THE GERMAN CONCEPTION OF HISTORY
To James Luther Adams
The German Conception of History
THE NATIONAL TRADITION OF HISTORICAL
THOUGHT FROM HERDER TO THE PRESENT
By Georg G. Iggers
Revised Edition
Wesleyan University Press
MIDDLETOWN, CONNECTICUT
Copyright © 1968 by Wesleyan University, 1983 by Georg G. Iggers
All inquiries and permissions requests should be addressed to the Publisher, Wesleyan University Press, 110 Mt. Vernon Street, Middletown, Connecticut 06457
Distributed by Harper & Row Publishers, Keystone Industrial Park, Scranton, Pennsylvania 18512
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Iggers, Georg G.
The German conception of history.
Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
1. Germany—Historiography I. Title.
DD86.I34 1983 943'.0072 83-1337
ISBN 0-8195-6080-4
Manufactured in the United States of America
First printing 1968
First Wesleyan paperback edition 1983
Contents
Preface to the Revised Edition
II The Origins of German Historicism:
III The Theoretical Foundations of German Historicism I: Wilhelm von Humboldt
IV The Theoretical Foundations of German Historicism II: Leopold von Ranke
V The High Point of Historical Optimism—The “Prussian School”
VI The “Crisis of Historicism” I:
THE PHILOSOPHIC CRITIQUE: COHEN, DILTHEY, WINDELBAND, RICKERT, WEBER
VII The “Crisis of Historicism” II:
ERNST TROELTSCH AND FRIEDRICH MEINECKE
VIII The Decline of the German “Idea” of History:
THE IMPACT OF TWO WORLD WARS AND TOTALITARIANISM ON GERMAN HISTORICAL THOUGHT
Preface to the Revised Edition
Since this volume was first published, a good deal of rethinking has taken place in historical studies in the Federal Republic of Germany. Continuities with older traditions and outlooks persist, but a large number of historians have begun to look critically at their national past. This critical perspective has been accompanied by a reorientation in methodology, away from the narrowly person-oriented approach of traditional German historiography to a concern with the social context in which political history takes place. I very much felt that the new edition of The German Conception of History should reflect the transformation of historical conceptions since the 1960’s.
The chapter that has been added to the new edition by no means aims at completeness. It rather seeks to grasp the changes in style, outlook, and methodology that characterize the new historiography. It is difficult to reduce the new scholarship to a simple common denominator. There is much more diversity in the work of the historians of the 1960’s and 1970’s than in that of their predecessors. Nevertheless, there is an effort in much of the historical writing of the last twenty years to arrive at an understanding of Germany’s tragic past. Much of the new final chapter deals with this concern. This emphasis explains certain of the omissions of the chapter—as well as of the book generally—such as the neglect of the important literature on medieval and early modern history. It also explains the focus on the new critical social historians of politics at the expense of more traditional, narrative approaches which have gained in importance in recent years.
There are other omissions. The final chapter focuses on historical studies in the Federal Republic. This is justified by the theme of the book, the development and decline of what I have called “The German Conception of History.” There is, however, an international literature on modern Germany. The emigré historians of the 1930’s were among the first to analyze the German recent past critically. This examination has been carried on by a younger generation of economic, social, and intellectual historians in the United States, Great Britain, Israel, the German Democratic Republic, and elsewhere. There is need for a study of German historiography that transcends political borders and concentrates on problems and methods.
After fifteen years I naturally have certain second thoughts about this book. The book was never intended as a comprehensive survey of German historical studies. The original preface made clear that it dealt with the history of a specific politico-intellectual tradition which dominated historical writing at the university from the mid-nineteenth century until the 1960’s. The two recently published analyses of historical studies during the Weimar Republic by Hans Schleier and Bernd Faulenbach have demonstrated anew the dominance of this ideology over the German historical profession. But there were also at all times voices of dissent to the illiberalism of the establishment and to its narrow focus on politics. I was very much aware of the liberal, democratic traditions in Germany. But the historians of democratic persuasion were mostly outsiders to the profession. Nevertheless were I to rewrite the book I would give greater space to them. Similarly the important impulses for a critical social approach to history came from scholars who were either outside the discipline like Ludwig von Stein, Gustav Schmoller, or Max Weber, or entirely outside the university such as Karl Marx. Again the reader should be aware that alternative traditions and approaches existed. I have also learned a good deal from Fritz Ringer’s analysis of the German academic community, The Decline of the German Mandarins, which appeared in 1969, the year after my book did. To be sure, my book does not treat