In last session we saw the rise of a new political and legal model in the late 18th century. The Nation State. It was such a powerful way of organizing a state that from the Fall of Napoleon to the beginning of World War I (1814-1914) this model would enable Europeans to control the World through colonization. This why we can say that 19th century is the European century.
The expansion of the Nation-State was not easy. It did not appear overnight. In the first half the principle of the Nation-State through the Laissez-faire (liberal) regime extends all over Europe despite the resistance of the Absolutists sovereigns reunited in the Congress of Vienna and signatories of the Holy Alliance, and Metternich policy of counterrevolutionary military intervention.
The Congress of Vienna (1815)
It is true that thanks to Metternich European sovereigns define a common policy to fight revolutions as the one started by Riego in Spain in 1820, that was followed by movements as the Decembrist Revolt in Russia.
Klemmens von Metternich (1773-1859)
But the UK walks away from the Holy Alliance when the British decide to back the rebellion in Spanish America, and France with the 1830 revolution that brings the creation of the Belgian State and the crucial electoral reform of Lord Grey in 1832 that transform the nature of the English Parliamentary system.
Allegory of the 1830 French Revolution by Eugène Delacroix
Nevertheless the whole order established in the Congress of Vienna crumbles with the wave of revolutions of 1848 that brings liberal nationalism to Italy, Austria and Prussia.
The 1848 Revolution in Berlin
The result is the creation of the Kingdom of Italy in 1861 and the German unification promoted by Bismarck, that thanks to the Prussian overwhelming victory over Napoleon III proclaim William I of Prussia as Kaiser of the Second Reich. Though the new German Empire, the North German Confederation headed by Prussia, is not a Parliamentary Regime as the Government is designated by the Kaiser and not by the Reichstag. It will be so until the foundation of the Weimar Republic in 1919.
Proclamation of the Second Reich in Versailles (January 18, 1871)
Imperial Russia would be the last bastion of autocracy, until the 1905 Revolution, a direct consequence of the humiliating defeat of Tsarist Russia by Imperial Japan. Russia will have a sort of Liberal regime from 1906 to 1917.
In the legal field in the course of the 19th century most of European States have a constitution, a set of fundamental rights and a national narrative that consolidate the independence of every European State. This enabled the consolidation of Liberalism, the result of the principle of the "laissez faire" that meant that the State power was extremely limited to protect the expansion of European oligarchies of industrials and bankers, as the law in Parliaments was dictated by the representatives of European oligarchies, thanks to the censitary electoral system, in which only the rich voted. The consequence was that the aim of the policy of these Nation-States was to accumulate as much wealth as possible. The French Prime Minister François Guizot motto was simply: "Enrich yourselves".
The Industrial Revolution and the new scientific discoveries boosted European Capitalism, that was solidly consolidated through Colonial Expansion. In the course of the 19th century the World become European. As European Nation-States expand all over the Planet that they consider a big cake they could divide among themselves. The best example was the partition of the African Continent at the Berlin Conference of 1884.
Map of "European Africa" in 1884
Africa was a "new" continent still unexplored so it was relatively easy for European Nation-States to occupy it. It is from these perspective more amazing the European expansion in the Far East, where they imposed their rule to millenary empires.
And the same was true in the Middle East.
The final result of this amazing colonial expansion of these wealthy and powerful European Nation-States was a growing tension as these greedy States fought fiercely for new lands. That lead to the Armed Peace period and, finally to the European suicide of World War I that brought the end of the Liberal period as we will see next week.
The most important idea you have to retain from Teaching Guide 5 is that powerful Nation-States end up fighting each other and provoking military conflicts that war weakened them. An important lesson that proud European States will not learn until the end of World War II.
INSTRUCTIONS: First read the text included in your Materials (pages 80 to 118), before proceeding to answer the Concrete Questions, the Concepts and the General Questions.
Concerning the Basic Chronology (pages 119-121) the crucial dates are the following:
1815, 1820-1823, 1830, 1832, 1848, 14 March 1861, 1862-1890 (Bismarck), 1868, 1870, 1871, 1904, 1905, 1906.
TOPIC FOR DISCUSSION IN CLASS: Are the principles of the revolutionary liberalism still valid in our Western Democracies ?
Please consider the following aspects:
1. Think that the Liberal regime establishes severe limits to the government, through the Constitution, the Declaration of Fundamental Rights and the Parliamentary regime. Think of how everyone of these limits work.
2. Look for the Concept of the “Rule of Law” (“Estado de derecho” in Spanish)
3. Do you think that the rule of law is really respected by Western governments? Provide some concrete examples.
4. Do you think that there are questions that justify governmental authoritarianism?
5. “ Please explain what Churchill meant when he said that “Democracy is the worst form of government except for all the others.”
Winston Churchill in 1941 by Yousuf Karsh
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