1848
Revolutions
Ancien Regime
• Absolute Monarchies
– Form of government
where the monarch
controls the right to make
war, tax, judge, and coin
money.
• Up to 19th Century
– The Most Widespread
Traditional Form of
Government in Europe
– Notable exceptions
• Ancient Greece
• Republican Rome
• Oliver Cromwell’s
Commonwealth
• American Revolution
French
Revolution
• Absolute Rulers
– Decadent
– Remote
– Ignorant of masses
• The ‘Consent’ to be
ruled by an absolute
monarch withdrawn
• The Mob
• The Terror
• Revolution Hijacked
– Napoleon
Napoleon
• Spread ‘Ideas’ of
French Revolution
throughout Europe
– By force
•
•
•
•
•
•
Equality
Meritocracy
Secular
Code Napoleon
Modernisation
Centralisation
• Nationalism employed
to Defeat Napoleon
Congress of
Vienna
• Attempt to reintroduce
Ancien Regime
– Legitimate Monarchy
• Bourbons Reinstated
– Authority of Church
– Aristocratic Privelege
• Congress imposed
without ‘consent’ of any
peoples
– Imposed by victorious
aristocracies
• Power politics and
Realpolitik over National
Feelings
– Buffer Zones
Metternich: “We have redrawn Europe’s Map For Eternity”
Imposing Ancien
Regime Principles
1815 - 1830
• Repressive
Measures
– Britain
• Six Acts
• Peterloo
– Naples
• Minister of
Vengeance
– Austria-Hungary
• Secret Police
• Agents
Provocateurs
• Conservativism
Ascendant
Localised
Revolutions
• Greece, Naples, Spain
• France
– 1830
• Over Royal Prerogative
• King tried to reduce electorate to Chamber of Deputies
• Bourbons replaced by Duc D’Orleans
New Challenges to Ancien
Regimes
• Liberalism
• Democracy
– Republican
Democrats
• Socialism
• Nationalism
Liberalism
• Government needs ‘Consent’ of
‘Responsible’ Classes
• Features
– Sovereignty of Parliament (not of People)
– Freedom of Press and Speech
– Individual Freedom
• Attracted
– Nouveau Riche
– Emerging Middle Classes
– Manufacturers, Industrialists, Merchants
• Traditional Institutional Power to be
restrained
– Church
• Protestant Ideals preferred to Catholic ones
– Monarchy
• Headway
– Britain and Belgium
Liberal Ideas on Universal Suffrage
• “No people should be electors unless their
income and intelligence indicated that they
had a vested interest in social order. Ideally
the electorate should be the mercantile
classes, the professions and especially the
owners of land.” Cavour 1847
• “If you want to ruin a state, give universal
suffrage.” Barrot, Opposition Leader, France
Democracy
Republican - Democrats
• Government should express ‘Will of
the People’
– Universal Suffrage
• Republicans
– One man, one vote
– Remove Monarchy
• Democrats would appeal to Working
Class Support
– Wary of repeat of 1792 Terror
• Appealed to
– Petite Bourgoisie, Students, Elementary
School teachers
• Headway
– France, Italian States, exiled Poles
Socialism
• Want social and economic
reorganisation of country in
addition to political
reorganisation
• Socialist dilemma
– How to achieve economic
reorganisation!
– Peaceful Social Reformers
• Robert Owen
– Adam Smith + Moral Conscience
– Common ownership of means of
production and distribution
• Marx & Engels
– Communist Revolution
– Insurrectionary, militant
• Appealed to:
– Educated Artisans
Nationalism
• The belief that a group of people who shared a common
language, history, heritage, culture and possibly religion,
should be brought together to form a Nation state.
• Requires ‘consent’ of people on a ‘form’ of government
– Therefore could be combined with other ideologies eg liberalism,
democracy
• Napoleon inspired French Nationalism and resistance to
French Nationalism
• Appealed to
– Educated ‘literate’ classes, professionals, middle classes
• Role of culture, arts, tradition in defining national consciousness
– Italian Resorgimento movement
• Combined Liberal Nationalists and Republican Nationalists
• Diversity of ideology hinders Nationalism
Pre-1848 Tensions
• Long Term
– Industrialisation
• Coal, iron, textiles
• Economic challenge to rulers
• Migration
– Rural to Urban Centres
• Urbanisation
• Communications
• Challenge to Artisans
– Population
• Doubled in previous century
• Food Supply Problems
• Malthus
– Ideological Challenges
• Liberalism, Nationalism, Democracy, Socialism
Pre-1848 Tensions
• Short Term
– Agricultural Crisis
• Poor Cereal Harvest
– Prices rise by 60% in a year
• Potato Blight
– Prices rise by 135% in a year
• Uncertainty of Supply
• 70% of Wages on food
– Financial Crisis
• Investment bubbles burst
– Railways, Iron, coal
• Less money to spend on manufactured goods
• Unemployment
• Working and Middle Classes, joined in misery as are
urban and agricultural populations
1848 Revolutions
• Unclear Reasons for Revolutionary Activity
– Reaction to Long term and Short term SocioEconomic causes
– Competing Ideologies in different countries
– Some Countries have no revolutions
• Britain & Russia
– Different Revolutionary leaders, aims and
aspirations in different countries
• Varying Combinations of Liberals, Democrats,
Nationalists and Socialists
• No clear coherent organised Revolutions
Case Study France: A Revolution
hijacked not once, not twice, but thrice!
• 1830 – 1848 a weak, corrupt Orleanist Monarchy
– Restricted privileged electorate of 240,000
– Liberal bourgeoisie demand incorporation into
electorate
• Reduction of Property qualification from 200 to 100 Francs
• Intransigent stand of Louis Philippe
– Conservative establishment alienates Liberals
– Reform Banquets used to protest against King
• Paris Banquet banned by authorities
• Liberals agree – but radical Republicans continue demos
–
–
–
–
–
Troops open fire on peaceful protesters
Barricades erected, looting, civil disorder
National Guard defect
King loses control of Paris
Abdicates 24th February to Republican Provisional Government
The Provisional Government falls
to the Conservatives
• Provisional Government
– Odd collection of radical & Moderate Republicans
• Radical social reform v constitutional parliamentary rule
– Conservative & Liberal suspicion of Republicanism (memories
of 1792 Terror)
• Financial Disarray
– Flight of capital – stock market crashes 55%
– New 45% increase of tax imposed on peasantry
• Handing power back to the Conservatives
– April Elections
•
•
•
•
•
•
Universal Suffrage (9,000,000)
Peasants suspicious of socialist plans to nationalise land
Politically Immature Peasants sought ‘advice’ from ‘betters’
Easter Sunday
Republicans won 80 seats (of 900 available)
Conservatives & Monarchists won 700 seats
The Second Republic elects a leader
who will kill the Republic!
•
•
The Constituent Assembly elects a new moderate executive
Unhappy Republicans recommence Revolution
– Radicals and Socialists
– “Liberty or Death”
•
‘June Days’ Barricades
– Forces of Law & Order do not buckle a second time
– 3,000 rioters killed, 12,000 arrested
•
December Presidential Elections
– Louis Napoleon 74% Cavaignac 19%
• Napoleon offers stability and familiarity
• Kills off 1848 Liberal, Socialist and Republican dreams once and for all!
•
New elections called May 1849
– Conservatives 500 seats
– Republicans up to 200 seats
•
Result unsettles Louis Napoleon
– Repressive measures extensively employed
– Freedom of speech restricted
– Franchise reduced (poorest 33% removed)
•
1851 Coup d’etat
– Declares Hereditary Empire
– Plebiscite to confirm
The Habsburg Empire
Rocks to the Core
• Nature of Austro-Hungarian Empire
– Very Conservative Monarchy
• Regency
– Archduke Ludwig for Ferdinand
• Court Intrigue
– Metternich versus Kolowrat in Konferenz with Ludwig and Karl
– Racially Diffuse
– Corrupt and Inefficient
• Severe economic difficulties (in response to rising Germany)
– Racial Character of Multi-National Empire
• The Liberal Revolution
– Influence of French Events
• Liberals take heart
– Demand removal of Arch-Reactionary Metternich & limited reforms of
government
• Meetings and Demonstrations dispersed by Gunfire
– Antagonises situation – Barricades erected
• Liberal Amazement
– Metternich resigns March 13th 1848
– Constitution Granted + Censorship lifted
The National Revolutions
• Emboldened by events in
Vienna
– Hungary
• New Liberal regime established
• Kossuth
• Magyar Language qualification
– To promote Hungarians
– Antagonises Slavs
– Bohemia
• Czechs emboldened by
Magyars
– Liberal Government set up in
Prague
– Italy
• Lombardy and Venice rise up
• Joined by Piedmont
The Radicalisation of the Liberal
Revolution
• Students and Democrats emboldened
– Stream of Petitions
• April 25th Liberal Constitution proposed
of elected assembly to share power with
Emperor
– Radicals rejection of ‘limited concessions’
• May 15th Elections agreed for new
assembly to decide new constitution
• May 17th – Royal Family legs it
• New government abolishes Serfdom
Liberal Austrian Weaknesses
• Slavic and National
Rivalries
– Revealed by Pan-Slavic
Congress
• Poor communications
• Failure to broaden appeal
of Revolution
– Urban Liberals antagonise
Rural Population
• Tax burden falls on peasantry
• Newly freed serfs are content
• Army owes allegiance to
Royal Family
The Counter-Revolution
• Loyal Army defeats Italians
• Returning Confidence from other
Counter-Revolutions
• Russians show Autocratic Solidarity
• Divide and Conquer
The Brief History
of ‘Liberal’
Germany
• Confederation of
Germany
–
–
–
–
Congress of Vienna
Buffer State
39 Sovereign States
Prussia & Austria
vied for domination
The King of Prussia
• Frederick William IV
– Mad as a Hatter
– Anti-Liberal but ‘Arthurian’ Medieval
Romanticist
– Agricultural Romanticist
– Relied on Junker Support
• Prussia
– Efficient
– Good Finances
– Strong Military
Following the French
• February French Revolutions
• Many riots in Minor German States
– Liberals, Democrats and Socialists take advantage
• Austria and Prussia expected to intervene to
crush revolutions BUT
– Vienna Revolution – Fall of Metternich
– Berlin riots
• Army efficiently suppressing revolutionaries However King
Frederick William IV withdraws Troops and hands victory
to Prussian Liberals
• Other Princedoms collapse when Prussia’s nerve fails
The Liberals cannot believe their
luck
• German National Assembly in Frankfurt
– Organised Constituent Assembly
– Universal Suffrage
• But only elected Privileged ‘Notables’
• Little Experience
• A German Ruler
– Choose Austrian Habsburg Archduke John
rather than King of Prussia
• Well Known Liberal Sympathiser
• But cannot guarantee loyalty of Prussian Army
Liberals Fail to broaden Support
• Impose Law and Order
– Keen to impress existing rulers
• Alienate democrats / socialists
• Suppression of National minorities
– Danes in Schleswig Holstein
– Czechs in Bohemia
• Use Prussians and Austrians to suppress
• However, support Poles
– To antagonise Russians
– But antagonises Prussian Junkers more
Prussian Resurgence
• Army moves to crush new Polish Grand Duchy
– Parliament cannot stop it
• Prussian parliament disagrees with Frankfurt
parliament
• Prussian army invades Schleswig Holstein (at
Frankfurt’s request)
– Horrifies international liberal opinion
– Britain and Russia threaten war with Prussia
– Prussia agrees to own peace with Denmark
• Abandons Frankfurt government
• Frankfurt realises that it has no army!
Austria and Prussia back in
Business
• Austria reasserts control in Vienna
• Frederick William deposes Berlin
parliament
• Frankfurt parliament offers
emperorship to Prussian King
– Frederick William declines
– Realist liberals realise parliament dead
– Radicals take to the barricades again
– Prussian army crushes all resistance
The Bottom Line for Germany
• Success of Revolution Discredited
Conservative ideas
• Failure of Revolution Discredited Liberal
Ideas
• Too many Chiefs not enough Indians
– Little Popular Support
– Union of Liberals and Democrats not followed up
• Democrats alienated
• Rule of Force the only winner
• Massive exodus of ‘liberal’ intelligentsia
• Liberalism died in Germany
– Militarism, hierarchy, statism triumphant
– Capitalists follow suit
The Bottom Line for the 1848
Revolutions
• It appeared as if the Conservatives
reasserted control
• However
– Things had changed forever
– Economic/social problems permanent
challenges to ruling order
– Conservatives would have to make concessions
to remain in power
– Many of the limited Liberal achievements
remained permanent
• The 1850s/60s would see the most liberal
period in European History