The strengths and weaknesses of the Weimar Republic summary

The following texts are the property of their respective authors and we thank them for giving us the opportunity to share for free to students, teachers and users of the Web their texts will used only for illustrative educational and scientific purposes only.

All the information in our site are given for nonprofit educational purposes

The information of medicine and health contained in the site are of a general nature and purpose which is purely informative and for this reason may not replace in any case, the council of a doctor or a qualified entity legally to the profession.

The strengths and weaknesses of the Weimar Republic summary

The strengths and weaknesses of the Weimar Republic

The Weimar Republic
This was the first democratic German constitution. A President was elected every seven years by everyone over the age of 18. Power was concentrated in the Reichstag where 550 MPs were elected by Proportional Representation (PR). They had to pass all bills and the leader of the largest party became Federal Chancellor but he could be dismissed at any time by the President. Article 48 allowed the President to suspend the constitution at any time in case of an emergency.

Strengths of the constitution
It was the first democratic constitution in German history and made sure that all sections of opinion were represented. A strong President ensured that someone was able to take charge in a crisis. Each state in Germany was allowed to keep control of its own domestic affairs.

Weaknesses of the constitution
The republic was always associated with defeat and the Treaty of Versailles. The high number of parties meant that decisions were often difficult to take – too many of these parties wanted to destroy the republic. The powers of the President allowed him to be become a dictator if he wished. If the states wanted to overthrow the Federal government they could.

The Treaty of Versailles.
Because she had become a democratic republic Germany expected to be treated fairly by the allies at the end of the war – she wanted a chance to recover as quickly as possible. Unfortunately France got her way and the Treaty was harsher than expected. She lost 30% of her land, she accepted blame for starting the war, she had to pay $6 600 000 000 to the allies and was only allowed to have a small army and navy but no airforce. The Germans were angry with this and wanted revenge – the failure of the Weimar republic occurred because it would always be associated with signing the treaty – in the end they had no choice because Germany was unable to restart the war.

The Kapp Putsch
As soon as the Treaty was signed the Friekorps and a group of army officers tried to overthrow the Republic – they took over the main cities and the government was forced to flee to Dresden. The government called a general strike which successfully bought the putsch to an end but this was a bad omen for the future – the government had to keep the army sweet otherwise they could overthrow the republic.

Source : http://www.hughff.net/revisiongermanyweimar.doc

Web site link to visit: http://www.hughff.net/

Google key word : The strengths and weaknesses of the Weimar Republic summary file type : doc

Author : not indicated on the source document of the above text

If you are the author of the text above and you not agree to share your knowledge for teaching, research, scholarship (for fair use as indicated in the United States copyrigh low) please send us an e-mail and we will remove your text quickly.