emphasized the workers’self-empowerment and the need for social and eco-
nomic advancement.Manyofthese associations werefoundedwith the involve-
ment of liberal intellectuals, which explains theirambivalentrelationship to in-
dustrialization and modernization. Cateringespeciallytocraftsmen and
journeymen, their organizational structures preserved the traditions of the crafts
and trades established through theguild system. The Catholic and Protestant
Churches started similar initiativeswith astrongeremphasis on Christian values.
Farremoved from the humanistic education found in gymnasiums and universi-
ties, learning in these contexts meant,aboveall, compensating for the glaring
inequities of the class-based school system and promotingthe behaviors and
competencies (e.g., discipline, cleanliness, reliability)required under the condi-
tions of wagelabor and the factory system. The parallel projects of national uni-
fication and democratization continuedto be the sourceofmanydisagreements
within the earlysocialistmovement and resultedinsharp debates between those
in favorofagitation for class struggle and those interested in compensating for
class inequities.
The socialistArbeitervereine(workers’associations) active since the 1860s
pursued explicitlypoliticalgoals within the largerworkers’movement–which
does not mean thattheirrelationshipto the Social Democrats was uncomplicat-
ed. Under the Anti-Socialist Laws, when outright bans and repressive measures
extended to workers’culturalassociations, seemingly“apolitical”singingand
gymnastic clubs providedasafe setting for members to continue the freeand
open discussion of socialist ideas. The new forms of sociability that developed
under these conditionsranged from local workers’educational associationsto
national cultural organizations and eventuallyincluded workers’ publishing
houses, illustrated journals, lending libraries, and countless special interest
clubs devotedto everything from singing, boxing,and bicycling,topromoting
atheism, preachingtemperance, and learning Esperanto.
Togetherthe extensive network of educational and culturalassociations and
the informal structures of associational lifegave rise toaheterogeneous socialist
lifeworld that,more or less in alignment with the workers’movement,developed
in self-chosen opposition to the institutions of bourgeois culture. Promisingto
organize workers’lives“from the cradleto the grave,”to citeafamous SPD slo-
gan, these organizations and initiativesnonetheless remained an integralpart of
theWilhelminianObrigkeitsstaat(authoritarian state) and itsversion ofKultur-
staat(cultural state). As the historianLynn Abrams has shown, the socialist life-
world mayhavebeen built around the (new/old) ethos of class solidarity but still
relied heavilyondistinctlybourgeois virtues, such as order,discipline, and re-
straint.Meanwhile it faced growingdemands and opportunities for leisure
time and entertainment,includingpubs, fairs, festivals,circuses, and street per-
The SocialistProjectofCultureand Education 163