Otto Von Bismarck’s Realpoltik

Debate and Diplomacy in European History

Process Paper
Senior Division Group Website
Yu Kyung Lee and Kelly Song
 Debate and Diplomacy in European History being this year’s topic, we decided to

analyze a figure that has been debated for their political career throughout history. We

started out by asking former AP European History students for suggestions. Out of all the

advice we got, Yu Kyung’s older sister recommended we look further into Otto von

Bismarck. After doing some light research, we were both fascinated by Otto von

Bismarck and his realpolitik. He appeared to be a significant figure in European history

that suited this year’s topic very well.

We began researching by looking up Otto von Bismarck through online databases.

We focused on looking up information about Bismarck’s use of realpolitik thoroughout

his political career. We gathered basic facts and divided the information into successes,

failures, and consequences. After acquiring the basic information, we looked further into

primary and secondary documents that contained analyses of Bismarck’s politics. Then,

we wrote out a simple document tying all our information together.

Afterwards, we chose to create an entry as a website. It seemed like the most

appropriate project we could accomplish. We approached the project by creating tabs on

our website. By creating sections, we could separate our information in a more organized

way and allowed us to research more efficiently. Knowing our first set of research wasn’t

enough, we gathered more information through books and the internet for two more

weeks. We visited the Lawrence Public Library and University of Kansas libraries. Then

we started on the website by constructing a timeline of significant events throughout

Bismarck’s reign. Afterwards, we began to structure our information into categories

which were the tabs on our website. Next, we looked for quotes, pictures, multimedia,
and documents relating to Otto von Bismarck. On our final step, we put in all the

information on the actual website.

Lastly, we asked our friends and teacher to review our website. At first, we asked

Kelly’s friend’s dad who is a history teacher. He gave us good feedback along with some

advice to look back on our sources to check if they’re credible or not. Then, we asked our

school history teacher to examine the website. She advised us that we blank blank blank

blank blank. After all the guidance and their opinions

Our project was not all a smooth ride. One of the complications we faced was the

word limit. We had a difficult time reducing our information since we tried to keep the

content sufficiently deep. Another problem we faced was the failed attempt of

interviewing professors. We contacted two professors in the department of History at

Kansas University, but there were no replies. We were a bit disappointed but found

analysts through books that gave adequately good evaluations of Bismarck’s realpolitik.

Throughout the whole process, we gained critical skills and knowledge pertaining

to the research of debate and diplomacy in history. We expanded in our knowledge of

Otto von Bismarck and his influences throughout the European continent using his

realpolitik.