all their assets.36 As Peter Melichar once expressed in a conversation, the “aryanisation” files contained the most complete material on the cultural history of the (so-called Jewish) middle classes of the interwar period. The “aryanisations” undoubtedly created a much more profound break in the continuity of the bourgeois world that could be followed up to this point and now came to an end, destroyed by flight and, in the worst cases, by deportation to Theresienstadt and Auschwitz.
The major ruptures that took place in 1918, 1938, and 1945 can therefore be interpreted as three stages on the path to the post-bourgeois era – in the first, the Austrian bourgeoisie lost much of its economic power, and then – in the second starting 1938 – large sections of this bourgeoisie (the large Jewish portion) lost their property, homeland, and – all too often – their lives. In the third, after 1945, the former Great German-Liberal bourgeoisie experienced a similar – albeit nowhere near as catastrophic – deprivation.
Let us therefore assume that those classes that dominated “bourgeois” society in the 19th century largely lost their livelihoods in 1918, 1938, and 1945. Did the end of fascism, national socialism, and communism bring about a renaissance of the bourgeoisie? There are continuities in quite a few families, as well as enterprises, but family companies in particular tend to be unable to continue operating as such after a few generations. The bourgeoisie cannot be reconstructed as an economically, intellectually, and culturally dominating class in the style of the German-liberal bourgeoisie of the second half of the 19th century.
I return to the statements about the civil society made at the beginning of this essay. Put in a nutshell, the question is: How many traditional bourgeoisie does a democratic, civil society of free “citizens” need if it is to function successfully? Was the great crisis of 1914–1918 so catastrophic because it hit the bourgeoisie so severely? And was the inability of the new states to offer the “old” bourgeoisie of the monarchy a suitable new home one of the (several) reasons for the relatively rapid downfall of the order in 1918/19? And: Is a democratic “civil society” possible without social groups that – whether they consider themselves “bourgeois” or not – still represent the canon of values that were characteristic of the “classical” bourgeoisie: a high level of esteem for the self-determined individual, as well as personal achievement and efficiency, combined with the belief in the proficiency of free associations and participation in the self-administration of the community, an optimistic, science-based concept of human development, coupled with a deep distrust of all ready-made solutions prescribed “from above”?
On the other hand, many things that the bourgeoisie of the 19th century strived, and paved the way for such as developing the possibilities for education, promoting technical advancement, and improving the material opportunities and living standards of broader levels of society, had actually been realised when the bourgeoisie came to an end so that, today, many more people live a more “bourgeois” life than in the long-past age of the bourgeoisie. And they also have many more opportunities for “civil society” commitment.
1 https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zivilgesellschaft (accessed 3. 11. 2020).
2 https://www.bing.com/search?q=obcanske+forum&form=PRUSEN&pc=EUPP_UE12&mkt=enus&httpsmsn=1&msnews=1&rec_search=1&refig=64bde755d3b54d88bbd2f1cb325b839e&sp=2&qs=SC&pq=obcanski+forum&sk=HS1&sc=3-14&cvid=64bde755d3b54d88bbd2f1cb325b839e (accessed 3. 11. 2020).
3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burgus (accessed 3. 11. 2020).
4 https://de.wiktionary.org/wiki/zivil
5 The van Swieten citation, after: Ernst Wangermann, Aufklärung und staatliche Erziehung, Vienna 1978, p. 79.
6 There is a wide range of literature on the ABGB. Here, I only refer to: Walter Selb, Herbert Hofmeister (eds.), Forschungsband Franz von Zeiller (1751−1828). Beiträge zur Gesetzgebungs- und Wissenschaftsgeschichte. Vienna – Graz – Cologne 1980.
7 Unless otherwise indicated, the author refers to his Sozialgeschichte Österreichs, 2nd ed., Vienna – Munich 2001.
8 Anonymous (Eduard von Bauernfeld), Pia desideria eines österreichischen Schriftstellers, Leipzig 1842, p. 16.
9 Wolfgang Häusler, Schubumkehr. Von der Tradition der demokratischen Revolution 1848 zu Deutschnationalismus und Antisemitismus, in: Österreich in Geschichte und Literatur 64, 2020, no.1, pp. 4–8, here p. 9.
10 Häusler, Schubumkehr, passim, sees the failure of the bourgeois revolution as the reason for this.
11 Waltraud Heindl published the most important works on Austrian bureaucracy in the 18th and 19th centuries: Gehorsame Rebellen. Bürokratie und Beamte in Österreich 1780 – 1848, Vienna – Cologne – Graz 1991; and: Josephinische Mandarine. Bürokratie und Beamte in Österreich vol. 2, 1848 –1914, Vienna 2013.
12 Fundamental information on these problems: Harm-Hinrich Brandt, Der österreichische Neoabsolutismus. Staatsfinanzen und Politik 1848 – 1860, 2 vols., Göttingen 1978. The resulting discussion is documented in: Harm-Hinrich Brandt (ed.), Der österreichische Neoabsolutismus als Verfassungs und Verwaltungsproblem, Vienna – Cologne – Weimar 2014.
13 Ernst Bruckmüller (ed.), Korruption in Österreich (Austriaca), Vienna 2011.
14 Cited after Häusler, Schubumkehr, p. 9.
15 Speeches by Ernst Frh. v. Plener 1873–1911, Stuttgart – Leipzig 1911, 987 (Speech in the Upper House on 2 December 1905).
16 Joseph von Friedenfels, Die individuelle Bewegung der Personaleinkommensteuer-Zensiten und die Höhe ihres Einkommens in den Jahren 1906 – 1908. In: Mitt. d. k. k. Finanzministeriums, no. 1 1913; Beiträge zur Statistik der Personaleinkommensteuer in den Jahren 1903 bis 1907, Vienna 1908.
17 John W. Boyer, Political Radicalism in Late Imperial Vienna. Origins of the Christian Social Movement 1848 –1897, Chicago-London 1981 (unchanged paperback edition, Chicago 1995).
18 Roman Sandgruber, Traumzeit für Millionäre. Die 929 reichsten Wienerinnen und Wiener im Jahr 1910, Graz – Vienna 2013.
19 Ernst Bruckmüller, Das österreichische Bürgertum zwischen Monarchie und Republik. In: Zeitgeschichte 20/1993, no. 3/4 (Schwerpunkt: Bürgertum) pp. 60–84. In particular, Ernst Bruckmüller – Elisabeth Ulsperger: Friedrich Pachers Einschätzung der materiellen Situation vor und nach dem Ersten Weltkrieg, in: Zeitgeschichte 20/1993, no. 3/4 (Schwerpunkt: Bürgertum), pp. 104–112.
20 Otto Bauer, Die österreichische Revolution, Wien 1923 (now in: Bauer, Werkausgabe, vol. 2, Vienna 1976), S. 755 f.
21 “Es läßt sich nicht zahlenmäßig nicht abschätzen, wie weit der Verarmung-sprozeß fortgeschritten ist. Aber als Tatsache kann er nicht verleugnet werden, wenngleich der äußere Anschein nicht die ganze Wirklichkeit merken läßt weil der Mieterschutz der breiten Masse des Bürgertums die Behauptung ihrer Wohnung und damit des äußeren Rahmens ihrer Existenz ermöglicht...” (It is impossible to quantify how far the
