Still a Monstrosity? Some Reflections on Early Modern German Statehood

Abstract

The German political scientist and philosopher, Samuel von Pufendorf, described the Holy Roman Empire in 1667 as a ‘monstrosity’, because it did not fit any of the recognized definitions of a state. The issue of the Empire's statehood has been the most important consideration in its historiography in recent decades: was it a state? If so, what kind? This review addresses these questions by examining how the debate on the Empire is related to wider controversies surrounding German history, the contemporary process of European integration, and about political organization in general. It explains how these debates are rooted in the political and religious disputes of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries that still influence how the history of the Empire is written today. The four principal modern interpretations are identified and assessed: the Empire as a ‘failed nation state’, as a federation, and, more recently, as an ‘Empire-State’ or a ‘Central Europe of the Regions’. The piece concludes by offering a new explanatory framework to assess the Empire's political development.

Revolutionary France and the Transformation of the Rhine

“…The absolute and relative decline of the river during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries does not support ideas emerging from other studies that the Empire could facilitate common action, enforce the collective will, or employ relatively efficient institutions. 66 Strong revisionist arguments have been advanced in favor of the old Reich's economic performance and, by extension, its overall structure. Applying the arguments of the new institutional economics (NIE) to the later Empire, Oliver Volckart's work has been influential over the past decade in rehabilitating scholarly perceptions of the Empire as a framework that could and did promote economic prosperity.…”

Mitteleuropa in East-Central Europe

“…27 As Peter Wilson points out, 'Political philosophers, such as Samuel Pufendorf, called the Old Reich [i.e. the Holy Roman Empire] "monstrum" (an irregular state body like a monster)' (Wilson 2006). 28 On the development of social services, see Tomka (2004).…”

Reason of State, Stände, and Estates in German and English Exchanges over the Crisis in the Palatinate, 1618–24

“… 3 For questions concerning the status of the Holy Roman Empire as a modern state, see P. H. Wilson, 2006, esp. 566 for the problem of Aristotle.…”