“The sense of belonging to a nation developed only over a period of time. In this chapter you will see how the idea of nationalism emerged in Europe, how territories were unified, and national governments formed. It was a process that took many decades, involved many wars and revolutions, many ideological battles and political conflicts.”
The theme of Frederic Sorrieu’s painting:
In 1848, Frederic Sorrieu, a French artist, prepared a series of four prints visualising his dream of a world made up of ‘democratic and social Republics’, as he called them.
The first print of the series shows the people of Europe and America – men and women of all ages and social classes – marching in a long train and offering homage to the statue of liberty as they pass by it.
A figure was shown with the torch of enlightenment in one hand and the Charter of the Rights of Man in the other.
On the earth in the foreground of the image lie the remains of the symbols of absolutist institutions.
In Sorrieu’s utopian vision, the people of the world are grouped as distinct nations, identified through their flags and national costume. United States and Switzerland are leading the procession.
Idea of Ernst Renan:
According to Renan a nation is the result of a long history of struggle, sacrifice and devotion.
A common glorious past, common will in the present and common goals for the future.
The inhabitants of a nation have a right to be consulted.
It is a large scale solidarity whose existence is a daily plebiscite.
The existence of a nation is a necessity because it guarantees freedom and liberty which would be lost if the world had only one law and one master.
Absolutist – Literally, a government or system of rule that has no restraints on the power exercised. In history, the term refers to a form of monarchical government that was centralised, militarised and repressive.
Utopian – A vision of a society that is so ideal that it is unlikely to actually exist.
Plebiscite – A direct vote by which all the people of a region are asked to accept or reject a proposal.
The French revolution and the idea of the nation:
Steps taken by French revolutionaries to develop the ideas of nation state:
The ideas of la patrie (the fatherland) and le citoyen (the citizen) emphasised the notion of a united community enjoying equal rights under a constitution.
A new French flag, the tricolor, was chosen to replace the former royal standard New hymns were composed, oaths taken and martyrs commemorated, all in the name of the nation.
The Estates General was elected by the body of active citizens and renamed the National Assembly.
A centralised administrative system was put in place and it formulated uniform laws for all citizens within its territory.
Internal customs duties and dues were abolished and a uniform system of weights and measures was adopted.
Regional dialects were discouraged and French, as it was spoken and written in Paris, became the common language of the nation.
French revolutionaries towards the rest of Europe:
The French revolutionaries declared that it was
The mission and the destiny of the French nation to liberate the people of Europe from despotism.
To help the people of Europe to become a nation.
The educated middle classes began setting up the Jacobin clubs whose activities prepared way for the French armies which moved into Holland, Belgium and Italy.
They carried the ideas of nationalism abroad.
Napoleon Bonaparte
Napoleon Bonaparte (15 August 1769-5 May 1821) was a French military and political leader who rose to prominence during the later stages of the French Revolution and its associated wars in Europe.
As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1814.
He implemented a wide array of liberal reforms across Europe, including the abolition of feudalism and the spread of religious toleration.
His legal code in France, the Napoleonic Code, influenced numerous civil law jurisdictions worldwide.
Napoleon is remembered for his role in leading France against a series of coalitions in the Napoleonic Wars.
He won the majority of his battles and seized control of most of continental Europe in a quest for personal power and to spread the ideals of the French Revolution.
Widely regarded as one of the greatest commanders in history, his campaigns are studied at military academies worldwide.
He remains one of the most studied political and military leaders in all of history.
Role of Napoleon-Civil code 1804:
Napoleon set about introducing many of the reforms in the territories that came under his control that he had already introduced in France.
He introduced Napoleonic code of 1804 which did away with all privileges based on birth, established equality before the law and secured the right to property.
In many parts of Europe like in the Dutch Republic, Switzerland, Italy and Germany he simplified administrative divisions, abolished the feudal system and freed peasants from serfdom and manorial dues. He removed guild restrictions from the towns.
He laid stress on infrastructure i.e., transportation, communication and banking system.
These new reforms were appreciated by the peasants, workers, businessmen, traders and even by the common people.
Drawbacks of Napoleonic code:
In the areas conquered, the reactions of the local populations to French rule were mixed.
Initially the French armies were welcome as harbingers of liberty but initial enthusiasm soon turned to hostility, as it became clear that the new administrative arrangements did not go hand in hand with political freedom.
Increased taxation, censorship, forced recruitment into the French armies required to conquer the rest of Europe, all seemed to outweigh the advantages of the administrative changes.
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1797
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Napoleon invades Italy; Napoleonic wars begin.
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1814-15
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Fall of Napoleon, the Vienna Peace Settlement.
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1821
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Greek struggle for independence begins.
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1848
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Revolutions in Europe, artisans, industrial workers and peasants revolt against economic hardships; middle classes demand constitutions and representative governments; Italians, Germans, Magyars, Poles, Czechs, etc demand nation states.
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1859-1870
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Unification of Italy
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1866-1871
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Unification of Germany
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1905
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Slav nationalism gathers force in the Habsburg and Ottoman Empires.
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Prince Klemens Wenzel von Metternich (15 May 1773-11 June 1859) was a politician and statesman of Rhenish extraction and one of the most important diplomats of his era, serving as the Foreign Minister of the Austrian Empire from 1809 until the liberal revolutions of 1848 forced his resignation.
The making of Nationalism in Europe:
In the mid-eighteenth century Germany, Italy and Switzerland were divided into kingdoms, duchies and cantons whose rulers had their autonomous territories of diverse peoples.
They did not see themselves as sharing common identity.
They spoke different languages and belonged to different ethnic groups.
Europe in the mid 18th century did not have nation states.
It was divided into kingdoms in which people of different ethnic groups lived.
Habsburg Empire of Austria-Hungary was one such example, it included:
Alpine regions – Tyrol, Austria, Sudetenland.
Bohemia where German speaking aristocracy lived.
Lombardy and Venetia with Italian speaking people.
Hungary where half of the people spoke Magyar and the other half spoken variety of dialects. Galicia – the aristocracy spoke polish.
These diverse groups had several differences but the only tie binding them together was their loyalty to the emperor.
The aristocracy and the new middle class:
Socially and politically, a landed aristocracy was the dominant class on the continent.
The members of this class were united by a common way of life that cut across regional divisions, owned estates in the countryside and also town houses, spoke French, their families were often connected by ties of marriage.
This powerful aristocracy was, however, numerically a small group.
The majority of the population was made up of the peasantry.
In Western and parts of Central Europe the growth of industrial production and trade meant the growth of towns and the emergence of commercial classes whose existence was based on production for the market.
New social groups came into being: a working-class population, and middle classes made up of industrialists, businessmen, professionals.
It was among the educated, liberal middle classes that ideas of nation unity following the abolition of aristocratic privileges gained popularity.
Liberal Nationalism:
The term liberalism’ derived from the Latin word liber, means free.
For the new middle classes liberalism stood for freedom for the individual and equality of all before the law.Politically, it emphasised the concept of government by consent.
Since the French Revolution, liberalism had stood for the end of autocracy and clerical privileges, a constitution and representative government through parliament.
Yet, equality before the law did not necessarily stand for universal suffrage.
Only for a brief period under the Jacobins did all adult males enjoy suffrage.
Throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth century’s women and non-propertied men organised opposition movements demanding equal political rights.
In the economic sphere, liberalism stood for the freedom of markets and the abolition of state-imposed restrictions on the movement of goods and capital.
During the nineteenth century this was a strong demand of the emerging middle classes.
Napoleon’s administrative measures had created out of countless small principalities a confederation of 39 states.
Each of these possessed its own currencies, and weights and measures, which involved time-consuming calculations.
In 1834, a customs union or zollverein was formed at the initiative of Prussia and joined up most of the German states.
The union abolished tariff barriers and reduced the number of currencies from over thirty to two.
The creation of network of railways further stimulated mobility, hamessing economic interests to national unification According to Prof Friedrich List, the aim of the zollverein was to bind the Germans economically into a nation.
A New Conservatism after 1815:
Conservatives believed that established, traditional institutions of state and society should be preserved, however they did not propose return to the society of pre-revolutionary days.
They realized from the changes initiated by Napoleon, that modernisation could in fact strengthen traditional institutions like the monarchy.
It could make state power more effective and strong.
Major Proposals of the Vienna Congress:
In 1815, representatives of the European powers (Britain, Russia, Prussia, Austria) who had collectively defeated Napoleon, met at Vienna draw up a settlement for Europe. The congress was hosted by the Austrian Chancellor Duke Metternich. The delegates drew up the Treaty of Vienna of 1815 with the object of undoing most of the changes that had come about in Europe during the Napoleonic wars.
The Bourbon dynasty, which had been deposed during the French Revolution, was restored to power and France lost the territories it had annexed under Napoleon.
(ii) A series of states were set up on the boundaries of France to prevent French expansion in future.
Thus the Kingdom of the Netherlands, which included Belgium, was set up in the north and Genoa was added to Piedmont in the south.
Prussia was given important new territories on its western frontiers, while Austria was given control of northern Italy.
The German confederation of 39 states that had been set up by Napoleon was left untouched.
In the east, Russia was given part of Poland while Prussia was given a portion of Saxony.
The main intention of the Congress was to restore the monarchies that had been overthrown by Napoleon, and create a new conservative order in Europe.
Criticism of Conservative Regimes:
Conservative regimes set up in 1815 were Autocratic, did not tolerate criticism and dissent, and sought to curb activities that questioned the legitimacy of autocratic governments. Most of them imposed censorship laws to control what was said in newspapers, books, plays and songs and reflected the ideas of liberty and freedom associated with the French Revolution
The Revolutionaries:
To be a revolutionary at this time meant a commitment to oppose monarchical forms that had been established after the Vienna Congress and to fight for liberty and freedom.
Most of these revolutionaries also saw the creation of nation states as a necessary part of this struggle for freedom.
Age of revolution 1830 – 1848:
As conservative regimes tried to consolidate their power, liberalism and nationalism came to be increasingly associated with revolution in many regions of Europe.
The revolutions were led by the liberal nationalists belonging to the educated middle-class elite, among whom were professors, school teachers, clerks and members of commercial middle classes.
Upheaval in France:
The first upheaval took place in France in July 1830.
The Bourbon kings who had been restored to power after the Vienna Congress by the conservatives were now overthrown by liberal revolutionaries who installed a constitutional monarchy with Louis Philippe as its head.
“When France sneezes, ‘Metternich once remarked, the rest of Europe catches cold’
Uprising in Brussels:
The July Revolution sparked an uprising in Brussels which led to Belgium breaking away from the United Kingdom of the Netherlands.
Uprising in Greece:
Greece had been a part of the Ottoman Empire since the fifteenth century.
The growth of revolutionary nationalism in Europe sparked off a struggle for independence amongst the Greeks which began in 1821.
Nationalists in Greece got support from other Greeks living in exile and also from many West Europeans who had sympathies for ancient Greek culture.
Poets and artists lauded Greece as the cradle of European civilisation and mobilised public opinion to support its struggle against a Muslim empire.
The English poet Lord Byron organised funds and later went to fight in the war, where he died of fever in 1824.
Finally, the Treaty of Constantinople of 1832 recognised Greece as an independent nation.
The Romantic Imagination & National feeling:
Though wars and territorial expansions played a major role in arousing the feeling of nationalism but culture, art, poetry, stories, music also played their role.
Romantic artists were against the glorifications of reason and science and focused on emotions, intution and mystical feelings.
They wanted to share a collective heritage, a common culture past as the basis of a nation.
Romantics such as the German philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder (1744-1803) claimed that true German culture was to be discovered among the common people (das volk).
Romantic philosophers wanted to create the true spirit of nationalism through folk songs, folk poetry and folk dances.
The emphasis on vemacular language and the collection of local folklore was not just to recover an ancient national spirit, but also to carry the modern nationalist message to large audiences who were mostly illiterate.
At the end of the 18th century Poland was partitioned by the great powers Russia, Prussia and Austria.
Even though Poland no longer existed as an independent territory, national feelings were kept alive through music and language.
Karol Kurpinski, for example, celebrated the national struggle through his operas and music, turning folk dances like the polonaise and mazurka into nationalist symbols.
Language too played an important role in developing nationalist sentiments.
After Russian occupation, the Polish language was forced out of schools and the Russian language was imposed everywhere.
In 1831, an armed rebellion against Russian rule took place which was ultimately crushed. Following this, many members of the clergy in Poland began to use language as a weapon of national resistance.
Polish was used for Church gatherings and all religious instruction.
As a result, a large number of priests and bishops were put in jail or sent to Siberia and the Russian authorities as punishment for their refusal to preach in Russian.
The use of Polish came to be seen as a symbol of the struggle against Russian dominance.
Hunger, hardship and popular revolt:
The 1830s were years of great economic hardship in Europe. The first half of the nineteenth century saw an enormous increase in population all over Europe.
(a) Increase in population all over Europe.
(b) More seekers of jobs than employment.
(c) Migration of rural people to the cities to live in overcrowded slums.
(d) In some areas aristocracy still enjoyed privileges while the peasants were burdened with feudal dues and obligations.
(e) Stiff competition from imports of cheap machine made goods from England.
(f) Rise of food prices due to a bad harvest led to increased poverty.
1848: The popular revolt:
In 1848, food shortages and widespread unemployment brought the population of Paris out on the road.
Barricades were erected and Louis Philippe was forced to flee.
A National Assembly proclaimed a Republic, granted suffrage to all adult males above 21, and guaranteed the right to work.
National workshops to provide employment were set up.
In 1845, weavers in Silesia had led a revolt against contractors who supplied them raw material and gave them orders for finished textiles but drastically reduced their payments.
On 4th June a large crowd of weavers marched up in pairs to the mansion of their contractors and demanded higher wages.
They were treated very badly.
As a result a group of weavers broke into the houses of contractors, damaged their house, plundered the cloth and tore them into threads.
The contractors fled with their families to the nearby village and returned with an army.
11 weavers were shot in the exchange firing.
1848: The revolution of the liberals:
Events of February 1848 in France had brought about the abdication of the monarch and a republic based on universal male suffrage had been proclaimed.
In other parts of Europe where independent nation state did not yet exist.
Men and women of the liberal middle classes combined their demands for constitutionalism with national unification.
They demanded for a nation state based on constitution, freedom of press and freedom of association.
The liberal movement did not give political rights to women all though a large number of women had participated actively in the movement.
They formed political associations, founded newspapers and took part in meetings and demonstrations.
They were not given the right to vote.
Although they stood as observers in the gallery of Frankfurt parliament.
Serfdom and bonded labour were abolished in most of the European countries but the workers, artisans and serfs were not given same facilities as enjoyed by middle class professionals and businessmen.
Frankfurt Parliament:
In the German regions a large number of political associations came together in the city of Frankfurt and decided to vote for an all-German National Assembly.
On 18 May 1848, 831 elected representatives marched in a festive procession to take their places in the Frankfurt parliament convened in the Church of St. Paul.
They drafted a constitution for a German nation to be headed by a monarchy subject to a parliament.
Obstacles
Friedrich Wilhelm IV, King of Prussia rejected and joined other monarchs. to oppose the elected assembly.
While the opposition of the aristocracy and military became stronger, the social basis of parliament eroded.
The parliament was dominated by the middle classes who resisted the demands of workers and artisans and consequently lost their support.
The issue of extending political rights to women was a controversial one within the liberal movement; they were denied suffrage rights during the election of the Assembly.
Outcomes
Though conservative forces were able to suppress liberal movements in 1848, they could not restore the old order.
In the years after 1848, the autocratic monarchies of Central and Eastern Europe began to introduce the changes that had already taken place in Western Europe before 1815.
The Habsburg rulers granted more autonomy to the Hungarians in 1867.
Feminist – Awareness of women’s rights and interests based on the belief of the social, economic and political equality of the genders.
Ideology – System of ideas reflecting a particular social and political vision.
The making of Germany and Italy-unifications:
Germany – Can the Army be the Architect of a Nation?
After 1848, nationalist feelings were widespread among middle-class Germans, who in 1848 tried to unite the different regions of the German confederation Into a nation-state governed by an elected parliament.
Prussia took on the leadership of the movement for national unification.
It’s Chief Minister, Otto Von Bismarck (followed the policy of Blood and Iron), was the architect of this process carried out with the help of the Prussian army and bureaucracy.
Three wars over seven years – with Austria, Denmark and France ended with Prussian victory and completed the process of unification.
In January 1871, the Prussian king, William 1, was proclaimed German Emperor in a ceremony held at Versailles.
On 18 January 1871, an assembly gathered in the unheated Hall of mirrors in the Palace of Versailles to proclaim the new German Empire headed by Kaiser (emperor) William I of Prussia.
The new state had the dominance of Prussia. It laid strong emphasis on modernising the currency, banking, legal and judicial systems in Germany.
Unification of Italy:
Fragmented society-Italy was divided into several states which were always quarreling among themselves as a result they became weak.
Foreign rule-Foreign invaders like France and Austria had occupied some Italian states and this became a hurdle in the unification of Italy.
Pope-The Pope of Rome had kept Rome and its adjoining territories in his control. He was the head of all the Christian countries of the world.
Italian Language – The Italian language had not acquired a common form and had many regional and local variations.
Stages of Unification:
Unification of Italy was done under the leadership of Cavour the Prime minister of Sardinia.
He followed the policy of war and diplomacy and was assisted by patriots like Garibaldi and Mazzini.
Cavour supported France and England against Russia in the Crimean war and thus gained their support against Austria. In 1859, he attacked Austria and acquired Lombardy.
Tuscany, Parma, Modena and the Papal states also joined hands with Sardinia.
In 1860 Garibaldi marched into Sicily and Naples (two kingdoms of Sicilies) with his revolutionary forces and liberated these two kingdoms to join Sardinia.
Venetia was given to Sardinia for helping Bismarck.
France vacated Rome and it became a part of Sardinia.
Thus in 1861 the unification of Italy was completed with Victor Emmanuel D as the monarch.
However, much of the Italian population among whom the rate of illiteracy was high and the people remained unaware of the liberal nationalist ideology
Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807-82):
Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807-82) is perhaps the most celebrated of Italian freedom fighters.
He came from a family engaged in coastal trade and was a sailor in the merchant navy.
In 1833 he met Mazzini, joined the Young Italy movement and participated in a republican uprising in Piedmont in 1834.
The uprising was suppressed and Garibaldi had to flee to South America, where he lived in exile till 1848.
In 1854, he supported victor Emmanuel II in his efforts to unify the Italian states.
In 1860, Garibaldi led the famous Expedition of the Thousand to South Italy.
Fresh volunteers kept joining through the course of the campaign, till their numbers grew to about 30,000.
They were popularly known as Red Shirts. In 1867, Garibaldi led an army of volunteers to Rome to fight the last obstacle to the unification of Italy.
The Red Shirts proved to be no match for the combined French and Papal troops.
The Strange Case of Britain:
In Britain the formation of the nation-state was not the result of a sudden upheaval or revolution. It was the result of a long-drawn-out process.
There was no British nation prior to the eighteenth century.
The primary identities of the people who inhabited the British Isles were ethnic ones-such as English, Welsh, Scot or Irish.
But as the English nation steadily grew in wealth, importance and power, it was able to extend its influence over the other nations of the islands.
The English parliament, which had seized power from the monarchy in 1688 at the end of a protracted conflict, was the instrument through which a nation-state, with England at its centre, came to be forged.
The Act of Union (1707) between England and Scotland that resulted in the formation of the “United Kingdom of Great Britain” meant, in effect that England was able to impose its influence on Scotland.
The British parliament was henceforth dominated by its English members.
The growth of a British identity meant that Scotland’s distinctive culture and political institutions were systematically suppressed. Ireland suffered a similar fate.
It was a country deeply divided between Catholics and Protestants.
The English helped the Protestants of Ireland to establish their dominance over a largely Catholic country. After a failed revolt led by Wolfe Tone and his United Irishmen (1798).
Ireland was forcibly incorporated into the United Kingdom in 1801.
A new ‘British nation was forced through the propagation of a dominant English culture.
The symbols of the New Britain-the British flag (Union Jack), the national anthem (God Save Our Noble King), the English language were actively promoted and the older nations survived only as subordinate partners in this union.
Visualising the nation:
Artists in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries found a way out by personifying a nation.
In other words they represented a country as if it were a person.
Nations were than portrayed as female figures.
The female form that was chosen to personify the nation did not stand for any particular woman in real life; rather it sought to give the abstract idea of the nation in concrete form.
That is, the female figure became an allegory of the nation.
Female allegories were invented by artists in the nineteenth century to represent the nation.
In France she was Christened Marianne, a popular Christian name, which underlines the idea of the people’s nation. Her characteristics were drawn from those of Liberty and the Republic. The red cap, the tricolor, the cockade.
Statues of Marianne were erected in public squares to remind the public of the national symbol of unity and to persuade them to identify with it.
Marianne images we marked on coins and stamps.
Germania became the allegory of the German nation.
In visual representations, Germania wears a crown of oak leaves, as the German oak stands for heroism.
Allegory – When an abstract idea (for instance, greed, envy, freedom, liberty) is expressed through a person or a thing. An allegorical story has two meanings, one literal and one symbolic,
Nationalism and Imperialism – Balkan states:
By the last quarter of the nineteenth century the major European powers manipulated the nationalist aspirations of the subject peoples in Europe to further their own imperialist aims.
The most serious of nationalist tension in Europe after 1871 was the area called the Balkans.
The Balkans was a region of geographical and ethnic variation comprising modem-day Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, Greece, Macedonia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Solvenia, Serbia and Montenegro whose inhabitants were broadly known as the Slavs.
A large part of the Balkans was under the control of the Ottoman Empire.
The spread of the ideas of romantic nationalism in the Balkans together with the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire made this region very explosive.
One by one, its European subject nationalities broke away from its control and declared independence.
All through the nineteenth century the Ottoman Empire had sought to strengthen itself through modernisation and internal reforms but with very little success.
One by one, its European subject nationalities broke away from its control and declared independence.
The Balkan area became an area of intense conflict.
The Balkan states were fiercely jealous of each other and each hoped to gain more territory at the expense of the others.
During this period, there was intense rivalry among the European powers over trade and colonies as well as naval and military might.
Each power Russia, Germany, England, Austro-Hungary-was keen on countering the hold of other powers over the Balkans and extending its own control over the area.
This led to a series of wars in the region and finally the First World War.
Nationalism, aligned with imperialism led Europe to disaster in 1914.
Many countries in the world which had been colonised by the European power in the nineteenth century began to oppose imperial domination
The anti-imperial movements that developed everywhere were nationalist in the sense that they all struggled to form independent nation-states and were inspired by a sense of collective national unity, forged in confrontation with imperialism.
The idea that societies should be organised into nation-states’ came to be accepted as natural and universal.
Imperialism is when a certain nation forcefully takes control of another area and becomes involved in its political economics and social affairs.
