Germany's ability to support its war machine financially has long puzzled scholars. The young nation had exhausted itself paying for its loss in the First World War, had suffered a hyperinflation in the early 1920s, and had ended the 1920s with a terrible economic depression. This is the first book in any language to examine the budget policies of the middle years of the Weimar Republic and to look at how these policies changed the politics of the time. It is also the first work to support the government's aggressive use of deficit spending and fiscal stimuli to promote economic growth. Some findings even indicate that the German government could have used creative financial solutions to avoid the worst of the Depression and to avert the Nazi regime. Clingan explores the changes and continuities in fiscal policy and budget-making politics, beginning in the last years of the Wilhelmine Empire and continuing into the 1930s. Although this is a story about money, it is also a story about men. Very few in Nazi Germany understood the intricacies of fiscal policy and budget making, and political parties tended to follow the lead of those who did. Clingan combines their personal stories with the tale of a country still growing into its economic power and still trying to learn both its limits and its strengths.

About the series The Access to History series is the most popular and trusted series for advanced level history students, offering: - Authoritative, engaging and accessible content - Comprehensive coverage of the History AS and A level specifications - Design features, study guides and web support to help students achieve exam success. About the book Endorsed by Edexcel, this title combines content from From Bismarck to Hitler 1890-1933 with Germany: The Third Reich to provide coherent and comprehensive coverage of Edexcel's A2 Unit 3 'From Kaiser to Fuhrer: Germany 1900-1945'. It charts the developments in Germany from 1900-1945 including an examination of: - the Second Reich: society and governent 1900-1919 - the democratic experiment 1919-29 - the rise of the Nazis - life in wartime Germany 1939-45 Throughout the book, key dates, terms and issues are highlighted, and historical interpretations of key debates are outlined. Summary diagrams are included to consolidate knowledge and understanding of the period, and exam-style questions and tips written by an examiner provide the opportunity to develop exam skills

Annually published since 1930, the International bibliography of Historical Sciences (IBOHS) is an international bibliography of the most important historical monographs and periodical articles published throughout the world, which deal with history from the earliest to the most recent times. The works are arranged systematically according to period, region or historical discipline, and within this classification alphabetically. The bibliography contains a geographical index and indexes of persons and authors.

For the first time in any language, a book examines the life of Hans Luther, the German statesman whose career began at the tail end of the Second Empire and ended in the postwar years. Luther had a front-row seat for World War I, the Revolution of 1918, the Great Inflation, the Great Depression, and the rise of the Third Reich-serving as Hitler's first ambassador to the United States. C. Edmund Clingan chronicles the life of this controversial German politician, diplomat, and banker. Luther served as mayor of Essen during the Revolution of 1918, the Kapp Putsch, and the occupation of the Ruhr Valley by the French. Rising rapidly in the political ranks, he served as finance minister and then, briefly, as chancellor in 1925 and 1926. Many criticized his policies as president of the Reichsbank during the Great Depression. Adolf Hitler then appointed Luther to serve as ambassador to the United States. After being recalled to Germany in 1937, Luther retired from politics until after World War II, when he served the Federal Republic well into the 1950s.

A riveting account of how the Nazi Party came to power and how the failures of the Weimar Republic and the shortsightedness of German politicians allowed it to happen. Why did democracy fall apart so quickly and completely in Germany in the 1930s? How did a democratic government allow Adolf Hitler to seize power? In The Death of Democracy, Benjamin Carter Hett answers these questions, and the story he tells has disturbing resonances for our own time. To say that Hitler was elected is too simple. He would never have come to power if Germany’s leading politicians had not responded to a spate of populist insurgencies by trying to co-opt him, a strategy that backed them into a corner from which the only way out was to bring the Nazis in. Hett lays bare the misguided confidence of conservative politicians who believed that Hitler and his followers would willingly support them, not recognizing that their efforts to use the Nazis actually played into Hitler’s hands. They had willingly given him the tools to turn Germany into a vicious dictatorship. Benjamin Carter Hett is a leading scholar of twentieth-century Germany and a gifted storyteller whose portraits of these feckless politicians show how fragile democracy can be when those in power do not respect it. He offers a powerful lesson for today, when democracy once again finds itself embattled and the siren song of strongmen sounds ever louder.

German imperialism in Europe evokes images of military aggression and ethnic cleansing. Yet, even under the Third Reich, Germans deployed more subtle forms of influence that can be called soft power or informal imperialism. Stephen G. Gross examines how, between 1918 and 1941, German businessmen and academics turned their nation - an economic wreck after World War I - into the single largest trading partner with the Balkan states, their primary source for development aid and their diplomatic patron. Building on traditions from the 1890s and working through transnational trade fairs, chambers of commerce, educational exchange programmes and development projects, Germans collaborated with Croatians, Serbians and Romanians to create a continental bloc, and to exclude Jews from commerce. By gaining access to critical resources during a global depression, the proponents of soft power enabled Hitler to militarise the German economy and helped make the Third Reich's territorial conquests after 1939 economically possible.

Examines the continuity of German Foreign Office influence in the forumlation of foreign policy under the leadership of Otto von Bismarck (1862-1890), Kaiser William II (1888-1918), the Weimar Republic (1919-1933), and Adolf Hitler (1933-1945)