After the terrible period of the Wars of religion that torn europe between mid 16th and mid 17th century, the idea of a Universal Christian Empire was replaced by an international order based on the struggle between different “monarchies”. The “official” sanction of these capital change in Western political organization was the Westphalia Peace of 1648 that reorganized Europe after the Thirty Years War.
The signing of the Westphalia Peace (1648)
The decadence of the Universal model was the direct consequence of the strengthening of the “state” as political organization. The consequence was that unity was replaced by diversity. There was not a common pope or a common emperor anymore, but a bunch of kings that were heads of their respective independent kingdoms-states”.
As we have already seen in Teaching guide 2 it all started in the Middle Ages when after the Feudal era kings turned into monarchs, because they could organize better their realms creating administrative bodies that enabled them to collect taxes for paying the maintain a permanent army. The result was that they were far more powerful because they were richer as as they could use their power (militar, political and legal) to impose a protectionist economic policy aiming at augmenting the wealth of the state by the way of increasing as much as possible the reserves of gold and silver.
Something that could be reached by establishing a favorable balance of trade. That is: exporting more goods than importing and monopolizing as many trades as possible. This economic policy was called “mercantilism” and reached his height during the reign of Louis XIV thanks to his outstanding Minister of Finances jean Baptiste Colbert.
So every monarch started competing with other monarchs in order to accumulate wealth and therefore power. For this it was rather convenientg to reunite as many territories as possible because that meant many more subjects that could pay taxes and join the royal armies. But paying taxes and dying in the war was difficult to swallow and this is why they came up with the idea of creating the myth of how great was to love your land king. For this monarchs did their best to develope step by step a “proto-national feeling.”
In France, for instance, this started with Jeanne d’Arc (1412-1431) who was burned at the stake being 19 years old, after helping his king Charles VII to get rid of the English soldiers that occupied a substantial part of French soil during the Hundred Years War (1337-1453). Napoleon considered her the symbol of France and she was beatified in 1909 ans canonized in 1920. Since then Saint Joan of Arc is one of the patrons of France. A Woman. Which is extraordinary in such a patriarcal society as France was in the first half of the 15th century.
In Teaching guide 1 we spoke of the “political use of nationalism”, referring to how 19th and 20th century historians considered the “Germanic Nations” as the origin of European nations. The real entrance in politics of the word “nation” however does not begin, as you already know, in the 5th century but in the 18th century with the Enlightenment, when Absolute monarchies fell in the name of the “Nation”, as the divine origin of the concept of sovereignty vested in the person of the king was transferred to the joint body of the inhabitants of a kingdom.
This idea had appeared a century earlier with the concept of “Social Pact”, referring to a new explanation of why political power had to be obeyed by citizens. In the Middle Ages the pope, the emperor and the kings were sovereigns because God had created the world this way (Theocentrism). But the religious crisis of the 16th and 17th centuries that brought the dreadful wars of religion obliged political thinkers to develop a laic approach to the justification of Power.
It was then when Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) horrified by the long English civil war and the execution of Charles I came up with the idea that sovereignty was vested in a political monster called Leviathan, integrated by the ensemble of citizens that gave up forever all their rights to Him in order to get His protection and avoid chaos.
This harsh vision of the Social Pact was tempered by John Locke (1632-1704) and Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) as they considered that the Social Pact could not be irreversible and irrevocable. Citizens accept to obey the Government but only if it works for the “Common wealth”. If not they could consider that those in power break the social pact and this legitimate them to disobey and bring along a new pact. On top of that the Social pact had some “special clauses” because some of the original rights of citizens could not be given up under any circumstance, as they were considered “fundamental”. This is the origin of the theory of the “Fundamental Rights and Liberties”
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The result of this mildest vision of the social pact empowered citizens as they became the “owners” of sovereignty –instead of the kings-, as they were the real “protagonists” of the Social pact. A body of people that had in common that they were born in the same territory. This is why they were called its “nationals”, and the ensemble of them a “Nation” with capital N. Remember the French celebration of the "Fête de la Fëdération" on the 14 of July of 1790, was the origin of French National Day.
The problem was, as you know, that the "state" is not a very "sexy" idea. It is just an organization, a way of setting the government and the administration of a territory. It was an idea too abstract for getting people attached to it. For paying taxes or dyong in a war for this political and administrative body people needed motivation. The state needed a soul, and that soul and easiest one was to develop the “national” pride. was nationalism. The result was the appearance of a new political : the Nation-State.
Because one thing was to have the idea of replacing the "Monarch" by the “Nation”, and another very different to put it into practice. It was not going to be an easy transition. In fact it required a revolutionary movement followed by dramatic wars steered by the “nationalistic narrative”. First in North America, since 1776, and secondly in France since 1789. This is what we are going to study today.
Signing the US Declaration of Independence on 4th of July 1776.
The idea that it was worth dying for your land and people appeared clearly for the first time in North America when colons rebelled against the British Crown and declared their independence on July 4, 1776, starting a Revolutionary War of 7 years (until 1783). Patriotism was at the stake in George Washington’s Camp. British soldiers fought essentially for money, but American soldiers fought to have a country of their own. Of course not all of the Americans were for rebellion. Some wanted to keep on being British subjects: they were called Loyalists. If you want to really feel what was it like I strongly recommend the US TV Serie “Turn. Washington Spies” (2014) and of course the classic and powerful Mel Gibson’s Movie The Patriot (2000).
Mel Gibson in The Patriot
Fighting for your own country and not for your king was a powerful narrative that lead you to be willing to die by patriotism. That was very clear under another Revolution: the French one. The French Revolution was such a mess that would have disappeared if the Revolutionary Constituant Assembly had not had the brilliant idea of declaring the war to the kings of Prussia and the Emperor of Austria on the 20 of April 1792.
The conflict of the newborn United States of America with the UK between 1776 and 1783, and the conflict of Revolutionary France against Absolutist European kings of the Ancien Régime created a new type of State: the Nation-State in which sovereignty was not vested on the Monarch, but on the People, considered as Nation, that is a Political Body that govern themselves through the representatives elected (Representative democracy). But the crucial point was that every “Nation” developed its own “nationalism”. A very powerful narrative that consolidated the state dissolving any rest of “universalism”. Even the Law ceased to be common to all European kingdmos (Ius commune) and became “national” as a result of “codification”. Every State created its own ordered set of national laws. Including the Law that declared who was “national” of the state and who was to be considered a foreigner, adn of course its symbols: the banner and the national anthem.
The first US flag: 13 stripes representing the colonies and 13 stars representing the new states. (Today it has 50 stars but still 13 stripes). The Star Spangled Banner.
The main problem that the European Union has is that its 27 Member states are still heavily rooted "Nation-States", and that usually their nationals do feel closer to their country than to the abstract idea of a United Europe. European narrative is still far less powerful. In contrast with what happens in the United States, where you 50 Member States but only "one nation". Of course their integration process was difficult and had to go through a terrible Civil war, but today they are one of the most powerful countries because despite their diversity they have a common strong narrative.
In this Teaching Guide 4 we will see the origins of the “Nation State” idea through the American and French Revolution, and how this new concept of state will take Europe to his zenith in the 19th century, when the world lived at the European hour. In the next Teaching Guide, number 5, we will see hor our countries reached the apogee of the Nation-States in a period that started with Napoleon and led to the Era of Great colonialism that rendered European states the most wealthy and powerful organizations of the World. Until they committed suicide provoking the holocaust of World War I.
INSTRUCTIONS: First read the text included in your Materials (pages 54 to 78), before proceeding to answer the Concrete Questions, the Concepts and the General Questions.
Concerning the Basic Chronology (pages 74 to 75) the crucial dates are the following:
a) For the American Revolution: 1607, 1620, 1754-1763, 1773, 17775, 1776, 1777, 1783 and 1787
b) For the French Revolution: the periods of Constituant Assembly (June 1789 to September 1791); the Legislative Assembly (October 1791 to August 1792); the Convention (September 1792 to October 1795) and the Directory (October 1795 to November 1799).
Crucial dates are : 1789 (17 June, 20 June, 27 June, 14 July), 1790 (July 14), 1792 (April 20; 10 August, 20 and 22 September); 1793 (21 January); 1794 (January until July: Robespierre). 1799, 9 November.
TOPIC FOR DISCUSSION IN CLASS: How important is your country for you?
Please consider the following aspects:
1. Are you proud of being “national” from your country?
2. Do you think your country is an arbitrary invention that does not make sense today?
3. Do you think that separatist nationalist in European statestoday should be independent Nation-States? Give reasons for and against.
4. Do you feel more “national” or more European?
5. What moves you more: your local soccer team or your National team?
The "Nation-State" an extremely powerful fiction
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