Land reform in Germany
There have been several land reforms in Germany, also known by the German term Bodenreform.
Reforms in the Kingdom of Prussia
- In 1763, Frederick II of Prussia abolished the serfdom on all Crown lands. Additionally, he issued an order to end the suppression of the peasant, relieving him and his children of domestic services to the landlord. His intentions were good – he believed that peasants should be well-treated in order to function properly. But, his reform did not have much effect, because the peasants had no land, and thus were forced to return to serving their previous lords in return to a right to till their lands.
- In 1798, Frederick William III of Prussia expressed his royal desire to see serfdom abolished throughout the kingdom, and permitted peasants to redeem their Corvée for cash payments. He also secured the rights of precarious tenants.
- In 1806, Prussia was defeated by Napoleon I and lost half its territory in the second of the Treaties of Tilsit. This was the trigger to the Prussian reforms, whose main goal was to modernize the Prussian state so that it may regain its lost power. As part of these reforms, serfdom was legally abolished throughout the kingdom. The peasant was allowed to become a free proprietor of land, if only he could buy it. Since peasants had no money, they were allowed to pay for the land by giving up their rights to assistance from their landlords and giving up their rights to use common lands for grazing. Alternatively, they could "pay" by giving some of their lands to their landlords. The net outcome was that the peasants' situation has worsened - they had less land to till, and no access to common lands. On the other hand, the nobles managed to buy much of the peasants' lands and gained exclusive access to the common lands, so land holding became more concentrated - just the opposite of what the reformers intended.
- Over the next three decades, the government made it easier for peasants to buy land, as part of a sweep towards liberal sentiment in much of western Europe.
- After the Revolutions of 1848 in the German states, peasants refused to pay their remaining obligations to their landlords. Most of these obligations were legally abolished at 1850. The price for redeeming land was set at 25 times its annual revenue, and peasants could buy land by taking mortgages from banks.
- In 1850, Prussia began its settlement-policies with the Gesetz zur Erleichterung der Ablösung durch Rentengutsverfahren. The Bauernregeln of 1859 forbid the monopolization of land by landlords.
From 1850 to 1945
Reform theories
Due to technological, medical and agricultural advances, the population of Germany rapidly grew and urbanized in the 19th century. Land reforms began to be discussed in Europe in the 1830s by various influential social economists such as Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Karl Kautsky and Eduard Bernstein.
An early proponent of land reform in Germany was Hermann Gossen with his 1854 book Die Entwicklung der Gesetze des menschlichen Verkehrs und der daraus fließenden Regeln für menschliches Handeln. The Austrian Theodor Hertzka published the utopian novel Freiland, ein soziales Zukunftsbild[1] (Freeland - A Social Anticipation)[2] in 1889, promoting emigration to the "empty" new world. In opposition against this, Franz Oppenheimer published Freiland in Deutschland (Freiland in Germany) in 1894 arguing for cooperative-based settlements in Germany. Both agreed that it was possible to overcome capitalism not through political conquest but by cooperative economic subversion which would naturally lead to social justice.[3] Although critical of their theories, Freiland can be seen in the tradition of Owenism and Fourierism and paralleled opinions of Marx and Engels. It was also highly influencial towards the founding document of Zionism, Der Judenstaat (The Jewish State), authored by Theodor Herzl in 1896. He also published a direct reply to Oppenheimer in his 1902 Altneuland (The Old New Land). In 1911 they were tasked with the creation of Merhavia by the Zionist Congress, which later became a successful Moshav and Kibbutz.
Inspired by the reform theories, the late 18th century also featured the parallel developement of hundrets[4] of ideologically motivated[5] settlements which were sometimes funded cooperatively or through the government.
Government actions
In 1886 an Ansiedelungskomision was created in the provinces of Posen and Westpreußen, which bough knight's estates and transformed them into settlements. In 1914 such counted 29053 settlements with 174000 inhabitants, but only 7089 of which were settlements of agriculture workers.[6]
Around 1900, began the de-tanglement of dense cityscapes through suburbs, allotment gardens and garden cities. Administrative infrastructure like centers of counseling, annuity banks and cooperative societies were created, and publications were collected in the Archiv für innere Kolonisation beginning in 1908. In the beginning of WWI began ideas for the accommodation of soldiers returning from war like settlements for war invalids, soldiers-homesteads and peace-cities, as well as the interior colonisaiton on a larger scale.[7]
The Reichssiedlunggesetz was passed in 1919 after the war. In this was, around 16172 ha of marshes and wasteland were transformed into 1761 new settlements between 1919 and 1928.[8] To hasten the resettlement of refugees from Poland the Flüchtungssiedlungsgesetz was passed 1923, leading to the relocation of about 2500 refugees.
Although settlements had been discussed as means to relief urban poverty since 1918, results were "sobering".[7] Only 26343 new settlements were created between 1919 and 1928, 21602 of them in Prussia. The Landlieferungssoll of 1413706 ha was fulfilled by only 25%. In 1931 three new laws were passed in order to create 100000 new settlements. [9] But the cabinet was overturned in May 1932 due to "Settlement-Bolshevism".
After World War II
The land reforms in both East and West Germany had three main goals:
- end the conservative political influence of land barons.
- reallocate and integrate refugees from the former eastern territories and citizens ousted by bombings.[10][11]
- enforce greater flexibility and efficiency in short term agricultural production[12]
The communist Bodenreform in East Germany nationalised all private property exceeding an area of 100 hectares, and redistributed it to publicly owned estates.[13]
Since 1990, after German reunification, some Junkers tried to regain their former estates through civil lawsuits, but the German courts have upheld the land reforms and rebuffed all claims for compensation.[14]
See also
Notes
- Theodor Hertzka: Freiland - ein soziales Zukunftsbild, Leipzig 1890 – Summary on the website of the Otto-Lilienthal-Museum.
- Theodor Hertzka: Freeland - A Social Anticipation, St. Loyes, Bedford, June, 1891. Book online at Project Gutenberg.
- Meyer-Renschhausen & Berger 1998, p. 267.
- Conti, Christoph (1984). Abschied vom Bürgertum. Alternative Bewegungen in Deutschland von 1890 bis heute (in German). Reinbeck.
- Feuchter-Schawelka 1998, p. 232.
- Feuchter-Schawelka 1998, p. 227.
- Feuchter-Schawelka 1998, p. 228.
- Die Deutsche ländliche Siedlung. Formen. Aufgaben. Ziele. Preussisches Ministerium für Landwirtschaft, Domänen und Forsten, 2. Aufl. Berlin 1931, p. 4
- Die Deutsche ländliche Siedlung. Formen. Aufgaben. Ziele. Preussisches Ministerium für Landwirtschaft, Domänen und Forsten, 2. Aufl. Berlin 1931, p. 3 & 206
- Häbich, Theodor (1947). Das Recht der Landlosen in der US-Zone (in German). Frankfurt am Main. p. 6
- Bode 1947, p. 6 f.
- Bode 1947, p. 14 ff.
- Bauerkämper 1996, p. 51 ff.
- Karlsruhe: Keine Rückgabe wegen Bodenreform-Enteignungen. In: Handelsblatt, 2004-12-01.
Further reading
In German
- Feuchter-Schawelka, Anne (1998). "Siedlungs- und Landkommune-Bewegung". In Kerbs, Diethart; Reulecke, Jürgen (eds.). Handbuch der deutschen Reformbewegungen 1880-1933. Wuppertal: Peter Hammer Verlag. pp. 227–244. ISBN 3-87294-787-7.
- Meyer-Renschhausen, Elisabeth; Berger, Hartwig (1998). "Bodenreform". In Kerbs, Diethart; Reulecke, Jürgen (eds.). Handbuch der deutschen Reformbewegungen 1880-1933. Wuppertal: Peter Hammer Verlag. pp. 265–276. ISBN 3-87294-787-7.
- Bauerkämper, Arnd, ed. (1996). Junkerland in Bauernhand?. Stuttgart: Steiner. ISBN 3-515-06994-1.
- Bode, August (1947). Bodenreform. Offenbach: Bollwerk-Verlag.
In English
- Powelson, John (1987). The Story of Land - [A World History of Land Tenure and Agrarian Reform]. Cambridge, MA, USA: Lincoln Institute of Land Policy. pp. 103–106. ISBN 0899462189.