The Current of Neoromanticism in the Weimar Republic: the Re-enchantment of Science and Technology (2014)
Panoutsopoulos, Grigoris (Author)
HOST: Journal of History of Science and Technology
Volume: 9
Pages: 40-63
This study investigates the bidirectional relationship between the wider ideological and social context of the Weimar Republic with the particular characteristics that science and technology received during this period. Of catalytic importance in this interactive relationship were a set of ideas, metaphors, terms and emotionally charged references to German tradition, which became widely accepted from both the engineering and scientific communities, as well as the social currents, intellectuals and political carriers of the period. In order to describe this particular ideological tradition, the term Neoromanticism will be introduced ---the result of a blending of two ideological traditions, that of classical romanticism and that of Modernism, which were given a unique meaning by the various ideological, philosophical and social currents already established in Germany since the end of the nineteenth-century. Even though the Weimar Republic Neoromanticism shares many theoretical origins with classical Romanticism, such as Lebensphilosophie and a holistic view of nature, it displays substantial differences. It did not reject scientific modernity or technological progress, industrialized production nor the symbolism of the machine. Neoromanticism was formed under a national imperative: any anti-technological views would express a national weakness. Thus, Neoromanticism was an important catalyst for the social part and the meaning that was given to both science and technology in the Weimar Republic, since, despite the idealism and mysticism that dominated the ideological field, what was achieved was the formation of a context of legitimization of Germany's new main goals: rearmament and industrial rationalization. These goals would be accomplished only through the radical development of technology and science. Various facets of the ideological context of the period will be considered: in German intelligentsia, in philosophical and social currents, and in the scientific and engineering communities.
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