Remaking German Socialism during the Great War (IN PERSON)

Join us for a lecture in cooperation with the Modern German History Seminar (IHR) given by Benjamin Ziemann (University of Sheffield).

Remaking German Socialism during the Great War: The Social Democratic Party between Opposition to War and National Integration, 1914–1918

By 1912, the German Social Democratic Party (SPD) was the largest socialist party in the world. Yet when war was imminent in July 1914, the party failed to mobilize effectively against it. Instead, on 4 August 1914, the party approved war credits in the German parliament and signed up to a domestic political truce, the Burgfrieden. The talk will explain the reasons for this decision, discuss the relation between socialist opposition to war and national integration, and analyse the process by which German social democracy splintered during the war.

Benjamin Ziemann is Professor of Modern German History at the University of Sheffield. He is the author of seven books and co-editor of numerous volumes, including the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of Nazi Germany. He is currently completing a major study on German labour during the Great War, which will be published as Vom Burgfrieden zur Novemberrevolution: Arbeiter und Arbeiterbewegung 1914–1918 by J. H. W. Dietz Nachf.