The Rise of Nationalism in Europe

Describe the painting by Frederic Sorrieu.

1. Frederic Sorrieu, a French artist, prepared the Dream of Worldwide Democratic and Social Republics, which shows the peoples 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. 

2. Artists of the time of the French Revolution personified Liberty as a female figure – holding 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 shattered remains of the symbols of absolutist institutions. 

3. In Sorrieu’s utopian vision, the peoples of the world are grouped as distinct nations, identified through their flags and national costume. Leading the procession, way past the Statue of Liberty, are the United States and Switzerland, which by this time were already nation-states. France, identifiable by the revolutionary tricolour, has just reached the statue. 

4. She is followed by the peoples of Germany, bearing the black, red and gold flag. Following the German peoples are the peoples of Austria, the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, Lombardy, Poland, England, Ireland, Hungary and Russia. 

5. From the heavens above, Christ, saints and angels gaze upon the scene. They have been used by the artist to symbolise fraternity among the nations of the world. 

What was the first incidence of Nationalism in Europe? 

1. The first clear expression of nationalism came with the French Revolution in 1789. 

2. The political and constitutional changes that came in the wake of the French Revolution led to the transfer of sovereignty from the monarchy to a body of French citizens. 

3. The revolution proclaimed that it was the people who would henceforth constitute the nation and shape its destiny.  

How did the French Revolution inspire people all over Europe? 

1. The revolutionaries further declared that it was the mission and the destiny of the French nation to liberate the peoples of Europe from despotism, in other words, to help other peoples of Europe to become nations. 

2. When the news of the events in France reached the different cities of Europe, students and other members of the educated middle classes began setting up Jacobin clubs. 

3. Their activities and campaigns prepared the way for the French armies which moved into Holland, Belgium, Switzerland and much of Italy in the 1790s. 

4. With the outbreak of the revolutionary wars, the French armies began to carry the idea of nationalism abroad. 

How did nationalism and the idea of the nation-state emerge? 

1. 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. 

2. Their families were often connected by ties of marriage. This powerful aristocracy was, however, numerically a small group. 

3. The majority of the population was made up of the peasantry. 

4. 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. 

5. Industrialisation began in England in the second half of the eighteenth century, but in France and parts of the German states, it occurred only during the nineteenth century. In its wake, new social groups came into being: a working-class population and middle classes made up of industrialists, businessmen, and professionals. 

6. It was among the educated, liberal middle classes that ideas of national unity following the abolition of aristocratic privileges gained popularity. 

What were the features of the conservative regime set up in 1815(early 19th century)?

1. Conservatives believed that established, traditional institutions of state and society – like the monarchy, the Church, social hierarchies, property and the family – should be preserved. 

2. Modernisation could in fact strengthen traditional institutions like the monarchy. It could make state power more effective and strong. 

3. A modern army, an efficient bureaucracy, a dynamic economy, and the abolition of feudalism and serfdom could strengthen the autocratic monarchies of Europe. 

4. Conservative regimes set up in 1815 were autocratic. They did not tolerate criticism and dissent and sought to curb activities that questioned the legitimacy of autocratic governments. 

5. 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. 

Write a note on Giuseppe Mazzini.

1. The Italian revolutionary Giuseppe Mazzini. Born in Genoa in 1807, he became a member of the secret society of the Carbonari. He subsequently founded two more underground societies, first Young Italy in Marseilles and then Young Europe in Berne, whose members were like-minded young men from Poland, France, Italy and the German states. 

2. Mazzini believed that God had intended nations to be the natural units of mankind. So Italy could not continue to be a patchwork of small states and kingdoms. 

3. It had to be forged into a single unified republic within a wider alliance of nations. This unification alone could be the basis of Italian liberty. 

4. Mazzini’s relentless opposition to monarchy and his vision of democratic republics frightened the conservatives. Metternich described him as ‘the most dangerous enemy of our social order’. 

"The development of nationalism did not come about only through wars and territorial expansion. Culture played an important role in creating the idea of the nation: art and poetry, stories and music helped express and shape nationalist feelings.". How? 

   Romanticism is a cultural movement which sought to develop a particular form of nationalist sentiment. Romantic artists and poets generally criticised the glorification of reason and science and focused instead on emotions, intuition and mystical feelings. Their effort was to create a sense of a shared collective heritage, a common cultural past, as the basis of a nation. 

Germany: 

   Other 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. It was through folk songs, folk poetry and folk dances that the true spirit of the nation (volksgeist) was popularised. So collecting and recording these forms of folk culture was essential to the project of nation-building. 

Poland: 

1. The emphasis on vernacular 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. 

2. Even though Poland no longer existed as an independent territory, national feelings were kept alive through music and language. 

3. Karol Kurpinski, for example, celebrated the national struggle through his operas and music, turning folk dances like the polonaise and mazurka into nationalist symbols. 

4. After the Russian occupation, the Polish language was forced out of schools and the Russian language was imposed everywhere. 

5. language as a weapon of national resistance. Polish was used for Church gatherings and all religious instruction, in 1831, an armed rebellion against Russian rule. The use of Polish came to be seen as a symbol of the struggle against Russian dominance. 

Describe the cause of the Silesian weavers’ uprising. 

1. Weavers in Silesia had led a revolt against contractors who supplied them with raw material and gave them orders for finished textiles but drastically reduced their payments. 

2. A large crowd of weavers emerged from their homes and marched in pairs up to the mansion of their contractor demanding higher wages. 

3. A group of them forced their way into the house, and smashed its elegant windowpanes, furniture, and porcelain … another group broke into the storehouse and plundered it of supplies of cloth which they tore to shreds. 

4. The contractor fled with his family to a neighbouring village which, however, refused to shelter such a person. 

5. He returned 24 hours later having requisitioned the army. In the exchange that followed, eleven weavers were shot. 

Write a note on the role of women in Nationalist Struggles.  

1. The issue of extending political rights to women was a controversial one within the liberal movement, in which large numbers of women had participated actively over the years. 

2. Women had formed their own political associations, founded newspapers and taken part in political meetings and demonstrations. 

3. Despite this, they were denied suffrage rights during the election of the Assembly. 

4. When the Frankfurt parliament convened in the Church of St Paul, women were admitted only as observers to stand in the visitors’ gallery. 

The model of the nation or the nation-state is Great Britain. Explain. 

(or) 

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. Explain. 

1. 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. 

2. 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. 

3. 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. 

4. The growth of a British identity meant that Scotland’s distinctive culture and political institutions were systematically suppressed. The Catholic clans that inhabited the Scottish Highlands suffered terrible repression whenever they attempted to assert their independence. 

5. The Scottish Highlanders were forbidden to speak their Gaelic language or wear their national dress, and large numbers were forcibly driven out of their homeland. 

6. Ireland 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. Catholic revolts against British dominance were suppressed. 

7. After a failed revolt led by Wolfe Tone and his United Irishmen (1798), Ireland was forcibly incorporated into the United Kingdom in 1801. 

8. A new ‘British nation’ was forged 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), and the English language – were actively promoted and the older nations survived only as subordinate partners in this union. 

Why did nationalist tensions emerge in the Balkans? 

(or) 

Nationalism, aligned with imperialism, led Europe to disaster in 1914. Explain. 

1. The Balkans was a region of geographical and ethnic variation comprising modern-day Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, Greece, Macedonia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovenia, 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. 

2. The spread of the ideas of romantic nationalism in the Balkans together with the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire made this region very explosive. 

3. One by one, its European subject nationalities broke away from its control and declared independence. The Balkan peoples based their claims for independence or political rights on nationality and used history to prove that they had once been independent but had subsequently been subjugated by foreign powers. 

4. As the different Slavic nationalities struggled to define their identity and 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. 

5. 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. 

6. Nationalism, aligned with imperialism, led Europe to disaster in 1914.