During the 1960s to 1970s theories began to emerge about the German Songerweg period of 1871 to 1945 in regards to the creation of the Third Reich of Nazi Germany. Two historians, Wehler and Kocka, emerged first with their interpretation attributed to the Belielefeld school. At the heart of their interpretation is that this period was marked by an absence of political modernization, particularly democratization and parliamentarization in the liberal sense, in conjunction with rapid economic modernization with a capitalist market economy. Power over the army and civil and diplomatic services was concentrated in the hands of the monarchs and aristocracy and it was presumably the German bourgiosie's responsibility to overturn these norms, but instead accepted a "free hand in the economy" and "abandon(ed) its political liberalism. This also contributed to the relative weakness of the liberals among other reasons such as their lack of a sufficient regional support, 'narrow' political views, the split of liberals because of Bismarck's tariff policy in 1873. Bismarck's Bonapartist tactics suppressed the liberals by essentially preoccupying the country with 'social imperialism' of defusing domestic tensions with foreign concerns and 'negative integration' of uniting Germans together by creating a presumed enemy, specifically against Catholics, socialists, and Poles. Wehler and Kocka see him as an evil Bonapartist who caused liberal failure and whose policies prevented the overturn of their unintegrated government.

Eley and Blackbourn criticize this theory because it assumes that the "aristocracy is inherently feudal" and that the "bourgeoisie by nature liberal" and that the bourgeoisie missed their chance for revolution and therefore the fate of Germany was more closely associated with "the non-occurrence of a bourgeois revolution and the absence of a parliamentary democracy." They also criticize that there is an "insufficient distinction" between the parliamentary system in politics and capitalist modes of production. They also argue that Bismarck successfully manipulated the masses and therefore actually enacted political mobilization earlier than other European countries. Though Eley and Blackbourn are not greatly accepted, the fact that they challenged the Bielefeld schools interpretations and saw Bismarck's actions as successful and viewed the latter events on the lack of elements opened the door for more historians to analyze and critique others or create their own interpretations.