The Federal Republic of Germany (German: Bundesrepublik Deutschland) is one of the world's leading industrialized countries, located in central Europe. Germany is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark and the Baltic Sea, to the east by Poland, and the Czech Republic, to the south by Austria and Switzerland, and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium and the Netherlands. Transversed by the Rhine, Danube, and Elbe rivers, Germany has sat at the crossroads of European trade and cultural routes.

A federal union of 16 states (Länder), Germany did not become unified until 1871, though the German language and culture have a much longer history. For centuries, until 1806, Germany was a collection of states enjoying large autonomy within the Holy Roman Empire. A confederacy was formed that lasted from 1815 to 1867. Under Otto von Bismarck, a unified Germany rapidly industrialized, but its quest for European pro-eminence was thwarted by its defeat in World War I. The post-war indemnities forced by the Allies led to the rise of Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party, which ultimately plunged Germany (and the rest of the world) into World War II. Germany was again defeated and occupied by the Allies, but the Cold War split the country into pro-Western bloc West Germany and Soviet-supported East Germany. With the collapse of communism, the two Germanys reunited under the Federal Republic in 1990, though differences between east and west, along with chronic unemployment and slowing economic growth continue to challenge the country.

Germany has the world's third largest economy, behind the United States and Japan, and is noted for its iron, steel, machinery, and automobile industries. Germany is a founding member of the European Union, and its largest member state with respect to population, and is also a member of the United Nations, NATO, and the G8.

Bundesrepublik Deutschland

(Flag) (Coat of Arms)
National motto: Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit (German: Unity and Justice and Freedom)
Official language	German1
Capital	Berlin
Largest City	Berlin
Chancellor	Gerhard Schröder
President	Horst Köhler
Area - Total - % water	Ranked 61st 349,223 km² 2.416%
Population - Total (2004) - Density	Ranked 13th 82,531,700 242/km²
Formation Unification	Treaty of Verdun (843) January 18, 1871 May 23, 1949 October 3, 1990
GDP - Total (2003) - GDP/capita	Ranked 3rd $2.271 trillion $27,600
Currency	Euro (€)2
Time zone - in summer	CET (UTC+1) CEST (UTC+2)
National anthem	Das Lied der Deutschen
Internet TLD	.de
Calling Code	+49
1 Danish, Low German, Sorbian, Romany and Frisian are officially recognized and protected as minority languages per the ECRML. 2 Prior to 1999: Deutsche Mark.

History

While the German language and the feeling of "Germanhood" go back more than a thousand years, the state now known as Germany was unified as a modern nation-state only in 1871, when the German Empire, dominated by the Kingdom of Prussia, was forged. This was the second German Reich, usually translated as "empire", but also meaning "realm".

From the Age of Charlemagne to the German Empire: 800-1871. The first Reich – known for much of its existence as the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation – stemmed from a division of the Carolingian Empire in 843. It was characterised by the continuous fragmentation of its constituent states until its demise. In the Middle Age, the Hanseatic League was an important vector for German influence in Northern Europe. In 1530, the Protestant Reformation established a separate church that was acknowledged as a new state religion in many states of Germany. This led to inter-German strife and the Thirty Years War (1618) that resulted in a drastically enfeebled and politically disunited Germany. It was thus unable to resist the stroke of the Napoleonic Wars, during which the Reich was overrun and dissolved (1806). The collapse of Napoleon's empire did not restore it, however, and a loose German Confederation was established instead.

German Empire: 1871-1918. The second Reich, i.e. the German Empire, was proclaimed in Versailles on January 18th, 1871, after the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, Austria having withdrawn from German affairs in the aftermath of the Austro-Prussian War. It was the first German nation-state and marks the unification of the Germany's diverse principalities. The German Empire, now a major European power, began to establish colonies in Africa. The 1890s were marked by the beginning of an armaments race with Great Britain.

World War I: 1914-1918. In the First World War, the German Empire fought on the side of the Austro-Hungarian Empire against, chiefly, France, Great Britain and the Russian Empire. On the Western front, it soon became a war of position with bloody battles, while in the east no decisive victories were won. On the Eastern front, Russia surrendered to the Germans after the Russian Revolutions; but since the United States entry into the war in 1917, the strength relations between the combatants had turned in the favor of the Allies, and the favourable peace treaty of Brest-Litovsk was overturned when, in November 1918, Germany surrendered to the Western Allies, ultimately ending the world war. The harsh peace terms codified in the Treaty of Versailles caused resentment in the German population unprepared for the negative outcome.

Weimar Republic: 1918-1933. After the Kaiser had abdicated, the Spartacists proclaimed a Socialist Republic on the same evening as the Social Democrats proclaimed the Weimar Republic. In the following months a German Communist Party and several Freikorps were established to fight each other and the supporters of the Weimar Republic. However, on August 11, 1919, the federal Weimar Constitution ultimately came into effect. At this time the Nazi Party was also founded.

Chiefly due to extended post-war economic hardship, and a general unpreparedness for democracy, unrest and weak confidence in the new state characterized the 1920s, but also a flourishing cultural life and German science retaining its world-leading position. German voters increasingly supported anti-democratic parties, both right- and left-wing. Anti-modernism and political reaction appealed to the voters. The situation detoriated further after the world wide Great Depression, and in two extraordinary elections of 1932, the most aggressive anti-parliamentarian parties together got more than the half of the seats, with 37% and then 33% of the votes to the Nazi Party, and about 16% of the votes to the Communists.

The end of the Weimar Republic came when on 30 January 1933, President Hindenburg appointed Adolf Hitler Chancellor of Germany with support from the center-right parties. A Reichstag fire was used as an excuse for abolishing civil and political rights, and with the Enabling Act, March 23, full legislative power was transferred to Hitler's government. A centralised totalitarian state was established that de facto was no longer based on the rule of law.

Third Reich: 1933-1945. The new regime quickly dissolved all trade unions, made Germany a one-party state, and repressed all opposition. From 1933 onwards, 412 concentration camps were set up for groups and people perceived as threats. Open persecution of Jews began. In 1934, the Nazi Party was purged of internal left-wing opposition, concentrated to the SA, in the Night of the Long Knives, ostensibly to end homosexual vices. In 1935 the Nuremberg race laws came into force: Jews were deprived of their German citizenship, were banned from marrying Germans, and locked out from most of society. Science and cultural life was hit by a massive brain drain. Many who had the opportunity chose exile, and of them who didn't, many died before Nazi rule was over.

In 1936, German troops entered the demilitarised Rhineland, violating the Versailles Treaty, but rebuilding national self-esteem. From 1938 onwards, Nazi Germany executed a policy of expansionism, starting with the annexation of Austria, followed by the Sudetes region in Czechoslovakia. In 1939, more of Czechoslovakia was annexed and a Slovakian puppet state was created of the remainder. To avoid a two-front war, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was concluded with the Soviet Union, which immediately led to a Blitzkrieg against Poland and World War II.

World War II: 1939-1945. In 1940, most of Western Europe was occupied, but Luftwaffe failed to defeat Britain. In 1941, Yugoslavia and Greece was conquered, then the Soviet Union was attacked, and in December war was declared also on the United States. Thereby, Hitler had engaged enemies ultimately too strong for Germany, which started to become obvious by the defeat in February 1943 at the Battle of Stalingrad. German cities increasingly became targets of Allied air attacks, and in 1945 all of Germany was occupied by the Allies, Hitler suicided, the war was over, and most of Europe's cities were mere ruins

The Allied occupation revealed for the world, and for the German public, the scale of the racially motivated killing of civilians: chiefly Slavs from behind the Eastern Front and virtually all Jews from the territories in German hands. Figures for the genocide in the East remain controversial and diverging, but the figure 6 million for the Jews who lost their lifes in the death camps of the Holocaust is established.

Division of Germany: 1945-1990. The war resulted in large losses of territory and the expulsion of millions of Germans from what had been the German regions of Silesia and East Prussia. The remaining German territory was occupied by the victors. The city of Berlin, though lying in the Soviet zone, was partitioned among the four Allies as well, with West Berlin being controlled by the Western allies.

In 1949, during the Berlin Blockade, Western forces airlifted food and supplies into West Berlin, after it had been cut off from Soviet-controlled East Berlin. West Germany benefitted from the American Marshall Plan for the reconstruction of Europe after the war and was a founding state of the European Union. The reconstructed West Germany once again became one of the world's major economies. Rule of law and democracy were restored and stabilised to prevent a second Weimar Republic. After fierce initial anticommunism, openings were made towards the Soviet Union during Willy Brandt's chancellorship.

East Germany, by contrast, became one of the socialist satellite states of the Warsaw Pact. The flight of growing numbers of East Germans via West Berlin led on August 13, 1961, to East Germany erecting the Berlin Wall and a fortified border to West Germany.

Reunification: 1989/1990. During the summer of 1989, following growing unrest, large numbers of East German citizens took refuge in West German embassies in Central and Eastern European countries in the hope of emigrating to the West. The East German government's confusion grew during the autumn of 1989, as events all over the Warsaw Pact countries turned to the favour of proponents of democracy. On November 9th, the East German authorities unexpectedly allowed East German citizens to enter West Berlin and West Germany. Hundreds of thousands of people took advantage of the opportunity; new crossing points were opened in the Berlin Wall and along the border with West Germany. This marked the de facto end of East Germany.

On July 1st 1990, economic, currency and social union between the two Germanys prepared the way for a full union. The reunification of the two Germanys came into force on October 3rd, which was declared a national public holiday (German Unity Day).

Politics

Main article: Politics of Germany

Germany is a constitutional federal republic, whose political system is laid out in the 1949 constitution called Grundgesetz (Basic Law). It has a parliamentary system in which the head of government, the Bundeskanzler (Chancellor), is elected by the parliament.

Parliament. German Parliament is made up of the Bundestag and the Bundesrat. The supreme legislative body is the Bundestag (Federal Assembly), the lower house of Parliament, which is elected every four years. It in turn elects the Federal Chancellor (Bundeskanzler). The Bundesrat (Federal Council), the upper house of Parliament, represents the 16 federal states (Bundesländer) and cooperates in law-making and administering the federation. Its members are appointed by the individual Länder, or states. Lately, there has been much concern about the Bundestag and the Bundesrat blocking each other, making effective government very difficult.

Head of state. The function of head of state is performed by the Federal President (Bundespräsident). He is elected every five years by the Federal Assembly (the Bundestag plus the corresponding number of Länder representatives), and his powers are limited mostly to ceremonial and representative duties.

Federal Constitutional Court. The Federal Constitutional Court (Bundesverfassungsgericht), located in Karlsruhe, acts as the highest legal authority and ensures that legislative and judicial practice conforms with the Basic Law, the German constitution. It acts independently of the other state bodies but cannot act on its own behalf.

Social welfare. Germany's social welfare system has deep roots, which go back to the strong bonds between individual and society which grew out of the Reformation, to the revival of the Prussian state after the 30 Years War, as well as to the early industrial revolution; and the welfare system remains one of the aspects of the German society of which most Germans are quite proud. The system provides for universal (but not government-run) medical care, unemployment compensation, child benefits, and other social needs. As in other Northern/Western European countries with similar systems, many economists consider a reform process of the Social security system to be necessary and this is currently (as of 2005) a major theme in domestic politics.

Foreign relations. Together with France, Germany plays a leading role in the European Union. Germany is at the forefront of European states seeking to advance the creation of a more unified and capable European political, defense, and security apparatus. In 1999 Chancellor Schröder's government broke with the German post-war tradition of keeping a notably low profile in international relations by sending German troops into combat for the first time since World War II, when it joined the Nato war against Yugoslavia. Currently, Germany also has troops stationed in Afghanistan. More recently, a German permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council has become one of Schröder's major foreign policy objectives.

Germany and France were protagonists of the coalition of nations opposing the 2003 military invasion of Iraq, which was led by the United States, together with a "Coalition of the Willing" including Poland, Spain, Italy, the United Kingdom Japan, and several other nations.

States

Main article: States of Germany

Germany is divided into sixteen states (in German called Bundesländer, singular Bundesland). It is further subdivided into 439 Kreise (districts) and cities (kreisfreie Städte) (2004).

Geography

Main article: Geography of Germany

The land. Since reunification of the two parts of the country Germany has resumed its traditional role as the major centre between Scandinavia in the north and the Mediterranean region in the south, as well as between the Atlantic west and the countries of Central and Eastern Europe.

The territory of Germany stretches from the high mountains of the Alps (highest point: the Zugspitze at 2,962 m) in the south to the shores of the North Sea in the north-west and the Baltic in the north-east. In between are found the forested uplands of central Germany and the low-lying lands of northern Germany (lowest point: Neuendorfer/Wilstermarsch at 3.54 meters below sea level), traversed by some of Europe's major rivers such as the Rhine, Danube and Elbe.

Thanks to its central situation Germany has more neighbours than any other European country; these are Denmark in the north, Poland and the Czech Republic in the east, Austria and Switzerland in the south, France and Luxembourg in the south-west and Belgium and the Netherlands in the north-west.

Climate. The greater part of Germany lies in the cool/temperate climatic zone in which humid westerly winds predominate.

In the north-west and the north the climate is extremely oceanic and rain falls all the year round. Winters there are relatively mild and summers comparatively cool.

In the east the climate shows clear continental features; winters can be very cold for long periods, and summers can become very warm. Here, too, long dry periods are often recorded.

In the centre and the south there is a transitional climate which may be predominantly oceanic or continental, according to the general weather situation.

There have been several large-scale river floodings in the last few years; while floods of such severity are quite rare in the long term, their frequency has been increasing lately, partly due to changes in land use in the flood plains.

Economy

Main article: Economy of Germany

Germany is the world's third largest economy measured by gross domestic product, placed behind the United States and Japan. As of 2004, Germany was also the world's largest exporter for the second year in a row, despite the skyrocketing strength of the euro. Its major trading partners include France, the United States, the United Kingdom, Italy and the Netherlands. A major issue of concern remains the persistently high unemployment rate - especially in the eastern Länder -, and partly as a result of it, weak domestic demand which slows down economic growth. However, when making international comparisons, one should never overlook the fact that Germany has had to shoulder the costs of reunifying two formerly separate parts of the country. According to Bert Rürup, head of Germany's Council of Economic Advisers, Unification is to blame for two-thirds of Germany's growth lag compared to its EU neighbours. In particular, until today eastern Germany lacks a solid base of small and medium-sized companies, which provided the foundation for West Germany's economic prosperity.

Agriculture. For many years now agriculture in Germany has been in a state of decline. Poor earnings and lack of profitability are counted to the main reasons for the failure of many medium and small concerns. The main crops grown are potatoes, wheat, barley, sugar beet and cabbage. Germany ranks among the world's largest producers of milk, milk products and meat.

Industrial sector. As in most other large economic nations, Germany's industrial sector has declined in favour of the service sector. Germany is among the world's largest and most technologically advanced producers of iron, steel, cement, chemicals, machinery, motor vehicles, machine tools and electronics, as well as a world leader in the shipbuilding industry. Major automakers like DaimlerChrysler and Volkswagen, and huge international corporations like Siemens rank among the world's largest firms.

Service sector. The service sector has grown steadily in recent years and now contributes the largest share of GDP. This sector includes tourism. As of 2004, the largest numbers of foreign visitors to Germany came from the Netherlands, followed by the United States and the United Kingdom.[1] (http://www.destatis.de/basis/e/tour/tourtab4.htm)

Natural resources. Germany is lacking in natural raw materials, if one disregards the hard coal deposits in the Ruhr area, in the Aachen district and in the Saarland, where mining is profitable only thanks to state subsidies. Brown coal from mines in the Leipziger Bucht and the Niederlausitz is still the major energy source in the eastern Länder, while mineral oil enjoys this position in the western Länder. The current red-Green coalition government is pursuing a long-term strategy of phasing out nuclear power in favour of renewable sources of energy.

Demographics

Main article: Demographics of Germany

The people. Germany has many large cities but only three with a population of one million or more (Berlin: 3 million, Hamburg: 1.8 million, Munich: 1.2 Million); the population is thus much less centralized and oriented towards a single large capital than in most other European countries. The largest cities are Berlin, Hamburg, Munich (München), Cologne (Köln), Frankfurt am Main, Stuttgart, Dortmund, Essen, Düsseldorf, Bremen, Duisburg and Hanover.

By far the largest urban conurbation is the Rhine-Ruhr region including the Düsseldorf-Cologne district. Leaving aside the metropolitan areas of the cities with over a million inhabitants, other large heavily populated areas are the Rhein-Main Region around Frankfurt/Main, Offenbach and Wiesbaden, the Stuttgart Region, the Rhine-Neckar region around Mannheim and Ludwigshafen, the Erzgebirge foothills around Chemnitz and Zwickau, the central Elbe valley around Dresden, the Halle-Leipzig area, as well as the catchment areas of Hanover and Nuremberg.

As of 31 December 2003, about 7.3 million non-citizen residents were living in Germany. By far the largest number came from Turkey, followed by Serbia and Montenegro, Italy, Greece, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Poland, Croatia, Austria, the United States, Macedonia and Slovenia [2] (http://www.destatis.de/basis/e/bevoe/bevoetab4.htm). About 2/3s of these have been in the country for more than 8 years, 20% were born in Germany; both groups qualify for citizenship after recent changes in immigration law (2002 data), if the individuals involved choose to apply for it (which regularly involves renunciation of previous citizenship(s)). Germany is still a primary destination for political and economic refugees from many developing countries, but the number of asylum seekers has been dropping in recent years, reaching about 50,000 in 2003. A new immigration law recently took effect (1 January 2005), which provides a more systematic treatment of immigration issues as well as increased support for German language classes for immigrants.

An ethnic Danish minority of about 50,000 people lives in Schleswig, mostly close to the Danish border, in the north; a small number of Slavic people known as the Sorbs lives in the states of Saxony (about 40,000) and Brandenburg (about 20.000). The Frisian language is mother tongue to about 12,000 speakers in Germany, the rest living in the Netherlands. In rural areas of Northern Germany Low Saxon is widely spoken.

There are also a large number of ethnic German immigrants from the former Soviet Union area (1.7 million), Poland (0.7 million) and Romania (0.3 million) (1980–1999 totals), who are automatically granted German citizenship, and thus do not show up in foreign resident statistics; unlike the foreigners they have been settled by the government almost evenly spread throughout Germany. Many of them speak the languages of their former resident countries at home.

Education. Germany has one of the world's highest levels of education. Since the end of World War II, the number of youths entering universities has more than tripled, but university attendance still lags behind many other European nations. In the annual league of top-ranking universities compiled by Shanghai Jiaotong University in 2004, Germany came 4th overall, but with only 7 universities in the top 100 (USA: 51). The highest ranking university, at no. 45, was the TU Munich.

Religion

Main article:Religion in Germany

Christianity is the major religion, with Protestants (particularly in the north and east) comprising 33% of the population and Catholics (particularly in the south and west) also 33%. In total more than 55 million people officially belong to a Christian denomination. Most German Protestants are members of the Evangelical Church in Germany. Independent and congregational churches exist in all larger towns and many smaller ones, but most such churches are small.

Roman Catholicism was Germany's top religion in the 15th century, but the Reformation changed this drastically. In 1517 Martin Luther challenged this religion as he saw it as a commercialisation of his faith. Through this, he altered the course of European and world history and established Protestantism, the largest denomination in Germany today.

In eastern Germany, there is much less religious feeling — probably the result of forty years of Communism — than in the West. Only 5% attend at least once per week, compared to 14% in the West according to a recent study (http://www.umich.edu/~newsinfo/Releases/1997/Dec97/r121097a.html). About 30% of the total population are officially religiously unaffiliated. In the East this number is also considerably higher.

Approximately 3.7 million Muslims (mostly of Turkish descent) live in Germany. Lately there have been heated discussions about the question of whether Muslim women working in public service, such as schoolteachers, should be allowed to wear headscarves to work or not.

Besides this there are a few hundred thousand Orthodox Christians, 400,000 New Apostolic Christians, numerous other small groups, and 160,000 Jews, of which around 100,000 belong to a synagogue.

Today Germany, especially its capital Berlin, has the fastest growing Jewish community worldwide. Some ten thousands of Jews from the former Eastern Bloc, mostly from ex-Soviet Union countries, settled in Germany since the fall of the Berlin wall. Prior to Nazism, about 600,000 Jews lived in Germany, most of them long-time resident families.

Culture

Main article: Culture of Germany

Germany's contributions to the world's cultural heritage are numerous, and the country is often known as das Land der Dichter und Denker (The Land of Poets and Thinkers). Germany was the birthplace of composers such as Beethoven, Bach, Brahms, Schumann and Wagner; poets such as Goethe and Schiller as well as Heine; philosophers including Leibniz, Kant, Hegel, Marx, Engels, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and Heidegger, theologians like Luther, authors including Hesse, Mann, Böll and Grass; scientists including Kepler, Haeckel, Einstein, Born, Planck, Heisenberg, Hertz and Bunsen; and inventors and engineers such as Gutenberg, Otto, Siemens, Braun, Daimler, Benz, Diesel and Linde. There are also numerous fine artists from Germany such as the Renaissance artist Dürer, the surrealist Ernst, the expressionist Marc, the conceptual artist Beuys or the neo expressionist Baselitz.

The German language was once the lingua franca of central, eastern and northern Europe, and remains one of the most popular foreign languages taught worldwide, in Europe it is the second most popular language after English.

The language has its origin in Old High German. Actually Germany had two languages: High German and Low German, which - from a lingustic standpoint - were two different languages. Whilst High German was subject to the so-called consonant shift, Low German was not. Today's standard language is based on High German rather than Low German, which has been given the status of a minority language by the European Union although it had almost become extinct in the early 20th century.

Many important historical figures, though not citizens of Germany in the modern sense, were nevertheless seen as Germans in the sense that they were immersed in the German culture, for example Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Franz Kafka and Stefan Zweig.

Since about 1970 Germany has once again had a thriving popular culture, now increasingly being led by its new old capital Berlin and the city of Hamburg, and a self-confident music and art culture. Germany is also well known for its many opera houses.

See also: Cuisine of Germany, German wine, Music of Germany, Public holidays: German Unity Day, Bundesliga, Goethe-Institut

Miscellaneous topics

• Holocaust
• Cost of unification of East and West Germany
• List of German towns
• List of German districts
• Historical Eastern Germany
• Communications in Germany
• Military of Germany
• Transportation in Germany
• Tourism in Germany
• Tax in Germany
• List of famous Germans
• List of English exonyms for German toponyms

External links

• Facts about Germany (http://www.facts-about-germany.de) — Official site published by the German Federal Foreign Office
• Deutschland.de (http://www.deutschland.de/home.php?lang=2) — Official German portal
• campus-germany.de