@article{ART003064153},
author={Ko Yongjun},
title={How German Socialists Came to Support ‘the Great War': The Irony of Socialist ‘Goodwill' and Their Proactive Cooperation on War},
journal={military history},
issn={1598-317X},
year={2024},
number={130},
pages={259-293}
TY - JOUR
AU - Ko Yongjun
TI - How German Socialists Came to Support ‘the Great War': The Irony of Socialist ‘Goodwill' and Their Proactive Cooperation on War
JO - military history
PY - 2024
VL - null
IS - 130
PB - Military History Institute, MND
SP - 259
EP - 293
SN - 1598-317X
AB - This article purports to revisit how German socialists came to support the Great War in 1914 despite their fierce antagonism against capitalist wars, based on secondary literature written in English. Conventional wisdom tends to explain it with a focus on either 'misjudgement and betrayal' against socialist ideals or 'resignation and passivity' caused by belligerent social atmosphere. In this article, however, I present some evidences for the logic of proactive cooperation on the war conceived by the leaders of the German Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the Free Labor Unions, both of which were most influential organizations of German socialism.
They can be analyzed into four different categories: first, to protect socialist values against the Czarist despotism; second, to counter the greed of the bourgeois British Empire; third, to promote benefits for labor class by realizing 'wartime socialism'; and fourth, to facilitate socialist revolutions around the world. Ironically, though, such 'goodwill' of German socialist leaders which legitimized their collaboration on the war turned out to result in not only the schism of socialist forces but also the emergence of the Nazist 'Third Reich' in the interwar Germany, which can be considered asacriticaljunctureinthenexusof'revolution'and'war'inmodernEuropean history.
KW - The First World War;German Social Democratic Party (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands); Burgfrieden; Wartime Socialism
DO -
UR -
ER -
Ko Yongjun. (2024). How German Socialists Came to Support ‘the Great War': The Irony of Socialist ‘Goodwill' and Their Proactive Cooperation on War. military history, 130, 259-293.
Ko Yongjun. 2024, "How German Socialists Came to Support ‘the Great War': The Irony of Socialist ‘Goodwill' and Their Proactive Cooperation on War", military history, no.130, pp.259-293.
Ko Yongjun "How German Socialists Came to Support ‘the Great War': The Irony of Socialist ‘Goodwill' and Their Proactive Cooperation on War" military history 130 pp.259-293 (2024) : 259.
Ko Yongjun. How German Socialists Came to Support ‘the Great War': The Irony of Socialist ‘Goodwill' and Their Proactive Cooperation on War. 2024; 130 : 259-293.
Ko Yongjun. "How German Socialists Came to Support ‘the Great War': The Irony of Socialist ‘Goodwill' and Their Proactive Cooperation on War" military history no.130(2024) : 259-293.
Ko Yongjun. How German Socialists Came to Support ‘the Great War': The Irony of Socialist ‘Goodwill' and Their Proactive Cooperation on War. military history, 130, 259-293.
Ko Yongjun. How German Socialists Came to Support ‘the Great War': The Irony of Socialist ‘Goodwill' and Their Proactive Cooperation on War. military history. 2024; 130 259-293.
Ko Yongjun. How German Socialists Came to Support ‘the Great War': The Irony of Socialist ‘Goodwill' and Their Proactive Cooperation on War. 2024; 130 : 259-293.
Ko Yongjun. "How German Socialists Came to Support ‘the Great War': The Irony of Socialist ‘Goodwill' and Their Proactive Cooperation on War" military history no.130(2024) : 259-293.
