AHC: Karl Marx elected Chancellor of Germany
- Thread starter GriffinFTW
- Start date
Likely the conservative Prussian elements of the state/army would move to depose him
... I can't answer the question without asking how he got there.
Like seriously. The guy was an exile living in Britain. He wasn't even a member of any party in Germany. The closest I can imagine him coming to power would be on the back of some sort of liberal revolution occurring in 1848 and the working class couping the liberals either immediately or shortly after. Cue a bloody war and Marx ending up as Chairman of the Deutsches Volksrepublik sometime in the 1860's, then since it involves real money and business and shit, he'd probably leaving the job of implementing it all to Engels...
Like seriously. The guy was an exile living in Britain. He wasn't even a member of any party in Germany. The closest I can imagine him coming to power would be on the back of some sort of liberal revolution occurring in 1848 and the working class couping the liberals either immediately or shortly after. Cue a bloody war and Marx ending up as Chairman of the Deutsches Volksrepublik sometime in the 1860's, then since it involves real money and business and shit, he'd probably leaving the job of implementing it all to Engels...
But would be damn intresting how a German communist state in this timeframe would look.
OK...
George IV lives another decade, continuing to be his fat, useless, spendthrift self. The Duke of Wellington rules with a reactionary fist as Prime Minister. All attempts at parliamentary reform never see the light of day. Victoria dies in infancy, and George's longer reign means that the moderate and popular William IV never gets in. When George finally dies, he is replaced by the (deeply unpopular) Ernst Augustus, the Duke of Cumberland.
Distaste for Ernest I leads to a Tory split. A moderate Tory-Whig Coalition tries to push through reform, only for it to be blocked and defeated. Amid riots, King Ernest embarks on a policy of brutal suppression. The moderate reformers find themselves helpless, and the more radical groups come to prominence. By the 1840s, Britain is on the brink of civil war.
Enter Karl Marx...
Er... the Republic after 1918 kept the job name of Chancellor.
There had been German Revolution in 1848-1849, like France had had one in 1848. But French Empire collapsed in a messy revolution 1870-1871.
Prussia had a major political crisis (purse power) before Bismarck, and his successes against Denmark.
How about a TTL where Bismarck´s iron and blood policy backfires, to collapse Prussia in 1862-1864 in a revolution more radical than 1848?
Even if the french revolution was more successful, it would not have turned into some kind of socialist government.
The biggest chaos France ever faced was the french revolution. Even at the time when the most extremist revolutionaries held power, they did not want any kind of socialist evolution. They even crushed the microscopic minority called the "hebertists" that could be quickly called "pre-socialists".
In 1848, they were very small socialist movements in France. It was impossible to have a socialist revolution in France because had universal suffrage and was a nation of small peasants that hated the distributionists.
This may be hard to understand today because so many french media and teachers promote left-wing ideas. But a very very wide majority of the french wanted to crush the commune of Paris in 1871.
They wanted to crush it because they refused any risk that Paris lead the country into chaos like it had done in the years of the first french revolution.
They wanted to crush it because they rejected what was done in Paris by the commune of Paris.
You just could not have a socialist revolution in 19th century countries that had not reached a level of industrial development that could create the conditions for a big socialist party. You can't have it in a country where rural small property is dominant.
The russian revolution was the exception that proves the rule. It needed the existence of immense aristocratic properties, the personal initiative of Lenin who invented the notion of militarily organized political party, and many specific russian conditions.
Given the military organization of Prussia, any socialist coup attempt would be crushed. And you won't have a socialist majority in Germany in the 19th century.
What would be left of that "military organization" after the budget crisis of Bismarck leads to his overthrow in 1860s (like Prussian military was overthrown, not by "socialists" but by liberals) in March 1848? If 1860s Prussia, instead of 3 victorious wars each couple of years has another overthrow of government and then a couple of years of liberal governments which cut the military budget, and carry out repeated purges? Could radicals/jacobins/socialists have a turn on power sometime then?
Why are we all assuming that TTL Marx would be a radical socialist anyway? He became more radical IOTL, but that was surely owed as much to the circumstances of his life as with any innate quality of the man. It's still a stretch to see it happening given the goals of the '48 revolution, but if we assume a) it is successful (meaning Marx becomes a left-wing journalist with good political connections) and b) German ultimately somehow ends up with a parliamentary system (that is harder, but at least thinkable), it's not at all implausible that he would join the governing class and moderate his views.
And especially if TTL German parliamentarism resembles that of 3rd Republic France at all, Marx being chancellor at some point is far from implausible.
And especially if TTL German parliamentarism resembles that of 3rd Republic France at all, Marx being chancellor at some point is far from implausible.
Imperial Germany had a parliamentary system. It wasn't a terribly powerful or useful one, but it was certainly there. And the Frankfurt Assembly actually offered the Prussian king the crown a constitutional monarchy, didn't they? At any rate, the problem with Wilhelmine constitutionalism was that the entire program was built to let Otto von Bismarck run the German state while only being accountable to the Kaiser. Diminish (or remove!) the influence of Bismarck in fashioning the German constitution and you likely have a very different political system.