L’État national allemand : configurations historiques et potentialités (1815-1990)

Abstract

If we wish to place within a long-term historical perpective the turning point represented by the recent German unification, this transformation, from the economic and demographic point of view, appears as the culmination of a long and steady evolution, going back to the beginning of the 19th century. This evolution was affected first by the economic transformation, then by political upheavals. With the development of the industrial revolution in Europe, a concentration of economic and human potential takes place in the central and western regions of the 1871 Reich, to the detriment of the east. The political upheavals ensuings from the two world wars confirm and amplify this shrinking surface area of the German nationstate, increasingly cut off from its eastern marches. Now that unity has been regained within frontiers which correspond roughly to those of the Germanic area often centuries ago, the new Germany, firmly rooted in the European Union cannot but re-establish its links with the Slav world, which is itself in the process of total recomposition.