Századok – 2003

TANULMÁNYOK - Vonyó Tamás: A megkésett fejlődés porosz útja. A császári Németország gazdasági fejlődésének sajátos forrásai 1275

A MEGKÉSETT FEJLŐDÉS POROSZ ÚTJA 1305 COMING LATE IN PRUSSIAN STYLE: THE ORIGINS OF IMPERIAL GERMANY'S UNIQUE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT by Vonyó Tamás Summary Germany, whose rapid establishment in 1871 literally shocked the world and turned the international status quo upside down, has risen into the highest league of great powers at stunning speed. Researching and analyzing her development in the following decades has long formed a crucial part of western historiography. It is more then understandable since the tempestuous surge of German industrial might is often considered to be a central element of the 'German question' and therefore also a principal reason behind the expansionism of the Second as well as the Third Reich. First in the trendsetting theory of Fritz Fischer was the argument crystallized that the radicalization of German politics had primarily not been the result of the Versailles settlements, but a logical consequence of the organic development of one among Europe's most populous nations. Famous and widely read historian, Hans Ulrich Wehler, in a 1973 publication completed the thesis according to which the dynamic and aggressive development of the German Empire was foremost the result of a unique modernization model - called the Sonderweg. He argued that in 1848 the liberal bourgeoisie had lost the political initiative, thereby leaving power in the hands of the Prussian aristocracy. Threatened by the forces of economic modernization, however, the East of the Elbe Junkers could conserve their superiority only by monopolizing political and social governance. In order to achieve that they required the crucial support of industrial giants, who were respectively dependent on state intervention in a market oligopoly resulting from the Great Depression between 1873 and 1895. As big industry had always been prone to back up the expansionist course of foreign policy, aggressive and assertive nationalism stood in the epicenter of prevailing political philosophy until the country's catastrophic defeat in 1945. The author of this study is not willing to drive the decade-long debate over the Sonderweg to a final conclusion. Our single objective is to prove - by focusing on the unique elements of economic modernization - that the above summarized concept overvalued and misjudged the role of the state in the process of Germern industrialization. First and foremost it hast to be emphasized that the fundamental pillars of sustainable economic growth have been established well before national unification, back in the era of Prussian liberalism and definitely not after the 1879 turn to protectionism. Moreover we stress the importance of scientific innovation and technological development over enduring deflation in creating a high level of vertical and horizontal concentration in heavy industry. Analyzing the nature and effects of economic policy we point out that the central government did not follow a consequent neo-mercantilist line, instead it still walked on the path of the traditionally state-oriented Prussian national liberalism. The rapid surge of protectionism must be regarded as the direct consequence of the staggering strength and increasing corporatism of big industry, so the logic of German economic development is actually the opposite of what the Sonderweg advocated. What was unique there was not a special modernization model with deliberate state intervention to regulate market forces, but a fortunate coexistence of vast reserves of natural resources, abundant and extremely high-qualified laborers and concentrated investment capital available on a massive scale. The real significance of German industrialization lays not in its specific nature, but in the fact that it propelled the Second Reich into world-power status.