The chapter explains how and why the EU has intervened with both standards and procedural regulations in the case of organic agriculture, first in 1991 and again in 2007. The chapter begins with analyzing the development of private organic agriculture governance since the late-1960s. It shows how attempts at private governance harmonization, the expectation of EU intervention providing new productive opportunities for farmers, and active lobbying by the organic agriculture movement (especially IFOAM) resulted in the 1991 EU Organic Agriculture Regulation. The Regulation offered an organic production standard and modest procedural rules for private governance schemes. Continued problems due to a fragmented private governance market led the Commission to propose severe limitations on private schemes’ governance space in the early-2000s. Opposition to these proposals by private governance schemes, the organic movement, and key Member States prevented significant public intervention. Nonetheless, both standards and procedural regulations were strengthened in an updated Regulation in 2007 by the introduction of a mandatory EU organic logo and mandatory accreditation of private auditors.

Chapter 9 analyzes Germany’s conservative intelligentsia as it has developed by the middle of the 1920s and the various institutions it has established in pursuit of a young conservative political agenda. Most of the individuals discussed in this chapter – Arthur Moeller van den Bruck, Oswald Spengler, Heinz Brauweiler, Heinrich von Gleichen, and Wilhelm Stapel among others – define themselves as “conservative revolutionaries” who do not to wish to return to the way things were before World War I but who espouse an apocalyptic view of the political and envision a revolutionary transformation of the world in which they live through direct political action. Some like Martin Spahn and Eduard Stadtler are connected to the DNVP, but for the most part they are politically unaffiliated and in most cases opposed to the German party system as it has developed since the founding of the Second Empire. But they are united in a pedagogic mission to educate the younger generation and to instill in it the values and virtues they believe necessary for Germany’s national rebirth.

Chapter 3 focuses on the history of the DNVP from the elections to the Weimar National Assembly to the Reichstag elections of June 1920. It deals in particular with the way in which the DNVP established itself as a party of “national opposition” at the National Assembly with particular attention to its positions on the Weimar Constitution and the Versailles Peace Treaty. It also examines the success with which hard-line conservatives around Count Westarp were able to assert themselves in the deliberations over the party program and in pushing back against efforts of the young conservatives around Ulrich von Hassell to shape the DNVP into a progressive conservative party free from the follies of the past. The chapter ends with the Kapp putsch in March 1920, the adoption of the party program a month later, and the Reichstag elections of June 1920 in which the DNVP improves upon its performance at the polls in the elections to the National Assembly.

The epilogue examines the implications of right-wing disunity upon the course of German political development from 1930 to 1933. The progressive disintegration of the DNVP from 1924 to 1930 left the non-Nazi German Right deeply divided and incapable of holding the more radical elements on the German Right that found a home in the NSDAP in check. This was a fact of German political life that became increasingly clear in the period from the September 1930 elections through the end of the Weimar Republic. The disunity and impotence of the traditional German Right left conservative strategists like Westarp, Schleicher, and Reusch with no alternative but to embrace the “taming strategy” as the best way of addressing Nazism and the threat that it posed to the status of Germany’s conservative elites. But the very success of this strategy presupposed the existence of a force capable of holding the NSDAP in check and in subjecting the Nazis to its own political agenda. The absence of such a force doomed the “taming strategy” to failure and greatly facilitated the Nazi seizure of power in 1932–33.

Chapter 8 examines the efforts of Stresemann to stabilize Germany’s republican system by coopting the support of influential special interest organizations like the National Federation of German Industry (RDI) and the National Rural League (RLB) in the hope that they can influence the DNVP to adopt a more responsible posture toward the existing system of government. The fact that the DNVP improved upon its performance in the May 1924 Reichstag elections in a new round of voting in December means that the DNVP can no longer be ignored as a potential coalition partner. The DNVP’s subsequent entry into the first Luther cabinet in January 1925 is to be seen as part of a larger stabilization strategy that also includes the election of retired war hero Paul von Hindenburg as Reich president in April 1925 and changes in the leadership of the RDI and RLB that reflect an increased willingness to work within the framework of the existing system of government.

The introduction states the premise that an essential precondition for the smooth transition from authoritarian to democratic government was the existence of a strong, resilient party on the Right that was committed to pursuing its objectives within the framework of the new democratic system and then asks why a party like the Conservative Party in Great Britain never succeeded in establishing itself as a durable political force in pre-Nazi Germany. It then focuses on the disunity of the German Right as a defining feature of the German party system and as it evolved in the late Second Empire and Weimar Republic. After a brief discussion of the milieu thesis as a theoretical point of departure for the study of the German Right, the essay then examines conservatism and its relationship to the German Right, the history of right-wing parties and organizations in the late Second Empire, and the role of antisemitism in the self-definition of those who identified themselves with the Right.

Under which conditions will a public authority intervene in private governance such as certification and eco-labeling schemes for sustainably produced goods? This chapter introduces this research question by presenting the empirical puzzle the book addresses: Why has the European Union (EU) intervened in private governance that deals with organic agriculture and biofuels, but has not intervened in private governance dealing with fair trade and fisheries? The chapter distinguishes between a public authority intervening with standards regulation that involves creating a public definition of sustainable production, and with procedural regulation that addresses the way private governance schemes are organized. The argument the book develops is that whether a public authority intervenes with standards and/or procedural regulation depends on the interplay of two variables: the domestic benefits of product differentiation by a public authority and the fragmentation of the private governance market. The chapter situates the book in the current state of the literature on the interactions between public and private governance and explains the research design and research contributions.

Chapter 6 deals with the crisis year of 1923 and examines the German Right’s response to the hyperinflation of 1922–23, the Franco-Belgian occupation of the Ruhr, the increasingly palpable fear of Bolshevism, and threat of Bavaria’s secession from the Reich. After a discussion of the DNVP’s relationship to the Cuno government that assumed office in November 1922, the chapter takes a particularly close look at its opposition to the Stresemann cabinet that assumed power at the height of the crisis in August 1923. Following the termination of passive resistance in the Ruhr, many DNVP leaders began to embrace the idea of a “national dictatorship” under the tutelage of the army commander-in-chief Hans von Seeckt as the only way out of the crisis in which Germany found itself. But movement in this direction was cut short not only by Seeckt’s ambivalence but more importantly by Hitler’s abortive “Beer Hall Putsch” in Munich. As the Stresemann government moved to consolidate its position in the aftermath of the putsch, any chance of replacing the Weimar Republic with a more authoritarian system of government had vanished.

Chapter 2 examines the infrastructure of the German Right with particular attention on the integration of industry, agriculture, Christian labor, and the different sectors of the German middle class into the organizational structure of the DNVP. It also deals with the way in which industry, agriculture, Christian labor, and the German middle classes organized themselves in order to represent their special interests within the framework of Germany’s new republican order. The high degree of interest articulation that this involved, however, subjected the DNVP to centrifugal pressures that were sometimes difficult contain and that posed a threat to the party’s unity and political effectiveness. Still, the DNVP was remarkably successful in anchoring itself in Germany’s conservative milieu since its founding a year and a half earlier and was well on its way to developing into a socially heterogeneous conservative Sammelpartei. Interest articulation that this involved, however, subjected the DNVP to centrifugal pressures that were sometimes difficult contain and that posed a threat to the party’s unity and political effectiveness. Still, the DNVP was remarkably successful in anchoring itself in Germany’s conservative milieu in the short period since its founding and was well on its way to developing into a socially heterogeneous conservative Sammelpartei.

Chapter 7 examines the DNVP’s reaction to the stabilization of Germany’s republican system under the auspices of a new government formed by the Center Party’s Wilhelm Marx in January 1924. In the campaign for the May 1924 Reichstag elections, the DNVP not only did its best to dissociate itself from the anti-social consequences of stabilization, but moved racism and antisemitism to the forefront of its campaign in an attempt to preempt attacks from the racists that had bolted the party in 1922. The result was a stunning victory at the polls that made its delegation the largest in the Reichstag. But with success comes responsibility, and the DNVP was suddenly faced with the task of voting for the Dawes Plan, a plan that in the campaign it had denounced as a “second Versailles.” In the decisive vote in August 1924, the Nationalist delegation to the Reichstag split right down the middle in a dramatic turn of events that only highlighted how deeply divided the DNVP was as it faced the prospect of governmental responsibility.

The chapter explains how and why the EU has intervened with both standards and procedural regulations in the case of biofuels production, first in 2009 and again in 2015. The chapter begins with an analysis of the emergence of private biofuels governance since the early 2000s. It then discusses how in 2003 the EU established a policy stimulating the development of a domestic crop-based biofuels market based on the expected economic and environmental benefits of biofuels, while not directly addressing private governance. Once it became clear that the sustainability of biofuels needed to be regulated, the EU established standards and procedural regulations in the 2009 Renewable Energy Directive. Developing sustainability criteria was considered necessary to further support the economic opportunities of farmers and biofuels producers. The diversity of biofuel certification schemes also warranted EU-level control, with policymakers considering them useful instruments to verify compliance with public sustainability criteria in the form of a meta-standard approach. Continued problems with the diversity of private schemes resulted in additional procedural regulation in the 2015 ILUC Directive.

The chapter develops a theory of public intervention in private governance. It examines the conditions under which a public authority will intervene and the form this intervention will take: standards and/or procedural regulations or the absence of intervention. The chapter explains that the type of public intervention depends on the interplay of two variables: the domestic benefits of product differentiation and the fragmentation of the private governance market. On the one hand, a pubic authority may intervene in the market for sustainably certified goods to improve the competitive position of domestic producers, who are the main rule targets of private governance schemes. On the other hand, a public authority can intervene to structure a fragmented private governance market in order to overcome problems such as supply chain confusion, a lack of credibility of existing private governance schemes, and trade and competitive distortions. The chapter further conceptualizes private governance schemes as interest groups that engage in lobbying. It also explains the dynamics of the theory in the context of the EU policymaking process and how the interventions may evolve over time.