Analyzes the German role in Central American domestic and international relations
Using previously untapped resources including private collections, the records of cultural institutions, and federal and state government archives, Schoonover analyzes the German role in Central American domestic and international relations.Of the four countries most active in independent Central America-Britain, the United States, France, and Germany- historians know the least about the full extent of the involvement of the Germans.
German colonial expansion was based on its position as an industrialized state seeking economic well-being and security in a growing world market. German leaders were quick to recognize that ties to the cheap labor of overseas countries could compensate for some of the costs and burdens of conceding material and social privileges to their domestic labor force. The Central American societies possessed limited resource bases; smaller and poorly educated populations; and less capital, communications, and technological development than Germany. They saw the borrowing of development as a key to their social, economic, and political progress. Wary Central American leaders also saw the influx of German industrialists as assurance against excessive U.S. presence in their political economies and cultures.
Although the simplistic bargain to trade economic development for cheap labor appeared to succeed in the short term, complex issues of German domestic unemployment and social disorder filtered to Central American countries and added to their own burdens. By 1929, Germany had recovered most of its pre-World War I economic position.
PREFACEINTRODUCTIONFoundations of German Interest in Central America, 1820–1848Prussia and Commerce with the Pacific Basin, 1848–1851Franz Hugo Hesse's Mission to Central America, 1851–1858Bismarck and the Foundations of the German Empire, 1858–1871Defining Germany's Role in Central America, 1871–1885Aggressive Participation in the New World, 1885–1898Aggressive Penetration and National Honor, 1898–1906Apogee of German Power in Central America, 1906–1914U.S. Displacement of German Economic Power during World War IReestablishing Germany's Role, 1920–1925A Revived German Presence in Central America, 1924–1929CONCLUSION AND EPILOGUEAPPENDIX: TABLESNOTESRESEARCH RESOURCES ON GERMANY IN CENTRAL AMERICAPRIMARY MATERIALS AND PUBLISHED SOURCESINDEX
Thomas Schoonover is a professor in the History Department at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.