Germany, officially Federal Republic of Germany, Country, north-central Europe. Area: 138,066 sq mi (357,592 sq km). Population: (2023 est.) 85,887,000. Capital: Berlin. The majority of the people are German
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Germany, officially Federal Republic of Germany, Country, north-central Europe. Area: 138,066 sq mi (357,592 sq km). Population: (2023 est.) 85,887,000. Capital: Berlin. The majority of the people are German. Language: German (official). Religions: Christianity (Protestant, Roman Catholic, other Christians); also Islam. Currency: euro. The land is generally flat in the north and hilly in the northeast and central region, rising to the Bavarian Alps in the south. The Rhine River basin dominates the central and western part of the country; other important rivers include the Elbe, Danube, and Oder. Germany has a developed free-market economy largely based on services and manufacturing. It is one of the richest countries in the world. Exports include motor vehicles and iron and steel products. Germany is a federal multiparty republic with two legislative houses; the head of state is the president, and the head of government is the chancellor. Germanic tribes entered Germany c. 2nd century BCE, displacing the Celts. The Romans failed to conquer the region, which became a political entity only with the division of the Carolingian empire in the 9th century CE. The monarchy’s control was weak, and power increasingly devolved upon the nobility, organized in feudal states. The monarchy was restored under Saxon rule in the 10th century, and the Holy Roman Empire, centring on Germany and northern Italy, was revived. Continuing conflict between the Holy Roman emperors and the Roman Catholic popes undermined the empire, and its dissolution was accelerated by Martin Luther’s revolt (1517), which divided Germany, and ultimately Europe, into Protestant and Catholic camps, culminating in the Thirty Years’ War (1618–48). Germany’s population and borders were greatly reduced, and its numerous feudal princes gained virtually full sovereignty. In 1862 Otto von Bismarck came to power in Prussia and in 1871 united the Germans, founding the German Empire. It was dissolved in 1918 after its defeat in World War I, and the Weimar Republic was declared. Germany was stripped of much of its territory and all of its colonies. In 1933 Adolf Hitler became chancellor and established a totalitarian state, the Third Reich, dominated by the Nazi Party. Hitler invaded Poland in 1939, plunging the world into World War II, and he was responsible for the Holocaust, the systematic killing of some six million Jews and millions of others. Following its defeat in 1945, Germany was divided by the Allies into four zones of occupation. Disagreement with the Soviet Union over their reunification led to the creation in 1949 of the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) and the German Democratic Republic (East Germany). Berlin, the former capital, remained divided. West Germany became a prosperous parliamentary democracy, East Germany a one-party state under Soviet control. In 1952 Germany became a founding member of the European Coal and Steel Community, the forerunner of the European Union. The East German communist government was overthrown peacefully in 1989, and Germany was reunited in 1990. A. Germany
The name Germany has long described not a particular place but the loose, fluid polity of Germanic-speaking peoples that held sway over much of western Europe north of the Alps for millennia. Although Germany in that sense is an ancient entity, the German nation in more or less its present form came into being only in the 19th century, when Prussian Prime Minister Otto von Bismarck brought together dozens of German-speaking kingdoms, principalities, free cities, bishoprics, and duchies to form the German Empire in 1871. This so-called Second Reich quickly became Europe’s leading power and acquired colonies in Africa, Asia, and the Pacific. That overseas empire was dismantled following Germany’s defeat in World War I and the abdication of Emperor William II. Economic depression, widespread unemployment, and political strife that verged on civil war followed, leading to the collapse of the progressive Weimar Republic and the rise of the Nazi Party under Adolf Hitler. After gaining power in 1933, Hitler established the Third Reich and soon thereafter embarked on a ruinous crusade to conquer Europe and exterminate Jews, Roma (Gypsies), homosexuals, and others. Rhine River
Zugspitze, Germany Zugspitze, Germany The major lineaments of Germany’s physical geography are not unique. The country spans the great east-west morphological zones that are characteristic of the western part of central Europe. In the south Germany impinges on the outermost ranges of the Alps. From there it extends across the Alpine Foreland (Alpenvorland), the plain on the northern edge of the Alps. Forming the core of the country is the large zone of the Central German Uplands, which is part of a wider European arc of territory stretching from the Massif Central of France in the west into the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Poland in the east. In Germany it manifests itself as a landscape with a complex mixture of forested block mountains, intermediate plateaus with scarped edges, and lowland basins. In the northern part of the country the North German Plain, or Lowland, forms part of the greater North European Plain, which broadens from the Low Countries eastward across Germany and Poland into Belarus, the Baltic states, and Russia and extends northward through Schleswig-Holstein into the Jutland peninsula of Denmark. The North German Plain is fringed by marshes, mudflats, and the islands of the North and Baltic seas. In general, Germany has a south-to-north drop in altitude, from a maximum elevation of 9,718 feet (2,962 metres) in the Zugspitze of the Bavarian Alps to a few small areas slightly below sea level in the north near the coast. It is a common assumption that surface configuration reflects the underlying rock type; a hard resistant rock such as granite will stand out, whereas a softer rock such as clay will be weathered away. However, this assumption is not always borne out. The Zugspitze, for example, is Germany’s highest summit not because it is composed of particularly resistant rocks but because it was raised by the mighty earth movements that began some 37 to 24 million years ago and created the Alps, Europe’s highest and youngest fold mountains. Another powerful force determining surface configuration is erosion, mainly by rivers. In the Permian Period (some 290 million years ago) an earlier mountain chain—the Hercynian, or Variscan, mountains—had crossed Europe in the area of the Central German Uplands. Yet the forces of erosion were sufficient to reduce these mountains to almost level surfaces, on which a series of secondary sedimentary rocks of Permian to Jurassic age (about 300 to 145 million years old) were deposited. The entire formation was subsequently fractured and warped under the impact of the Alpine orogeny. This process was accompanied by some volcanic activity, which left behind not only peaks but also a substantial number of hot and mineral springs. Dramatic erosion occurred as the Alpine chains were rising, filling the furrow that now constitutes the Alpine Foreland. The pattern of valleys eroded by streams and rivers has largely given rise to the details of the present landscape. Valley glaciers emerging from the Alps and ice sheets from Scandinavia had some erosive effect, but they mainly contributed sheets of glacial deposits. Slopes outside the area of the actual ice sheets—those under tundra conditions and unprotected by vegetation—were rendered less steep by the periglacial slumping of surface deposits under the influence of gravitation. Winds blowing over unprotected surfaces fringing the ice sheets picked up fine material known as loess; once deposited, it became Germany’s most fertile soil-parent material. Coarser weathered material was carried into alluvial cones and gravel-covered river terraces, as in the Rhine Rift Valley (Rhine Graben). People of Germany Oktoberfest The German-speaking peoples—which include the inhabitants of Germany as well as those of Austria, Liechtenstein, and the major parts of Switzerland and Luxembourg; small portions of France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Italy; and the remnants of German communities in eastern Europe—are extremely heterogeneous in their ethnic origins, dialectal divisions, and political and cultural heritage, in which the split between Protestantism and Roman Catholicism has played a significant role since the Protestant Reformation and Catholic Counter-Reformation in the 16th century. Throughout its history Germany has been characterized by a lack of clearly defined geographic boundaries. Both the area occupied by the German peoples and the boundaries of the German state (at such times as it existed) have fluctuated constantly. The German people appear to have originated on the coastal region of the Baltic Sea and in the Baltic islands in the Bronze and early Iron ages. From about 500 BCE they began to move southward, crushing and absorbing the existing Celtic kingdoms; from 58 BCE they clashed with Rome along the line of the Rhine and Danube rivers. With the fall of the Roman Empire, German peoples, predominantly under Frankish tribal leadership, closely settled a large area west of the Rhine River in what is still German territory; they also penetrated deeply into Belgium and areas that later became France. The Merovingian and Carolingian empires made no distinction between what are now France and western Germany, and thus it is understandable that Charlemagne (Karl der Grosse) is recognized as an important figure in the history of both countries. The weakness of Charlemagne’s successors was revealed in their inability to handle the waves of invaders that poured into the empire at the end of the 9th century. In despair, people turned to local leaders able to offer protection. In the German heartland the old tribal divisions still retained their validity, and the tribes looked for defense to an army of their own people, led by a duke. Indeed, the names of these dukedoms are still used for some of the German states (Länder), notably Bavaria, Thuringia, and (Lower) Saxony. In the 10th and 11th centuries they were brought under the power of a single monarch, but this precocious centralization did not survive. The dukedoms were progressively subdivided until Germany became notorious for its Kleinstaaterei—its swarm of frequently tiny states, each with its court borne on the backs of the peasantry. The states, and particularly their boundaries, were of considerable social and economic significance, introducing contrasts that are still somewhat perceptible. The rise of France extinguished most of Germanic control west of the Rhine, a process facilitated by German divisions; German dialects remain in use in France only in Alsace and parts of Lorraine. However, driven by population pressure during the Middle Ages, Germans cleared large areas of forest for the expansion of cultivation and extended their settlements far to the east. From about 800 in the south and about two centuries later in the centre and north, the Germans moved east in an advance that divided into three prongs: down the Danube through Austria, north of the Central German Uplands through Silesia, and along the Baltic shore. Between the prongs were the partially isolated Slavic areas of Bohemia and Poland; this development held the potential for conflict that lasted into the 20th century. Islands of German people were at various times established beyond the continuously settled area as far as the Volga. Many of their descendants later moved farther east into Asia under harsh decrees and policies instituted by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. Over the centuries these groups tenaciously retained their German language and culture History of Germany Ancient history Germanic peoples occupied much of the present-day territory of Germany in ancient times. The Germanic peoples are those who spoke one of the Germanic languages, and they thus originated as a group with the so-called first sound shift (Grimm’s law), which turned a Proto-Indo-European dialect into a new Proto-Germanic language within the Indo-European language family. The Proto-Indo-European consonants p, t, and k became the Proto-Germanic f, [thorn] (th), and x (h), and the Proto-Indo-European b, d, and g became Proto-Germanic p, t, and k. The historical context of the shift is difficult to identify because it is impossible to date it conclusively. Clearly the people who came to speak Proto-Germanic must have been isolated from other Indo-Europeans for some time, but it is not obvious which archaeological culture might represent the period of the shift. One possibility is the so-called Northern European Bronze Age, which flourished in northern Germany and Scandinavia between about 1700 and 450 BC. Alternatives would be one of the early Iron Age cultures of the same region (e.g., Wessenstadt, 800–600 BC, or Jastorf, 600–300 BC). Encyclopedia Britannica HomeGames & QuizzesHistory & SocietyScience & TechBiographiesAnimals & NatureGeography & TravelArts & CultureMoneyVideos Germany Home Geography & Travel Countries of the World History of Germany Ancient history Germanic peoples occupied much of the present-day territory of Germany in ancient times. The Germanic peoples are those who spoke one of the Germanic languages, and they thus originated as a group with the so-called first sound shift (Grimm’s law), which turned a Proto-Indo-European dialect into a new Proto-Germanic language within the Indo-European language family. The Proto-Indo-European consonants p, t, and k became the Proto-Germanic f, [thorn] (th), and x (h), and the Proto-Indo-European b, d, and g became Proto-Germanic p, t, and k. The historical context of the shift is difficult to identify because it is impossible to date it conclusively. Clearly the people who came to speak Proto-Germanic must have been isolated from other Indo-Europeans for some time, but it is not obvious which archaeological culture might represent the period of the shift. One possibility is the so-called Northern European Bronze Age, which flourished in northern Germany and Scandinavia between about 1700 and 450 BC. Alternatives would be one of the early Iron Age cultures of the same region (e.g., Wessenstadt, 800–600 BC, or Jastorf, 600–300 BC). Evidence from archaeological finds and place-names suggests that, while early Germanic peoples probably occupied much of northern Germany during the Bronze and early Iron ages, peoples speaking Celtic languages occupied what is now southern Germany. This region, together with neighbouring parts of France and Switzerland, was the original homeland of the Celtic La Tène culture. About the time of the Roman expansion northward, in the first centuries BC and AD, Germanic groups were expanding southward into present-day southern Germany. The evidence suggests that the existing population was gradually Germanized rather than displaced by the Germanic peoples arriving from the north. Solid historical information begins about 50 BC when Julius Caesar’s Gallic Wars brought the Romans into contact with Germanic as well as Celtic peoples. Caesar did cross the Rhine in 55 and 53 BC, but the river formed the eastern boundary of the province of Gaul, which he created, and most Germanic tribes lived beyond it. Direct Roman attacks on Germanic tribes began again under Nero Claudius Drusus Germanicus, who pushed across the Rhine in 12–9 BC, while other Roman forces assaulted Germanic tribes along the middle Danube (in modern Austria and Hungary). Fierce fighting in both areas, and the famous victory of the Germanic leader Arminius in the Teutoburg Forest in AD 9 (when three Roman legions were massacred), showed that conquering these tribes would require too much effort. The Roman frontier thus stabilized on the Rhine and Danube rivers, although sporadic campaigns (notably under Domitian in AD 83 and 88) extended control over Frisia in the north and some lands between the Rhine and the upper Danube. Encyclopedia Britannica
In the social market economy the government attempts to foster fair play between management and labour and to regulate the relationship between the capitalist participants in the market, particularly with regard to competition and monopolies. Works councils have been established, and workers have representation on the boards of businesses. The social market economy was created by policy makers with a vivid memory of market distortions and social tensions caused by the giant industrial trusts before 1939. Legislation against monopolies appeared in 1958 and has been criticized as ineffective. For example, it has proved impossible to restrict the indirect coordination, through which individuals, banks, and other financial institutions build up “diagonal” share holdings linking a range of firms that are nominally independent. Moreover, where a whole branch of industry has experienced difficulties (e.g., the Ruhr coal industry), even the federal government has encouraged concentration. The emergence of very large monopolistic firms has been unavoidable because, in an increasingly international economy, large firms that enjoy economies of scale are better positioned to survive. With globalization, governments are less able to regulate businesses at the national level or even at the transnational level of the EU. Germany Home Geography & Travel Countries of the World Economy of Germany The German constitution, the Basic Law (Grundgesetz), guarantees the right to own property, freedom of movement, free choice of occupation, freedom of association, and equality before the law. However, the constitution modified the operation of the unfettered free market by means of its “social market economy” (Soziale Marktwirtschaft). With a “safety net” of benefits—including health protection, unemployment and disability compensation, maternity and child-care provisions, job retraining, pensions, and many others—paid for by contributions from individuals, employers, and public funds, Germany has an economic order supported by most workers and businesses. In the social market economy the government attempts to foster fair play between management and labour and to regulate the relationship between the capitalist participants in the market, particularly with regard to competition and monopolies. Works councils have been established, and workers have representation on the boards of businesses. The social market economy was created by policy makers with a vivid memory of market distortions and social tensions caused by the giant industrial trusts before 1939. Legislation against monopolies appeared in 1958 and has been criticized as ineffective. For example, it has proved impossible to restrict the indirect coordination, through which individuals, banks, and other financial institutions build up “diagonal” share holdings linking a range of firms that are nominally independent. Moreover, where a whole branch of industry has experienced difficulties (e.g., the Ruhr coal industry), even the federal government has encouraged concentration. The emergence of very large monopolistic firms has been unavoidable because, in an increasingly international economy, large firms that enjoy economies of scale are better positioned to survive. With globalization, governments are less able to regulate businesses at the national level or even at the transnational level of the EU. The social market economy is regulated not exclusively by the federal government but by a plurality of agencies. For example, there are numerous insurance institutions that deliver social benefits. The most important institution in post-World War II Germany is the Frankfurt-based Deutsche Bundesbank (German Federal Bank). With memories of the runaway inflation of 1922–23, the West German government decided that it should never again have a license to print money and that the central bank should be independent of political control. Consequently, Germany’s adoption of the euro, the EU’s single currency, in 1999 raised some concerns in the country that the European Central Bank would be subject to political influence and manipulation. The Chambers of Trade, at every level of the administrative hierarchy, are also influential, and the state governments play a significant economic role (e.g., the government of North Rhine–Westphalia is intimately concerned with the survival of the Ruhr coal industry). Federal and state governments also participate in the ownership of some enterprises, notably public utilities. The Basic Law, however, prevents the arbitrary intervention of the central government. As Germany has numerous economic actors, a high degree of coordination has been required to achieve adequate growth, balanced foreign trade, stable prices, and low unemployment. A variety of consultative bodies unite federal and state governments, the Deutsche Bundesbank, representatives of business and of the municipalities, and trade unions. The Board of Experts for the Assessment of Overall Economic Trends, established in 1963 and known as the “five wise men,” produces an evaluation of overall economic developments each year to assist in national economic decision making. Moreover, the federal government submits an annual economic report to the legislature that contains a response to the annual evaluation of the Board of Experts and an outline of the economic and financial policies it is pursuing. Although the free market operates in Germany, the federal government plays an important role in the economy. It is accepted as self-evident that it should underwrite the capital and operating costs of the economic and social infrastructure, such as the autobahn network, waterways, the postal system and telecommunications, and the rail system. The federal government, the states, and the cities also contribute to the regional and local rapid transit systems. Government collaborates with industry in bearing the costs of research and development, as, for example, in the nuclear power industry. Federal intervention is particularly strong in the defense industry. The coal industry is perhaps the most notable example of subsidization, and agriculture has traditionally been massively protected by the state, though the sector is now governed by EU institutions. Regional planning is another significant field of government intervention; the federal government fosters economic developments in rural and industrial “problem” regions. States and cities also intervene with schemes to foster regional or local development. Germany has a varied tax system, with taxes imposed at the national, state, and local levels. Because of the generous system of social services, tax rates on corporations, individuals, and goods and services are all relatively high in comparison with other countries. Germany employs a system of tax equalization, through which tax revenues are distributed from wealthier regions to less-prosperous ones. After unification these transfers were resented among many western Germans. Modern economic history: from partition to reunification The West German system lignite pit lignite pit After the devastation of World War II, West Germany rebounded with a so-called “economic miracle” that began in 1948. The subsequent combination of growth and stability made West Germany’s economic system one of the most respected in the world, though it began to suffer strains beginning in the 1990s, exacerbated by the costs of unification. Germany’s remarkable economic performance was largely a result of effective economic management, but temporary factors were especially important in spurring economic growth in the immediate post-World War II era. In particular, a large force of unemployed workers—returned servicemen and displaced persons—were available and eager to rebuild their own lives and willing to work hard at a rate of remuneration that left a considerable investment surplus in their employers’ hands. In addition, the country reaped benefits from the joint economic planning for the American, British, and French zones of occupation that culminated in the vital and essential currency reform that introduced the deutsche mark in June 1948 and the U.S.-financed Marshall Plan (1948–52), which helped to rebuild war-torn Europe. From 1951 to 1961 West Germany’s gross national product (GNP) rose by 8 percent per year—double the rate for Britain and the United States and nearly double that of France—and exports trebled. Despite some occasional economic downturns (e.g., during the oil crisis of 1973–74), West Germany’s economy followed an upward trend. Indeed, when East and West Germany reunited in 1990, West Germany’s economy was enjoying a cycle of business expansion that had lasted since the early 1980s and continued into 1992. By that time Germany had one of the largest economies in the world and was a leader in world trade. All this was achieved while maintaining low inflation. The East German system East Germany also had experienced an economic miracle of sorts. Unlike the other Soviet-style states of eastern Europe, East Germany had been part of an advanced capitalist economy before the war, which gave it a considerable advantage in reconstruction. Even though it had emerged from World War II and the postwar Soviet demolitions economically ravaged, its surviving industrial infrastructure, inherited skills, and high level of scientific and technical education enabled it to develop the economy and to advance the standard of living to a level markedly higher than those of most other socialist countries, though living standards were still well below those of western Europe. East Germany became the principal supplier of advanced industrial equipment to the communist countries, though it became apparent after unification that it produced poor quality goods and caused environmental devastation. East Germany had a command economy, in which virtually all decisions were made by the governing communist party, the Socialist Unity Party (SED). The system of planning was inflexible and eventually caused ruinous economic conditions. Power, influence, and personal connections (Beziehungen, or “vitamin B”) drove economic decisions, and all groups, including trade unions, were expected to collaborate to achieve the SED’s economic objectives. Download 1.17 Mb. Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: 
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