice Age Lion Man which is the oldest uncontested figurative art ever discovered,[14] and the 35,000 year old Venus of Hohle Fels which is the oldest uncontested human figurative art ever discovered.[15]The Nebra sky disk is a bronze artifact created during the European Bronze Age attributed to a site near Nebra, Saxony-Anhalt. It is part of UNESCO's Memory of the World Register.[16]
Migrations in Europe (100-500 CE)
The Germanic tribes are thought to date from the Nordic Bronze Age or the Pre-Roman Iron Age. From southern Scandinavia and north Germany, they expanded south, east and west from the 1st century BCE, coming into contact with the Celtic tribes of Gaul as well as Iranian, Baltic, and Slavic tribes in Centraland Eastern Europe.[17] Under Augustus, Rome began to invade Germania (an area extending roughly from the Rhine to the Ural Mountains). In 9 CE, three Roman legions led by Varus were defeated by the Cheruscan leader Arminius. By 100 CE, when Tacitus wrote Germania, Germanic tribes had settled along the Rhine and the Danube (the Limes Germanicus), occupying most of the area of modern Germany; Austria, southern Bavaria and the western Rhineland, however, were Roman provinces.[18]
In the 3rd century a number of large West Germanic tribes emerged: Alemanni, Franks, Chatti, Saxons, Frisii, Sicambri, and Thuringii. Around 260, the Germanic peoples broke into Roman-controlled lands.[19] After the invasion of the Huns in 375, and with the decline of Rome from 395, Germanic tribes moved further south-west. Simultaneously several large tribes formed in what is now Germany and displaced the smaller Germanic tribes. Large areas (known since the Merovingian period as Austrasia) were occupied by the Franks, and Northern Germany was ruled by the Saxons and Slavs.[18]
Martin Luther (1483–1546) initiated theProtestant Reformation
For 900 years, the history of Germany was intertwined with the history of the Holy Roman Empire.[20] In 800, the Frankish king Charlemagne was crowned emperor and founded theCarolingian Empire, which was divided in 843 among his heirs.[21] The Holy Roman Empire included the eastern portion of Charlemagne's original kingdom and emerged as the strongest. Its territory stretched from the Eider River in the north to the Mediterranean coast in the south.[21]
The Ottonian emperors (919–1024) consolidated several major duchies and the German king Otto I was crowned Holy Roman Emperor of these regions in 962. In 996 Gregory V became the first German Pope, appointed by his cousin Otto III, whom he shortly after crowned Holy Roman Emperor. The Holy Roman Empire absorbed northern Italy and Burgundy under the reign of the Salian emperors (1024–1125), although the emperors lost power through the Investiture Controversy.[22]
In the 12th century, under the Hohenstaufen emperors (1138–1254), German princes increased their influence further south and east into territories inhabited by Slavs; they encouragedGerman settlement in these areas, called the eastern settlement movement (Ostsiedlung). Members of the Hanseatic League, which included mostly north German cities and towns, prospered in the expansion of trade.[23] In the south, the Greater Ravensburg Trade Corporation (Große Ravensburger Handelsgesellschaft) served a similar function. The edict of theGolden Bull in 1356 provided the basic constitutional structure of the Empire and codified the election of the emperor by seven prince-electors who ruled some of the most powerful principalities and archbishoprics.[24]
Population declined in the first half of the 14th century, starting with the Great Famine in 1315, followed by the Black Death of 1348–50.[25] Despite the decline, however, German artists, engineers, and scientists developed a wide array of techniques similar to those used by the Italian artists and designers of the time who flourished in such merchant city-states as Venice,Florence and Genoa. Artistic and cultural centers throughout the German states produced such artists as the Augsburg painters Hans Holbein and his son, and Albrecht Dürer. Johannes Gutenberg introduced moveable-type printing to Europe, a development that played a key role in the Renaissance, Reformation, the Age of Enlightenment, and the Scientific revolution, and laid the material basis for the modern knowledge-based economy and the spread of learning to the masses.[26]
The Holy Roman Empire in 1648, after the Peace of Westphalia which ended the Thirty Years' War.
In 1517, the Wittenberg monk Martin Luther publicised The Ninety-Five Theses, challenging the Roman Catholic Church and initiating the Protestant Reformation. In 1555, thePeace of Augsburg established Lutheranism as an acceptable alternative to Catholicism, but also decreed that the faith of the prince was to be the faith of his subjects, a principle called Cuius regio, eius religio. The agreement at Augsburg failed to address other religious creed: for example, the Reformed faith was still considered a heresy and the principle did not address the possible conversion of an ecclesiastic ruler, such as happened in Electorate of Cologne in 1583. From the Cologne War until the end of theThirty Years' Wars (1618–1648), religious conflict devastated German lands.[27] The latter reduced the overall population of the German states by about 30 percent, and in some places, up to 80 percent.[28] The Peace of Westphalia ended religious warfare among the German states[27] and Catholicism, Lutheranism and the Reformed faith became the official religions in many German states after 1648.[29]
In the 18th century, the Holy Roman Empire consisted of approximately 1,800 territories.[30] The elaborate legal system initiated by a series of Imperial Reforms (approximately 1450–1555) created the Imperial Estates and provided for considerable local autonomy among ecclesiastical, secular, and hereditary states, reflected in Imperial Diet. TheHouse of Habsburg held the imperial crown from 1438 until the death of Charles VI in 1740. Having no male heirs, he had convinced the Electors to retain Habsburg hegemony in the office of the emperor by agreeing to the Pragmatic Sanction. This was finally settled through a the War of Austrian Succession; in the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, Maria Theresa's husband became Holy Roman Emperor, and she ruled the Empire as Empress Consort. From 1740, dualism between the Austrian Habsburg Monarchy and theKingdom of Prussia dominated the German states in the 18th century. As a consequence of the French Revolutionary Wars, and the subsequent final meeting of the Imperial Diet, most of the secular Free Imperial Cities were annexed by dynastic territories; the ecclesiastical territories were secularized and annexed. In 1806 the Imperium was dissolved; German states, particularly the Rhineland states, fell under the influence of France. Until 1815, France, Russia, Prussia and the Habsburgs competed for hegemony in the German states as a result of the Napoleonic Wars.[31]
Foundation of the German Empirein Versailles, 1871. Bismarck is at the center in a white uniform.
King William I appointed Otto von Bismarck as the new Minister President of Prussia in 1862. Bismarck successfully concluded war on Denmark in 1864, which promotoed German interests over Danish ones in the Jutland peninsula. The subsequent (and decisive) Prussian victory in the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 enabled him to create theNorth German Confederation (Norddeutscher Bund) which excluded Austria from the federation's affairs. After the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, the German princes proclaimed the founding of the German Empire in 1871 at Versailles, uniting all scattered parts of Germany except Austria. Prussia was the dominant constituent state of the new empire; the Hohenzollern King of Prussia ruled as its concurrent Emperor, and Berlin became its capital.[33]
The German Empire (1871–1918), with the Kingdom of Prussia in blue
In the Gründerzeit period following the unification of Germany, Bismarck's foreign policy as Chancellor of Germany under Emperor William I secured Germany's position as a great nation by forging alliances, isolating France by diplomatic means, and avoiding war. At the Berlin Conference in 1884, Germany claimed several colonies including German East Africa, German South-West Africa, Togo, andCameroon.[34] Under Wilhelm II, however, Germany, like other European powers, took an imperialistic course, leading to friction with neighbouring countries. Most alliances in which Germany had previously been involved were not renewed. This resulted in creation of adual alliance with the multinational realm of Austria-Hungary, promoting at least benevolent neutrality if not outright military support. Subsequently, the Triple Alliance of 1882 included Italy, completing a Central European geographic alliance that illustrated German, Austrian and Italian fears of incursions against them by France and/or Russia. Similarly, Britain, France and Russia also concluded alliances that would protect them against Habsburg interference with Russian interests in the Balkans or German interference against France.[35]
The assassination of Austria's crown prince on 28 June 1914 triggered World War I. After four years of warfare, in which approximately two million German soldiers were killed,[36] a general armistice ended the fighting on 11 November, and German troops returned home. In the German Revolution (November 1918), Emperor Wilhelm II and all German ruling princes abdicated their positions and responsibilities. Germany's new political leadership signed the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. In this treaty, Germany, as part of the Central Powers, accepted defeat by the Allies in one of the bloodiest conflicts of all time. Germans perceived the treaty as humiliating and unjust and it was later seen by historians as influential in the rise of Adolf Hitler.[37][38][39]
Hitler, leader of Nazi Germany (1933-1945)
The Nazi Party won the special federal election of 1932. After a series of unsuccessful cabinets, Hindenburg appointed Adolf Hitler as Chancellor of Germany in 1933.[43] After the Reichstag Fire, a decree passed abrogated basic civil rights and within weeks the first Nazi concentration camp, Dachau, opened.[44][45] The Enabling Act of 1933 gave Hitler unrestricted legislative power, his government established a centralised totalitarian state, withdrew from the League of Nations following a national referendum, and began military rearmament.[46] In 1935, the regime withdrew from the Treaty of Versailles and introduced the Nuremberg Laws which targeted Jews and other minorities. Germany reacquired control of the Saar in 1935.[47]Austria wasannexed in 1938 and Czechoslovakia occupied in early 1939. Hitler's government signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop pact with Stalin and in late 1939 Germany invaded Poland along with the Soviets. The United Kingdom and France then declared war on Germany, marking the beginning of World War II.[48]
Concurrently, using deficit spending, a government sponsored program economic renewal focused on public works projects. In 1933, 30 percent of the national workforce was unemployed. In public work projects of 1934, 1.7 million Germans were put to work which gave them an income and social services benefits.[49] Average wages both per hour and per week began to rise.[50] This began with imperial roadway, or the Reichsautobahn system, called the German autobahns; this was a system of controlled access roadways designed for high speed traffic between cities. Such roadways passed through mountain ranges and countryside on a system of bridges (such as the Mangfall Bridge opened in 1936), and banked, paved multiple lane roads.[51] There had been previous plans for controlled-access highways in Germany under the Weimar Republic, and two had been built, but long-distance highways had not been successful. Other capital construction projects included such hydroelectric facilities as the Rur Dam, such water supplies as Zillierbach Dam and such transportation hubs as Zwickau Hauptbahnhof.[52] In 1936, Germany also hosted the Summer Olympics in Berlin, and the Winter Olympics in Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Bavaria.
In the Spring of 1940, Germany conquered Denmark and Norway, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, and France forcing the French government to sign an armistice after German troops occupied most of the country. The British repelled German air attacks in the same year. In 1941, German troops invaded Yugoslavia, Greece and the Soviet Union. By 1942 Germany and other Axis powers controlled most of continental Europe and North Africa but following the Soviet Union's victory at the Battle of Stalingrad, the allies' reconquest of North Africa and invasion of Italy in 1943 German forces repeatedly suffered military defeats.[48]
In what later became known as The Holocaust, the Nazi regime enacted policies which persecuted minorities. Over 10 million civilians died during the Holocaust, including 6 million Jews, between 220,000 and 1,500,000 Romani, 275,000 persons with disabilities, thousands of Jehovah's Witnesses, thousands of homosexuals, and hundreds of thousands of members of the political and religious opposition.[53] Nazi policies in the occupied countries resulted in the deaths of 2.7 million Poles,[54] 1.3 million Ukrainians,[55] and an estimated 2.8 million Soviet war prisoners.[55] The German army also committed countless war crimes, especially in Eastern Europe and against Jews.[56]
In June 1944 the Western allies invaded France, the Soviets reconquered much of Eastern Europe and by late 1944 the Western allies had entered Germany despite one final German counter offensive in the Ardennes Forest. Following Hitler's suicide during the Battle of Berlin, the German armed forces surrendered on 8 May 1945, ending World War II in Europe.[57] The war was the bloodiest in human history and caused the deaths of at least 40 million people in Europe.[58] German army war casualties were between 3.2 million and 5.3 million soldiers,[59] and up to 2 million German civilians.[60] Losing the war resulted in territorial losses for Germany and the expulsion of millions of ethnic Germans from Eastern Europe. Strategic bombing and land warfare destroyed numerous cities and cultural heritage sites. After World War II, former members of the regime were tried for war crimes at the Nuremberg trials.[61]
Occupation zones in Germany, 1947. The territories east of the Oder-Neisse line, under Polish and Soviet de facto annexation (white).
After the surrender of Germany, the remaining German territory and Berlin were partitioned by the Allies into four military occupation zones. Together these zones accepted more than 6.5 million of the ethnic Germans expelled from eastern areas.[62] The western sectors, controlled by France, the United Kingdom, and the United States, were merged on 23 May 1949 to form the Federal Republic of Germany (Bundesrepublik Deutschland); on 7 October 1949, the Soviet Zone became the German Democratic Republic (Deutsche Demokratische Republik). They were informally known as "West Germany" and "East Germany". East Germany selected East Berlin as its capital, while West Germany chose Bonn as a provisional capital, to emphasise its stance that the two-state solution was an artificial and temporary status quo.[63]
West Germany was established as a federal parliamentary republic with a "social market economy". Starting in 1948 West Germany became a major recipient of reconstruction aid under the Marshall Plan and used this to rebuild its industry.[64] Konrad Adenauer was elected the first Federal Chancellor (Bundeskanzler) of Germany in 1949 and remained in office until 1963. Under his and Ludwig Erhard's leadership, the country enjoyed prolonged economic growth beginning in the early 1950s, that became known as an "economic miracle" (Wirtschaftswunder).[65] West Germany joined NATO in 1955 and was a founding member of the European Economic Community in 1957.
The Berlin Wall during its fall in 1989, with the Brandenburg Gate in the background.
East Germany was an Eastern Bloc state under political and military control by the USSR via occupation forces and the Warsaw Pact. Though East Germany claimed to be a democracy, political power was exercised solely by leading members (Politbüro) of the communist-controlled Socialist Unity Party of Germany, supported by the Stasi, an immense secret service controlling many aspects of the society.[66] A Soviet-style command economy was set up and the GDR later became a Comecon state.[67] While East German propaganda was based on the benefits of the GDR's social programmes and the alleged constant threat of a West German invasion, many of its citizens looked to the West for freedom and prosperity.[68] The Berlin Wall, built in 1961 to stop East Germans from escaping to West Germany, became a symbol of the Cold War.[33] It was the site of U.S. Present John F. Kennedy's famous Ich bin ein Berliner speech of 26 June 26 1963 and subsequently Ronald Regan's, Mr. Gorbachov, Tear down this wall! speech of 12 June 1987; hence its fall in 1989 became a symbol of the Fall of Communism, German Reunification and Die Wende.[69]
Tensions between East and West Germany were reduced in the early 1970s by Chancellor Willy Brandt's Ostpolitik. In summer 1989, Hungary decided to dismantle the Iron Curtain and open the borders, causing the emigration of thousands of East Germans to West Germany via Hungary. This had devastating effects on the GDR, where regularmass demonstrations received increasing support. The East German authorities eased the border restrictions, allowing East German citizens to travel to the West; originally intended to help retain East Germany as a state, the opening of the border actually led to an acceleration of the Wende reform process. This culminated in the Two Plus Four Treaty a year later on 12 September 1990, under which the four occupying powers renounced their rights under the Instrument of Surrender, and Germany regained full sovereignty. This permitted German reunification on 3 October 1990, with the accession of the five re-established states of the former GDR.[33]
On 3 October 1990 the German reunificationwas established. Since 1999, the Reichstag building in Berlin is the meeting place of theBundestag, the German parliament.
The united Germany is considered to be the enlarged continuation of the Federal Republic of Germany and not a successor state. As such, it retained all of West Germany's memberships in international organizations.[70]
The modernisation and integration of the eastern German economy is a long-term process scheduled to last until the year 2019, with annual transfers from west to east amounting to roughly $80 billion.[71]
Based on the Berlin/Bonn Act, adopted in 1994, Berlin once again became the capital of the reunified Germany, while Bonn obtained the unique status of a Bundesstadt(federal city) retaining some federal ministries.[72] The relocation of the government was completed in 1999.[73] Following the 1998 elections, SPD politician Gerhard Schröder became the first Chancellor of a red–green coalition with the Alliance '90/The Greens party.
Germany became a co-founder of the European Union (1993), introduced the Euro currency (2002), and signed the Lisbon Treaty in 2007 (pictured).
Since reunification, Germany has taken a more active role in the European Union. Together with its European partners Germany signed the Maastricht Treaty in 1992, established the Eurozone in 1999, and signed the Lisbon Treaty in 2007.
Germany sent a peacekeeping force to secure stability in the Balkans and sent a force of German troops to Afghanistan as part of a NATO effort to provide security in that country after the ousting of the Taliban.[74] These deployments were controversial since Germany was bound by domestic law only to deploy troops for defence roles.[75]
In the 2005 elections, Angela Merkel became the first female Chancellor of Germany as the leader of a grand coalition.[33] In 2009 the German government approved a €50 billion economic stimulus plan to protect several sectors from a downturn.[76]
In 2009, a liberal-conservative coalition under Merkel assumed leadership of the country. In 2013, a grand coalition was established in a Third Merkel cabinet. Among the German political projects of the early 21st century are the energy transition (Energiewende) for a sustainable energy supply, the "Debt Brake" (Schuldenbremse) for balanced budgets, measures to overcome the low fertility rate, and high-tech strategies for the informatization and future transition of the German economy, summarized as Industry 4.0
listen)),[6] is a federalparliamentary republic in western-central Europe. It includes 16 constituent states and covers an area of 357,021 square kilometres (137,847 sq mi) with a largely temperate seasonal climate. Its capital and largest city is Berlin. With 80.7 million inhabitants, Germany is the most populous member state in the European Union. After the United States, it is the second most popular migration destination in the world.[7]Various Germanic tribes have occupied northern Germany since classical antiquity. A region named Germania was documented before 100 CE. During the Migration Period the Germanic tribes expanded southward. Beginning in the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire.[8] During the 16th century, northern German regions became the centre of the Protestant Reformation.
The rise of Pan-Germanism inside the German Confederation, which had been occupied by France, resulted in the unification of most of the German states in 1871 into the Prussian-dominated German Empire. After World War I and the German Revolution of 1918–1919, the Empire was replaced by the parliamentary Weimar Republic.The establishment of the Third Reich in 1933 eventually led to World War II and the Holocaust. After 1945 Germany lost some of its territory and evolved into two states,East Germany and West Germany. In 1990, the country was reunified.
In the 21st century, Germany is a great power and has the world's fourth-largest economy by nominal GDP and the fifth-largest by PPP. As a global leader in several industrial and technological sectors, it is both the world's third-largest exporter and importer of goods. It is a developed country with a very high standard of living, and it maintains a comprehensive social security and a universal health care system.
Germany was a founding member of the European Communities in 1957, which became the European Union in 1993. It is part of the Schengen Area, and became a co-founder of the Eurozone in 1999. Germany is a member of the United Nations, NATO, the G8, the G20, and the OECD. Known for its rich cultural history Germany has been continuously the home of influential artists, philosophers, musicians, entrepreneurs, scientists and inventors.
Etymology
Further information: Names of Germany
The English word Germany derives from the Latin Germania, which came into use after Julius Caesar adopted it for the peoples east of the Rhine.[9]The German termDeutschland (originally diutisciu land, "the German lands") is derived from deutsch, descended from Old High German diutisc"popular" (i.e. belonging to the diot or diota"people"), originally used to distinguish the language of the common people from Latin and its Romance descendants. This in turn descends from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz "popular" (see also the Latinised formTheodiscus), derived from *þeudō, descended from Proto-Indo-European *tewtéh₂- "people".[10]History
Main article: History of Germany
Evidence of modern humans, similarly dated, has been found in caves in the Swabian Jura near Ulm. The finds include 42,000 year old bird bone and mammoth ivory flutes which are the oldest musical instruments ever found,[13] the 40,000 year old Ice Age Lion Man which is the oldest uncontested figurative art ever discovered,[14] and the 35,000 year old Venus of Hohle Fels which is the oldest uncontested human figurative art ever discovered.[15]The Nebra sky disk is a bronze artifact created during the European Bronze Age attributed to a site near Nebra, Saxony-Anhalt. It is part of UNESCO's Memory of the World Register.[16]
Germanic tribes and Frankish Empire
Main articles: Germania and Migration Period
In the 3rd century a number of large West Germanic tribes emerged: Alemanni, Franks, Chatti, Saxons, Frisii, Sicambri, and Thuringii. Around 260, the Germanic peoples broke into Roman-controlled lands.[19] After the invasion of the Huns in 375, and with the decline of Rome from 395, Germanic tribes moved further south-west. Simultaneously several large tribes formed in what is now Germany and displaced the smaller Germanic tribes. Large areas (known since the Merovingian period as Austrasia) were occupied by the Franks, and Northern Germany was ruled by the Saxons and Slavs.[18]
Holy Roman Empire
Main article: Holy Roman Empire
The Ottonian emperors (919–1024) consolidated several major duchies and the German king Otto I was crowned Holy Roman Emperor of these regions in 962. In 996 Gregory V became the first German Pope, appointed by his cousin Otto III, whom he shortly after crowned Holy Roman Emperor. The Holy Roman Empire absorbed northern Italy and Burgundy under the reign of the Salian emperors (1024–1125), although the emperors lost power through the Investiture Controversy.[22]
In the 12th century, under the Hohenstaufen emperors (1138–1254), German princes increased their influence further south and east into territories inhabited by Slavs; they encouragedGerman settlement in these areas, called the eastern settlement movement (Ostsiedlung). Members of the Hanseatic League, which included mostly north German cities and towns, prospered in the expansion of trade.[23] In the south, the Greater Ravensburg Trade Corporation (Große Ravensburger Handelsgesellschaft) served a similar function. The edict of theGolden Bull in 1356 provided the basic constitutional structure of the Empire and codified the election of the emperor by seven prince-electors who ruled some of the most powerful principalities and archbishoprics.[24]
Population declined in the first half of the 14th century, starting with the Great Famine in 1315, followed by the Black Death of 1348–50.[25] Despite the decline, however, German artists, engineers, and scientists developed a wide array of techniques similar to those used by the Italian artists and designers of the time who flourished in such merchant city-states as Venice,Florence and Genoa. Artistic and cultural centers throughout the German states produced such artists as the Augsburg painters Hans Holbein and his son, and Albrecht Dürer. Johannes Gutenberg introduced moveable-type printing to Europe, a development that played a key role in the Renaissance, Reformation, the Age of Enlightenment, and the Scientific revolution, and laid the material basis for the modern knowledge-based economy and the spread of learning to the masses.[26]
In the 18th century, the Holy Roman Empire consisted of approximately 1,800 territories.[30] The elaborate legal system initiated by a series of Imperial Reforms (approximately 1450–1555) created the Imperial Estates and provided for considerable local autonomy among ecclesiastical, secular, and hereditary states, reflected in Imperial Diet. TheHouse of Habsburg held the imperial crown from 1438 until the death of Charles VI in 1740. Having no male heirs, he had convinced the Electors to retain Habsburg hegemony in the office of the emperor by agreeing to the Pragmatic Sanction. This was finally settled through a the War of Austrian Succession; in the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, Maria Theresa's husband became Holy Roman Emperor, and she ruled the Empire as Empress Consort. From 1740, dualism between the Austrian Habsburg Monarchy and theKingdom of Prussia dominated the German states in the 18th century. As a consequence of the French Revolutionary Wars, and the subsequent final meeting of the Imperial Diet, most of the secular Free Imperial Cities were annexed by dynastic territories; the ecclesiastical territories were secularized and annexed. In 1806 the Imperium was dissolved; German states, particularly the Rhineland states, fell under the influence of France. Until 1815, France, Russia, Prussia and the Habsburgs competed for hegemony in the German states as a result of the Napoleonic Wars.[31]
German Confederation and Empire
Main articles: German Confederation and German Empire
Following the fall of Napoleon, the Congress of Vienna (convened in 1814) founded the German Confederation (Deutscher Bund), a loose league of 39 sovereign states. The appointment of the Austrian king as the permanent president of the Confederation reflected the Congress's failure to accept Prussia's influence among the German states, and acerbated the long-standing competition between the Hohenzollern and Habsburg interests. Disagreement within restoration politics partly led to the rise of liberal movements, followed by new measures of repression by Austrian statesman Metternich. The Zollverein, a tariff union, furthered economic unity in the German states.[32] National and liberal ideals of the French Revolution gained increasing support among many, especially young, Germans. The Hambach Festival in May 1832 was a main event in support of German unity, freedom and democracy. In the light of a series of revolutionary movements in Europe, which established a republic in France, intellectuals and commoners started theRevolutions of 1848 in the German states. King Frederick William IV of Prussia was offered the title of Emperor, but with a loss of power; he rejected the crown and the proposed constitution, leading to a temporary setback for the movement.[33]The assassination of Austria's crown prince on 28 June 1914 triggered World War I. After four years of warfare, in which approximately two million German soldiers were killed,[36] a general armistice ended the fighting on 11 November, and German troops returned home. In the German Revolution (November 1918), Emperor Wilhelm II and all German ruling princes abdicated their positions and responsibilities. Germany's new political leadership signed the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. In this treaty, Germany, as part of the Central Powers, accepted defeat by the Allies in one of the bloodiest conflicts of all time. Germans perceived the treaty as humiliating and unjust and it was later seen by historians as influential in the rise of Adolf Hitler.[37][38][39]
Weimar Republic and the Third Reich
Main articles: Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany
At the beginning of the German Revolution in November 1918, Germany was declared a republic. However, the struggle for power continued, with radical-left Communists seizing power in Bavaria. The revolution came to an end on 11 August 1919, when the democratic Weimar Constitution was signed by President Friedrich Ebert.[40] After a tumultuous period seeing the occupation of the Ruhr by Belgian and French troops and the rise of inflation culminating in the hyperinflation of 1922–23, a debt restructuring plan and the creation of a new currency in 1924 ushered in the Golden Twenties, an era of increasing artistic innovation, liberal cultural life. However, the economic situation was still volatile. Historians describe the period between 1924 and 1929 as one of "Partial Stabilization."[41] The Great Depression hit Germany in 1929. After the federal election of 1930, Chancellor Heinrich Brüning's government was enabled by President Paul von Hindenburg to act without parliamentary approval. Brüning's government pursued a policy of fiscal austerity and deflation which caused high unemployment of nearly 30% by 1932.[42]Concurrently, using deficit spending, a government sponsored program economic renewal focused on public works projects. In 1933, 30 percent of the national workforce was unemployed. In public work projects of 1934, 1.7 million Germans were put to work which gave them an income and social services benefits.[49] Average wages both per hour and per week began to rise.[50] This began with imperial roadway, or the Reichsautobahn system, called the German autobahns; this was a system of controlled access roadways designed for high speed traffic between cities. Such roadways passed through mountain ranges and countryside on a system of bridges (such as the Mangfall Bridge opened in 1936), and banked, paved multiple lane roads.[51] There had been previous plans for controlled-access highways in Germany under the Weimar Republic, and two had been built, but long-distance highways had not been successful. Other capital construction projects included such hydroelectric facilities as the Rur Dam, such water supplies as Zillierbach Dam and such transportation hubs as Zwickau Hauptbahnhof.[52] In 1936, Germany also hosted the Summer Olympics in Berlin, and the Winter Olympics in Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Bavaria.
In the Spring of 1940, Germany conquered Denmark and Norway, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, and France forcing the French government to sign an armistice after German troops occupied most of the country. The British repelled German air attacks in the same year. In 1941, German troops invaded Yugoslavia, Greece and the Soviet Union. By 1942 Germany and other Axis powers controlled most of continental Europe and North Africa but following the Soviet Union's victory at the Battle of Stalingrad, the allies' reconquest of North Africa and invasion of Italy in 1943 German forces repeatedly suffered military defeats.[48]
In what later became known as The Holocaust, the Nazi regime enacted policies which persecuted minorities. Over 10 million civilians died during the Holocaust, including 6 million Jews, between 220,000 and 1,500,000 Romani, 275,000 persons with disabilities, thousands of Jehovah's Witnesses, thousands of homosexuals, and hundreds of thousands of members of the political and religious opposition.[53] Nazi policies in the occupied countries resulted in the deaths of 2.7 million Poles,[54] 1.3 million Ukrainians,[55] and an estimated 2.8 million Soviet war prisoners.[55] The German army also committed countless war crimes, especially in Eastern Europe and against Jews.[56]
In June 1944 the Western allies invaded France, the Soviets reconquered much of Eastern Europe and by late 1944 the Western allies had entered Germany despite one final German counter offensive in the Ardennes Forest. Following Hitler's suicide during the Battle of Berlin, the German armed forces surrendered on 8 May 1945, ending World War II in Europe.[57] The war was the bloodiest in human history and caused the deaths of at least 40 million people in Europe.[58] German army war casualties were between 3.2 million and 5.3 million soldiers,[59] and up to 2 million German civilians.[60] Losing the war resulted in territorial losses for Germany and the expulsion of millions of ethnic Germans from Eastern Europe. Strategic bombing and land warfare destroyed numerous cities and cultural heritage sites. After World War II, former members of the regime were tried for war crimes at the Nuremberg trials.[61]
East and West Germany
Main article: History of Germany (1945–1990)
West Germany was established as a federal parliamentary republic with a "social market economy". Starting in 1948 West Germany became a major recipient of reconstruction aid under the Marshall Plan and used this to rebuild its industry.[64] Konrad Adenauer was elected the first Federal Chancellor (Bundeskanzler) of Germany in 1949 and remained in office until 1963. Under his and Ludwig Erhard's leadership, the country enjoyed prolonged economic growth beginning in the early 1950s, that became known as an "economic miracle" (Wirtschaftswunder).[65] West Germany joined NATO in 1955 and was a founding member of the European Economic Community in 1957.
Tensions between East and West Germany were reduced in the early 1970s by Chancellor Willy Brandt's Ostpolitik. In summer 1989, Hungary decided to dismantle the Iron Curtain and open the borders, causing the emigration of thousands of East Germans to West Germany via Hungary. This had devastating effects on the GDR, where regularmass demonstrations received increasing support. The East German authorities eased the border restrictions, allowing East German citizens to travel to the West; originally intended to help retain East Germany as a state, the opening of the border actually led to an acceleration of the Wende reform process. This culminated in the Two Plus Four Treaty a year later on 12 September 1990, under which the four occupying powers renounced their rights under the Instrument of Surrender, and Germany regained full sovereignty. This permitted German reunification on 3 October 1990, with the accession of the five re-established states of the former GDR.[33]
German reunification and the EU
Main articles: German reunification and History of Germany since 1990
The modernisation and integration of the eastern German economy is a long-term process scheduled to last until the year 2019, with annual transfers from west to east amounting to roughly $80 billion.[71]
Based on the Berlin/Bonn Act, adopted in 1994, Berlin once again became the capital of the reunified Germany, while Bonn obtained the unique status of a Bundesstadt(federal city) retaining some federal ministries.[72] The relocation of the government was completed in 1999.[73] Following the 1998 elections, SPD politician Gerhard Schröder became the first Chancellor of a red–green coalition with the Alliance '90/The Greens party.
Germany sent a peacekeeping force to secure stability in the Balkans and sent a force of German troops to Afghanistan as part of a NATO effort to provide security in that country after the ousting of the Taliban.[74] These deployments were controversial since Germany was bound by domestic law only to deploy troops for defence roles.[75]
In the 2005 elections, Angela Merkel became the first female Chancellor of Germany as the leader of a grand coalition.[33] In 2009 the German government approved a €50 billion economic stimulus plan to protect several sectors from a downturn.[76]
In 2009, a liberal-conservative coalition under Merkel assumed leadership of the country. In 2013, a grand coalition was established in a Third Merkel cabinet. Among the German political projects of the early 21st century are the energy transition (Energiewende) for a sustainable energy supply, the "Debt Brake" (Schuldenbremse) for balanced budgets, measures to overcome the low fertility rate, and high-tech strategies for the informatization and future transition of the German economy, summarized as Industry 4.0