Rural Protest In The Weimar Republic: The Free Peasantry In The Rhineland And Bavaria (st Antony's/macmillan Series)

This is a study of the radical peasant trade union which thrived in parts of south and west Germany in the 1920s. The Free Peasantry, as it was known, challenged the authority of the state through food delivery strikes, a separatist putsch which ended in bloodshed. After the First World War peasants in south and west Germany campaigned to defend their economic position. They did so on their own account and not as tools of the Prussian Junkers. One radical organisation was the Free Peasantry, which thrived in the Bavarian Palatinate on the Rhine and led agitation further north and in southern Bavaria. Its peasant demagogues whipped up strong feelings in the farmers and wine-growers about state agricultural policy and parliamentary government. The results were peasant refusal to deliver produce, angry marches on government offices, and mass ceremonies to symbolise the peasants' plight. One political consequence was a separatist putsch in the Palatinate, followed by the gory assassination of the Free Peasant president by German nationalist paramilitaries. Another was a growing link between peasant discontent and the appeal of Hitler. The Nazis took over all the peasant organisations, including what remained of the Free Peasantry, and destroyed them. Front Matter....Pages i-xiv Introduction....Pages 1-4 The Peasants of the South and West....Pages 5-12 The Bavarian Palatinate....Pages 13-29 The Birth of the Free Peasantry....Pages 30-56 The Free Peasantry and the Controlled Economy....Pages 57-93 The Free Peasantry and Separatism....Pages 94-119 The End of the Free Peasantry....Pages 120-152 Conclusion....Pages 153-156 Back Matter....Pages 157-224 Jonathan Osmond. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 201-214) And Index.