Elections, Mass Politics, and Social Change in Modern Germany: New Perspectives

 

Edited by

Larry Eugene Jones and James Retallack

 

 

Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press,

cloth 1992, paperback 2002

 

 

 

Opinion

 

 

The contributions here address German political culture, broadly conceived, from the Kaiserreich to the Third Reich from a variety of perspectives, reflecting the eclectic trends in the current historiography of modern Germany: heavily empirical and quantitative pieces, for example, sit side by side with contributions utilizing post-structural analytical techniques. Detailed case studies are juxtaposed with attempts to address broad trends and the national electorate. As a whole, the collection aims to conceive of politics more broadly, through the lenses of gender, generation, region, locality, language, and religion. [M]ore than one essay [offers] a new or expanded definition of politics to include social space and arenas where the interaction between the social and political may occur, suggesting the possibility of a more inclusive history of mass politics. These are major issues which point to exciting and innovatory research in the future.

 

 – Lynn Abrams, European History Quarterly 25, no. 1 (January 1995): 135-6.

 

 

[T]here can be little doubt that the focus of many historians of modern Germany on social history, the history of everyday life (Alltagsgeschichte), and cultural history has tended to shove to the side the arena of elections and politics. However, this volume unabashedly brings the political back and clearly indicates that the study of elections and politics is alive and well in Germany, Britain, and United States. Indeed, the range of methodological approaches included in this book is what makes it a particularly important contribution: it insists that there can be many different responses to old questions and that other new questions must be asked if we are to have a complete understanding of what constitutes politics.

 

– Robert G. Moeller, Journal of Social History (Fall 1994): 203-4.

 

 

This well-produced and thoughtfully edited collection comprises the majority of contributions presented during a 1990 conference at the University of Toronto.... [Of the] papers in this volume, most are theoretically sophisticated and almost all highly original in the material they present.

 

– Lawrence D. Stokes, Canadian Journal of History 29 (April 1994): 226-9.

 


 

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Last Updated: 1 November 2021.