The alternative culture : the socialist labor movement in Imperial Germany

This is a study of the social-cultural milieu of the Social Democratic labor movement in the era between the 1860s and the outbreak of the First World War. It is an attempt to describe and interpret those aspects that tended to create within the Social Democratic labor movement an alternative culture in which organized workers could fulfill their needs for companionship, sociability, recreation, learning, and aesthetic satisfaction. Although the book does not focus on the organizations of the Social Democratic party and free trade unions themselves, they constitute the larger and vital framework for the endeavors discussed in the following chapters. The role of Social Democracy as a political party within the Imperial, state, and municipal systems has been the subject of innumerable inquiries, and that history is included here only insofar as it is essential for explicating the other activities in the world of the socialist labor movement. The same is true of the free trade unions whose growth after 1891 and predilection for amalgamation and centralization created a reasonably stable organizational core around which organized workers could establish other types of voluntary associations. A special social-cultural milieu emerged, first chiefly around the socialist-oriented political organizations of the 1860s and 1870s. Trade unions, small and struggling, played a minor role in shaping that environment until the mid-1890s, when they became increasingly important. In the first decade after the turn of the century unions influenced to a large degree the quality of the labor-movement milieu Introduction: The Social-Cultural Milieu of the German Labor Movement 2. Labor Movement Associations: Growth, Structure, and Composition 3. Club Life 4. Festivals 5. Songs 6. The Uses of Poetry and Drama 7. Teaching and Learning 8. Conclusion: The Labor Movement Milieu and Its Meaning Appendices A. List of Complete Festival Programs B. Sample Festival Programs C. Educational Programs Notes Bibliography Index This book is a study of the social and cultural aspects of the German Social Democratic labour movement in the era between the 1860s and the outbreak of World War I.