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C. Edmund Clingan on Turning Points in Modern Times: Essays On Karl Dietrich Bracher. Turning Points in Modern Times: Essays on German and European History. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1995. xiv + 338 pp. $34.50, paper, ISBN 978-0-674-91354-7. Reviewed by C. Edmund Clingan Published on H-German (February, 1996) Turning Points in Modern Times is a collec‐ In the spirit of pleasant but vigorous conver‐ tion of nineteen addresses and essays written by sation, let me take issue with some of Bracher's Karl Dietrich Bracher between 1983 and 1992. theories and interpretations. The editors at Har‐ Bracher, a longtime Professor of Political Science vard should have arranged the volume so that the at the University of Bonn, recounts how his frst essay "Totalitarianism as Concept and Reality" real experience with liberal democracy came af‐ could have appeared frst (instead of tenth) and ter 1943 when he was captured during the North "The Ideas and Failure of Socialism" second African campaign and interned in a POW camp in (rather than ffth). These two essays lay out the Kansas. Bracher studied ancient history at the strengths and weaknesses of Bracher's theories. camp and continued after the war at the Universi‐ Bracher himself seems unsure at times what con‐ ty of Tuebingen. Inevitably he was drawn from stitutes a fully totalitarian system. Sometimes he the fall of the Roman Republic to the more recent uses a broad brush to cover all fascist and com‐ fall of the Weimar Republic; this latter problem munist dictatorships; other times, he seems to pull has preoccupied most of his professional life. The back. Clearly there were differences in the Soviet book is not intended as a scholarly volume so Union under Stalin on the one hand and much as a presentation of more informal essays Khrushchev and Brezhnev on the other. It is very and think-pieces. It creates the effect of sitting in difficult to draw sharp lines when discussing cen‐ conversation by a freplace with a wise old friend, tralized political power. Many Americans would roving time and space from the streets of ancient regard German gun laws, personal registration Athens to the gulags of the modern Soviet Union. with authorities, radio and television licensing, The rather random arrangement allows for no de‐ and closing hours as "totalitarian" intrusions velopment of argument but the recurring themes upon liberty. Bracher includes China as a totalitar‐ throughout are the natures of democracy, social‐ ian society, yet he was allowed to deliver an ad‐ ism, and totalitarian- ism. dress at Southeastern University in Nanking. H-Net Reviews These are old debates, but at times Bracher crees dissolving the state governments of Saxony ventures onto shakier ground. He exalts a society and Thuringia, which served as precedents for of laws as being a vital democratic distinction, but von Papen's dissolution of the government of the judicial systems of western democracies vary Prussia. wildly and are often criticized for not providing A recurring weakness in the work is the disre‐ justice. In 1987, he believed that "the late totalitar‐ gard of economics. One need hardly be a Marxist ianism in the Communist system is still powerful to believe that the condition of the economy enough...to quash any opposition from dissidents played a major role in the collapse of the Weimar should it want to." I wonder how the Ceaucescus Republic and in the gradual decay and collapse of would have felt about this statement. Indeed totalitarianism in Russia. In his essay on social‐ many of the essays are suffused with the demo‐ ism, Bracher identifies the portions of Marxist so‐ cratic pessimism of the late 1970s often associated cialism derived from Hegel without noting that with the ideas of Jean-Francois Revel, where many of Marx's most fawed theories came from democracies were allegedly falling prey to a "to‐ liberal economists Adam Smith and David Ricar‐ talitarian temptation." Bracher has too much faith do. However, Bracher's writings are useful anti‐ in totalitarianism: "in the 1950s...performance dotes to neo-Hegelian writings about the "end of and living standards started to lag behind those in history." the West." Does this mean that Stalin's USSR in the Bracher has a broad knowledge of ancient 1930s had the same living standard as Roosevelt's and modern history, but is notably weaker on me‐ USA? One might talk instead of a "democratic dieval and early modern history. He lumps Mon‐ temptation": I cannot think of any liberal democ‐ tesquieu and Tocqueville together as believers in racies voluntarily turning themselves over to dic‐ representative liberal democracy. However, mid‐ tatorship in the last twenty-five years, but many dle-class liberals picked up Montesquieu's ideas of dictatorships have opened up voting procedures federalism and a separation of powers only after or have even surrendered power (Poland, Hun‐ the American Revolution. Montesquieu originally gary, Nicaragua, etc.). intended the aristocracy to use these ideas against This issue leads back to the study of the fall of monarchical power. the Weimar Republic, where Bracher justly Six of the essays touch upon the revolutions gained his fame. He sums up much of his current of 1989. Bracher fears that the same national thinking in this volume. Bracher believes that problems which engulfed Europe in war in 1939 Weimar's main problems were the unpopularity may resurface. He thus urges the growth of feder‐ of democracy and the role of Hindenburg as presi‐ al institutions for all of Europe just as Western Eu‐ dent. I can make a strong case that democracy rope formed cooperative groups and the Federal was very popular: participation rates in voting Republic combined a federal political system and rose steadily in the 1928-1933 period. People des‐ a social market economy. In summary, Turning perately sought relief from the Depression by vot‐ Points in Modern Times is a thought-provoking ing for the parties which had social programs: the book. Even if one does not agree with all of Communists, Socialists, and Nazis. As William S. Bracher's points, we rise from the freplace seats, Allen and Thomas Childers have written, many still friends. outside the urban working class would not vote for the left, and with the failure and collapse of the traditional middle class parties, they were left with only the Nazis. Friedrich Ebert was also no stranger to the use of Article 48; he signed the de‐ 2 H-Net Reviews If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the network, at https://networks.h-net.org/h-german Citation: C. Edmund Clingan. Review of Bracher, Karl Dietrich. Turning Points in Modern Times: Essays on German and European History. H-German, H-Net Reviews. February, 1996. URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=296 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. 3.
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