Klemmens von Metternich (1773-1859)
Thanks to Metternich's system European sovereigns agreed on a common policy to fight successive Liberal revolutions. First the ones that tried to be imposed by military uprisings, like the one started by Riego in Spain in 1820, or the Decembrist Revolt in Russia (1825).
The last one was leaded by military officers that got acquainted with the French revolutionary principles during the wars against Napoleon, masterfully described by Leon Tolstoi in War and Peace, published in the Journal The Russian Messenger from 1865 to 21867, before being published as a novel in 1869.
Unfortunately for the Absolutists the Metternich's system ends when the UK walks away from the Holy Alliance because Her Majesty's Government accepts the fact that the British ruling classes do not want to back the repression of the rebellion in Spanish America (1809-1824). Not because they sympathize with the liberal Spanish rebels, but since they saw a great potential for British Colonial interests in Central and South America. For not exactly the same reasons the Western European States fight the absolutism of the Ottoman Empire in the Greek War of independence (1821-1832), a more Romantic movement in which notorious European intellectuals participated, like Lord Byron (1788-1824) who died in Missolonghi fighting for the land where the Western culture was born.
The Metternich System collapses also in France with the 1830 revolution that brings as a corollary the Belgian Revolution against the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The result is the creation of the Belgian State.
These movements would also have an extremely important repercussion in England, as they led to the crucial electoral reform of Lord Grey in 1832 that transformed the nature of the English Parliamentary system in the sense of rendering it more representative. A movement that opened up the way to the democratization of the British Political System, though this process would not be completed entirely until British women were granted the right of vote in 1928.
The whole order established in the Congress of Vienna crumbles definitely in the rest of Europe with the wave of 1848 revolutions. This crucial movement would end up changing the political history of Continental Europe, starting with the Unification movements that happened in Italy and Germany. It also enables the creation of the French Second Republic, which is the first "social" regime in European history.
By the way, 1848 is significantly also the year in which Marx and Engels publish their "Communist Manifesto". And I want to mention this because Socialists’ ideas would become the main enemy of the European bourgeois liberal regimes.
The first permanent consequence of 1848 Revolution is the creation of the Kingdom of Italy in 1861, through the movement called the Risorgimento (“Resurgence”) headed, among others, by the Comte of Cavour and Giuseppe Garibaldi.
The Italian unity would only be completed in 1870 when Italian troops occupied the Papal States and Rome became the Capital of Italy. The popes would not have again an independent State until 1929, and thanks to Mussolini who agrees on creating the Vatican City state.
For understanding what the liberal revolution meant to the Italian Nation you should read the indispensable novel The Leopard (1958), of Giuseppe Tomaso di Lampedusa (1896-1957), published posthumously. In the book this Italian noble tells the story of a Sicilian Aristocrat, the Prince of Salina, who is fully conscious of the changes that the Risorgimento revolution is bringing, and realizes that old nobility has to adapt to the new times, accepting the change "so that everything could remain the same".
Let me point out that this novel created a neologism, el gattopardismo, which we might define as any political action consisting of presenting as revolutionary an idea that, in reality, does not seek to change economic or social foundations but rather to maintain the status quo. If you want to understand this key concept better, I encourage you to read the book, or, at the very least, watch Luchino Visconti movie (1963) with the same title, starring Burt Lancaster, in one of his most memorable performances. It is a beautiful film that effectively conveys the novel's themes of decline and impermanence. Do not miss it.
The other essential process of national unification happens in Germany. The German unification promoted by Bismarck, is the result of the Prussian overwhelming victories over Austria (1866), and especially over Napoleon III (1870-1871).
It is interesting that the defeat of the French Second Empire gave way to the creation of the German Second Reich (remember that the First Reich lasted from 962 to 1806), with the proclamation of William I of Prussia as Kaiser in Versailles.
This was a huge humiliation for the French, and certainly a cause of French anger towards Germans and explains why French were willing to start World War I that would end with the disaster of the Peace of Versailles in 1919. A “Diktat” that will lead to Hitler and World War Two.
The new German Empire (the Second Reich) was not a totally unified state (as France, for instance was). In fact it was called the North German Confederation and was headed by Prussia. On top of that it was not a Parliamentary Regime as the Government was designated by the Kaiser and not by the Reichstag. The full German unification and the instauration of the Parliamentary Regime would not occur until the foundation of the Weimar Republic in 1919.
As far as the Liberal revolutions cycle is concerned Imperial Russia would be the last bastion of autocracy. The Czars would be the last European absolutists monarchs, and remained so until the 1905 Revolution, that was provoked by the humiliating defeat of Tsarist Russia by Imperial Japan, the new Eastern Power developed as a result of the Meiji Revolution (1868).
Thanks to the 1905 movement Russia did have a sort of Liberal regime from 1906 to 1917. But it would not reach its definitive consolidation because of the Soviet Revolution of October 1917 that not only abolished the monarchy, but physically exterminated the royal family that was murdered on the night of the 16-17 July 1918 in Yekaterinburg by order of Lenin.
The Imperial Russian family
The 19th century however was the peak of European history, as European Nation-states ended up controlling most of the World, through an exorbitant colonial expansion. If you want to understand how Europe became the leading continent in the World you should not miss Orlando Figes book The Europeans: Three Lives and the Making of a Cosmopolitan Culture (2020).
The Europeans is a richly enthralling, panoramic cultural history of nineteenth-century Europe, told through the intertwined lives of three remarkable people: a great singer, Pauline Viardot, a great writer, Ivan Turgenev, and a great connoisseur, Pauline's husband Louis. Their passionate, ambitious lives were bound up with an astonishing array of writers, composers and painters all trying to make their way through the exciting, prosperous and genuinely pan-European culture that came about as a result of huge economic and technological change. This culture - through trains, telegraphs and printing - allowed artists of all kinds to exchange ideas and make a living, shuttling back and forth across the whole continent from the British Isles to Imperial Russia, as they exploited a new cosmopolitan age. (Extracted from AMAZON web page).
From a Legal perspective, it is important to remember that all the revolutionary movements that happen in Europe in the course of the 19th century in the name of the Liberal state principles, end up bringing essential legal tools like constitutions, sets of fundamental rights and, above all, a national narrative that consolidates the independence of every European State. The result of this rising nationalism is the amazing colonial expansion that will make European Nation-States extremely wealthy and powerful to the point they would control the whole World that was distributed among the colonial European states in international conferences, like the one held in Berlin in 1884 for distributing the African continent among the different European nations.
And the same happened in Asia, where Europeans controlled most of two of the oldest and most prestigious civilizations in history: India and China.
.jpg)
The result of it is that Europe ends up controlling a lot of territories worldwide. This is why the 19th century is undoubtedly the European century. The only non-Western world power is Japan, a country that fully accepted the nation-State model in 1868, thanks to the Meiji Revolution backed by emperor Mutsuhito (the 122nd Japanese emperor) that reigned from 1867 to 1912. The result of the Westernization of Japan resulted in Japanese imperialism that enabled the Japanese Military expansion in China and the Pacific area.
Nevertheless, the European colonial expansion increases gradually the tensions among the different colonial powers, which rearm themselves very strongly trying to get as many colonies as possible, following the classic Roman principle "Si vis pacem para bellum" (If you want peace prepare for war). This is why the last third of the 19th century is known as the Armed Peace period. The military equilibrium based in alliances would finally be broken in 1914. And European Nation-States would commit suicide in the horrid and absurd World War I.
The most important idea that you must retain from Teaching Guide 5 is how through the adoption of the Nation-State model European states became powerful and wealthy, until nationalists’ excesses drove them to commit suicide in an annihilating war. An important lesson that proud European States will not learn until the end of World War II, when a destroyed Old Continent had totally disappeared from the world scene. To the point that European governments realized that they should unite for surviving.
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 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 actuallly respected by Western governments (Europeans and Americans)? Provide some concrete examples.
4. Do you think that circumstances could 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.”
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario