Week Summary

This week, everyone seems to agree that the primary issue was nationalism - it was all about what a nation was, as we discussed in class whether the US was a nation - and in our modern world, it is - and the history involved two very important events, the unification of Italy and Germany, both of which were driven by nationalist feeling.

However, I feel that this focus on nationalism as the central focus of the week undermines something else that was equally important - the conflict between conservatism and liberalism that drove so much of this period. I believe that this was at least as important a factor as nationalism in the revolutions of 1848 and the unifications that occurred afterward - conservatism and liberalism divided people, and they were ultimately united in nationalism or more powerful forces.

In France, the country had revolutions that went back and forth with becoming more liberal and more conservative, until ultimately they were united by Louis Napoleon, who was a symbol of the power of France through his relation to Napoleon.

In Italy, the country again had conflicts between liberalism and conservatism, between Mazzini/Garibaldi and Cavour, prevented unification until it was ultimately enabled by the power of Piedmont-Sardinia to conquer. Germany functioned similarly, with Bismarck ultimately uniting the nation with his political power.

This week was not only about nationalism - it was more about nationalism as a response to the liberal/conservative conflict.

Romantic Nationalism at Frankfurt

The Frankfurt assembly was compared to the French assembly in 1789, as both were good examples of revolutions whose leaders were less concerned with the reality of their times and more concerned with the ideals they hoped to be able to follow. The Frankfurt Assembly hoped to be able to draft a liberal constitution and then bind an existing monarch by it, an enormously great goal for such a small and powerless group. The Frankfurt assembly demonstrates the reason why Bismarck would become necessary later in German history for unification - Frankfurt would be the example that proved why bottom-up nationalism built on ideals would fail, and fail utterly. This failure was ultimately cemented by Frederick William IV's refusal of the throne - he rejected even allowing a bottom-up structure to exist, saying that all power had to come from divine right.

Nationalism and Idealism

Idealism and nationalism were tied throughout the history of Europe in several ways in the mid-1800s - there was a clear divide between the more idealistic and more pragmatic rulers and revolutionaries, with the more pragmatic almost always being more effective. Such figures as Mazzini, who sought to create a people's republic for his unified Italy, were unsuccessful, while the later leader Cavour, a much more pragmatic leader who sought to unite Italy by whatever means he could, managed to reunite Italy for the first time since the Roman empire.

However, Cavour may not have been an idealist, but he was still devoted to a cause, which he managed to achieve, unlike the idealist romantics Garibaldi and Mazzini. In his way, Cavour was just as much an idealist, but rather than achieving everything he wanted to do he achieved everything he could do, which I see as just as admirable as any action of Garibaldi or Mazzini.

Synthesis

The three French Revolutions are an example of the way that rule by only liberals and rule by only conservatives cannot work. In each revolution, it began with a conservative king - Louis XVI, Charles X, or Louis Philippe - and ended with the declaration of some form of liberal government, whether it was the Assembly, a constitutional monarch, or a republic. However, none of these systems were, at this point in time in French history, stable. The country was too polarized between liberals and conservatives, with conservatives wanting monarchies and liberals wanting some form of republic, and because of this the only system it could sustain was dictatorship, by both Napoleons.

Proletariatophobia

While I agree with Charlie's central point that a Marxist revolution is not inevitable, I disagree with his reasons why, and instead believe that his reliance on the labor theory of value is flawed. His first point, that we have a variety of other classes which are in-betweens and make our society less polarized, requires examples - most social classes have the means of production, don't and serve those who do, or occasionally, such as lawyers, work in some other field that has nothing to do with either. However, it hardly seems to me that lawyers are going to prevent a proletariat revolution. Second, this election was not proof of propaganda being insufficient - Obama had just as much propaganda as anyone else, and simply used it better. Finally, Marx's point is that those who are poor and proletariat will need to tear down the entire structure of capitalism to achieve their aims - capitalism could accomodate civil rights, but it cannot accomodate the proletariat.

Response About Romanticism

Laura's post about Romanticism was very interesting, but I see both the Enlightenment and Romanticism as working in the opposite way. When I picture the enlightenment, I see young iconoclasts who break the rules, who think about what has been learned through the years, reject all of it, and make up their own equally arbitrary systems. They may be more intellectual and more logical, but tradition has never been based on logic, and they break tradition far more obviously than romanticism does - Romanticism may be applied to conservatism, but Enlightenment thought almost never is.
Romanticism, on the other hand, seems much more traditional. While it's vibrant and emotional, unlike the enlightenment, its almost excessive level of emotion is inextricably tied to the past - to a nostalgia for the peaceful countryside and the spiritualism that came before the Enlightenment. Nostalgia rarely makes old ladies say 'tsk'.

The Restoration

The restoration was characterized by simultaneous attempts from former powers to return to the status quo and attempts by formerly weak or subjugated countries to establish a new power or independence. The Congress of Vienna, which sought to restore Europe to its former state, included all the countries that had been extremely powerful before - Britain, Austria, Prussia, and Russia were the members of the quadruple alliance, and even France, which had been responsible for the Napoleonic Wars, was later admitted. However, just as the major powers sought to maintain order, those who had not emerged as powerful were frequently in opposition to the Restoration. While Leopold of Belgium wanted to prevent a conflict, he had been put on his throne by the quadruple alliance. In Italy and Spain, however, revolts against the restoration were common, even though the rulers who had been put in power by the Restoration forces were in support of the Restoration. Likewise, Greece, Serbia, and Latin America were all hotbeds of revolution during this period.