1924-29 in Germany Was a ‘golden Age’ for the Weimar Republic - Assess the Validity of This View

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Socially, the welfare extended meaning the working class made gains as in November 1918; workers won agreement from employers to an 8-hour working day and a system of industrial tribunals. This shows that it was a massive achievement as before workers had no say on how long they worked for and how much money they would get. This gave them a voice making them feel like they were finally part of the nation and were not only just the ‘working class’. Also, advances were made in social services, such as improvements in hospitals, electricity supplies etc. A further major advance in the welfare provision was made in 1927 when the social insurance scheme was extended to protect a dozen of workers in event of unemployment. All these advances strengthened the support of amongst the Germans because they felt that the nation was progressing and the Republic was doing a good job in the sense of listening to the people. The Weimar culture was very significant as it contained artistic forms that were greatly to influence later culture development and reflected new optimism, democratization and challenge to tradition, excitement and modernism on the period. If this experimentation happened at any other time then it would have been worse for the government, so with recovering they could tackle the cultural aspects of Germany, proving its stability. However, a lot of people in rural areas, extremist parties (like the Nazis), old people and church were against modernism because they saw it as a sign of ‘discipline of once a great nation’, showing that it wasn’t very popular for some as they believed all this was influenced by the American culture. Arguably though, Berlin replaced Paris/London in Europe’s culture capital showing that it was successful and popular as many people would come to visit Berlin to experience this ‘modernism’.

On the other hand, social welfare alienated powerful groups in the elite and aroused expectations that could not be met. Some groups felt that the expectations were exaggerated and the demands on the welfare couldn’t be met, feeling it was wrong to put up the hopes of man people (especially the working class). This shows that it affected the elite’s attitude towards the republic as resulting high taxation and comparative redistribution of resources away from the elite, reinforced its suspicions of the new democratic system. Overall this shows that the elite could not trust the republic as they believed they couldn’t achieve what they set out to do in the start. Overall, this goes against the idea that it was a Golden Age in the Weimar Republic because the Weimar society was becoming increasingly polarised before the onset of the political and economic crisis in 1929 and reinforced their hostility to the regime, proving Germany was instable and could not manage to make many changes.

In conclusion, between 1924-29 in Germany it was slightly seen as a Golden Age because the economic recovery was only successful for the short-term but in the long term it was not successful because it lacked the structural integrity to withstand recession. Also, Germany was too reliant on the American loans. Politically, the Weimar republic had been hampered by a variety of relatively weak coalition government. Whilst with no doubt there might have been some support for the Republic, there was no real faith for it amongst the German people and this was proven on the election of the traditional president, General Hindenburg in 1925. As for socially it was a much stronger recovery as there was new ways of people enjoying themselves in visual arts and night clubs, although this wasn’t popular with the more traditional German people who believed more in the autocratic form of Germany.