Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- List of Abbreviations
- Chapter One The Peculiarity of German History: Handicraft versus Handwerk
- Chapter Two Hamburg: A German Hometown?
- Chapter Three In Search of Hamburg Handwerk: Figures and Forms
- Chapter Four The Handicraft Occupational Estate in the Crisis of the Weimar Republic
- Chapter Five A Constitution without Decision
- Chapter Six From the Politics of Barter to Volksgemeinschaft
- Conclusion: Continuity in German History Revisited
- References
- Index
Chapter Three - In Search of Hamburg Handwerk: Figures and Forms
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 May 2019
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- List of Abbreviations
- Chapter One The Peculiarity of German History: Handicraft versus Handwerk
- Chapter Two Hamburg: A German Hometown?
- Chapter Three In Search of Hamburg Handwerk: Figures and Forms
- Chapter Four The Handicraft Occupational Estate in the Crisis of the Weimar Republic
- Chapter Five A Constitution without Decision
- Chapter Six From the Politics of Barter to Volksgemeinschaft
- Conclusion: Continuity in German History Revisited
- References
- Index
Summary
Statistical uniformities constitute understandable types of action, and thus constitute sociological generalizations, only when they can be regarded as manifestations of the understandable subjective meaning of a course of social action […] There are statistics of processes devoid of subjective meaning […] But only when the phenomena are meaningful do we speak of sociological statistics. (Max Weber)
The particular German transition from corporations is essential for an understanding of the ideas and organizational forms upon which German master artisans drew […] Corporate institutions provided a continuity over time which sustained this identity. (Geoffrey Crossick and Heinz-Gerhard Haupt)
In late 1927, Franz Schubert, an engineer by trade, submitted a legal brief to the Hamburg Administrative Court contesting the fact that he had been forced to become a member of the city's Locksmiths and Mechanical Engineers Guild. According to the German Business Ordinance (Gewerbeordnung), handicraft guilds could constitute themselves as mandatory organizations whenever a majority of eligible craftsmen in a locality had so voted. Schubert objected that such compulsion violated his right to free economic combination under the Weimar Constitution. He wished instead to join the Association of Iron Industrialists (Verband der Eisenindustriellen), which he claimed had a more advantageous collective bargaining agreement with its workers. The Court rejected his arguments. It responded that the state had not established mandatory guilds simply to pursue business affairs and protect the interests of employers, but to further social, educational and cultural goals of national importance. It was therefore inappropriate for any individual to argue that such institutions were unconstitutional. Schubert had no other choice than to honor his legal obligation, regardless of his personal preferences.
Engineer Schubert's case was not unique. Ever since the Reich had established handicraft chambers and mandatory guilds in an 1897 amendment (Handwerkernovelle) to the Business Ordinance, the legal distinction between handicraft and industry had been an issue of great controversy in artisanal, employer, labor and political circles. Since the law itself had not differentiated the two productive sectors, chambers and guilds often took matters into their own hands, enrolling enterprises in their organizations as they saw fit.
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- Information
- Hometown HamburgArtisans and the Political Struggle for Social Order in the Weimar Republic, pp. 103 - 156Publisher: Anthem PressPrint publication year: 2019