Otto von Bismarck

Prussian Nationalist

Extraordinary Practitioner of REALPOLITIK

Bismarck Completes His Project, 18 January 1871

The Quotable Bismark: Realpolitik1. “The great questions of the time are not decided by speeches and majority

decisions – that was the error of 1848-49 – but by iron and blood. 1862 speech to the Prussian Diet

2. “Politics is not an exact Science.” Speech 18633. “Only a completely ready state can permit the luxury of a liberal

government” Speech 18664. “Let us put Germany in the saddle, so to speak – it already knows how to

ride.” Speech to the N. German Reichstag 18775. “A conquering army on the border will not be halted by the power of

eloquence” Ib. 6. “He who has his thumb on the purse has the power.” Ib.7. “The right people in the right jobs.” Speech 1875

8. “Your map of Africa is really quite nice. But my map of Africa lies in Europe. Here is Russia, and here... is France, and we're in the middle — that's my map of Africa.” Dec. 1888

9. Der alte Jude, das ist der Mann. “The Old Jew, he is the Man.” Reffering to Benjimin Disreali. quoted in Seven Great Statesmen in the Warfare of Humanity with Unreason (1912) by Andrew Dickson White, p. 482

Quotable Bismark Cont.

10. “They treat me like a fox, a cunning fellow (Schlaukopf) of the first rank. But the truth is that with a gentleman I am always a gentleman and a half, and when I have to do with a pirate, I try to be a pirate and a half.” 1877

11. “Europe today is a powder keg and the leaders are like men smoking in an arsenal … A single spark will set off an explosion that will consume us all … I cannot tell you when that explosion will occur, but I can tell you where … Some damned foolish thing in the Balkans will set it off. “Comment during the Congress of Berlin in 1878, as quoted in "European Diary" by Andrei Navrozov

12. “Not worth the healthy bones of a single Pomeranian grenadier.” of possible German

involvement in the Balkans; speech to the Reichstag, 5 December 1876

Realpolitik: • Niccolo Machiavelli• Power and the acquisition of power is the goal of all politics and politicians• Realizing this one should concern themselves less with the moral or

ideological implications of actions• Realizing this focus should be on whether actions advance the individual or

states interests or not

Bismark & UnificationProblems of Nation Building•Geographic divissions,

– Deutschlandliedsuggests the problems– Federal System that limmets Bismark’s authority

•Competing Elites of Rye and Steel•Social Question and class Conflict

Bismark’s Negative Integration: Great in short term, catastrophic in the long terms. •Pick and enemy of the Riech and build unity by gathering political force to fight it•Powerfull but does not sow the seeds of political cooperation on a liberal basis as did say George Washington, or the British example of the Belle Epoch Period•Kulturkampf, gains support of liberals and conservatives for economic programs by singling out Catholics for persecution•Anti-Socialist Legislation unites Rye & Steel but is accompanied by the imposition of the welfare state, the first really in the world

Wilhelm II

• 60 Years younger and sharing non of Bismark’s statesman like qualities would pursue a different direction

• Repealed anti-socialist legislation and is met with the meteoric rise of the SDP

• SDP explicitly Marxist was the largest political party in German Riechstag giving the Emporor nightmares on the eve of WWI – Would they be Germans or worlkers

• Willhelm, hold authority close and engage in program of Weltpolitik to build national cohesion– Nationalism and militarism– Imperialism

France and the Dryfus Affair

• Communards, Prussians, and National Humiliation

• Edourd Drumont– La Libre Parole– Jewish France, 1886

• Alfred Dreyfus –– National Trauma of the Franco

Prussian War– Example of Negative Integration

• Emile Zola, J’accuse and the Dryfusards

– “progress and justice against the reaction and prejudice”

– Their victory was the basis of the ensuing stable success of the Republic

Russian Revoltution 1905

1. Weakness of Regime bare to see after the Fiasco of the Russio Japanese War

1. Alexander III’s Reactions

2. Nicholas II’s Russiafication

3. Mensheviks & Bolsheks

2. Bloody Sunday and Father Gapon – pops the cultural belief in the Tsar’s benevolence

3. General protest leads to a national general strike

4. October Manifesto1. Duma

2. Franchise

5. Reaction: State political police/internal security the only thing Russia has gotten good at

Nietzsche: Critique of European CultureProfessor Lloyd Kramer

Chairman of the History Dept. Univ. NC Chapel Hill

Assignment: Cornell Notes focusing on Nietzsche's philosophy as the exemplifying a new era in Western and World history.

•What are examples of “the will to power” in society and relationships?

•How might Nietzsche's critique be the source of both good and bad in the 20th Century?