Additionally, industrialization, particularly modernized transportation with the railroad, encouraged the growth of nationalism. With railroads, regions within a state or nation that had once seemed so distant from each other were pulled closer together economically and socially as people, food, and other items could travel across large distances faster. Railroads encouraged a unified trade and economy as well as a singular cultural identification. Industrialization and nationalism both worked as independent events in the 19th century, but their simultaneous presence in Europe allowed the two ideas to influence one another.
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Summary
Industrialization and Nationalism were two constant themes in the 19th century that interestingly shared a lot of connections. Industrialization greatly transformed the social atmosphere, reconstructing the role of workers and imposing new social issues. The colossal size and mechanism industry favored lessened the importance of an individual worker, paving the way for protests for workers' rights and unions. The worker's role was one of many new social issues industrialization introduced, others including the loss of a rural environment and the role of industrialization for the state that often times influenced particular political, economic, and social measures. These social changes created issues that needed to be dealt with reform. Nationalism in the 19th century acted as a valuable mechanism for reform. Nationalism meant tearing down the political, social, and economic barriers within a state in hopes of unifying the state under common law and common goals. Under unification, reform would be much easier to pass in legislature. In this case, nationalism acted as a response to Europe's growing industrialization.
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“Does this make the intentions of the Congress of Vienna a failure? Or did the Crimean War merely mark the end of an era for European peace? The Great Power politics that arose during the onset of the Crimean War harken back to traditional dominating and power-seeking intentions of countries. The Great Power politics would remain the go-to strategy up to World War I.”
ReplyDeletehttp://j91h.blogspot.com/2009/02/eastern-question.html
Good question. So, what do you think? Does it mark the end of the Concert of Europe? Note the shifting alliances—France against Russia; after 1871, France will look to Russia for alliances—and again, all because of the Balkans and the tensions with the Austrians...
“that power does not come to those arguing for just causes such as enlightened values of reason and rights, but to those through economic expansion and social institutions.”
http://j91h.blogspot.com/2009/02/bismarck.html
And from iron and blood, right? So economic expansion, but also war, if needed...
“Realism took a different approach to the revolutionary and nationalistic spirit from Romanticism, celebrating the common people by making them the focus of their work. Never before had middle and lower class individuals been given central artistic representation in a movement.”
http://j91h.blogspot.com/2009/01/art-in-19th-century.html
Does this mean that Realism, in its own way, rejected Enlightenment ideals? Or is this an extreme position to hold? What role did the new-fangled invention of the camera, 1836, play in all this. Did realism also evoke emotion?
http://j91h.blogspot.com/2009/01/congress-of-viennas-staunch-motives-for_25.html
Doesn't this look like a repeat of your post: “The Eastern Question”?
“The revolutions of 1830 and 1848 reveal the French public's outspokenness and rejection of any ideals that challenged the people's liberties. And although it can be said that Napoleon's imperial role was less of the independence France had fought for in the French Revolution, Napoleon maintained a likable image in France for unifying the country. Louis Napoleon Bonaparte's landslide election reveals the French people's decisiveness in what they wanted and their unfaltering determination to get what they wanted.”
http://j91h.blogspot.com/2009/01/reading-pages-732-742-frances.html
And so my question for you is this: Given what you say—why didn't the French people throw these guys out as soon as it became clear that they were not really better than the last mob. Could it be that safety and security were very important to the French people as well—and that economic distress was a major factor in getting these regimes overthrown—i.e., they could cope with the lack of political freedom, but the economic downturns was just too much to bear...