1. Examine the nature and the legacy of the Revolutions of 1848.

The year 1848 saw a wave of revolutions across Europe. Revolution spread on an unprecedented scale with equally unprecedented speed. One by one, the old order in Europe collapsed against coalitions of socialists, republicans and liberals who had stirred the masses into a popular movement. In Central and Eastern Europe, their demand often assumed a nationalist character along with the demand for a constitutional government. In France, a republic was called for. The spring of 1848 came to be known as the ‘springtime of the people’. It should be mentioned that Britain and Russia, the most and least industrially developed countries in Europe respectively, were not affected beyond incidents of disorder. However they did play a part as mediators. By the end of the year of revolutions, the old order had more or less succeeded in re-establishing itself, but there were changes in European political, social and economic landscapes.

 The cultural atmosphere of Romanticism played a large part in the revolutions of the first half of the 19th century. It had emerged in Germany and at the time of the revolutions still flourished. The middle class was becoming more prosperous, and this was also the era of opposition to industrial reform. Art and the artist were becoming increasingly separated from society. While the political ideas of the French revolution were openly regretted, the ideas of the revolution – liberty, equality and fraternity- found application in the criticism of the emerging industrial society. Utopian Socialism was one such idea, which believed in the replacement of capitalism by socialism by enlightened and benevolent authorities. Thinkers of this school were Henri de Saint Simon, Charles Fourier and Robert Owen. They were mocked by later socialists like Marx and Engels. Proudhon, a philosophical anarchist, wished to substitute free association and contract for all legal compulsions. Romanticism also had room for the ideas of conservatism, for Romantic thought could also extend to the idea of a benevolent despot. The idea of liberalism too found root in this cultural phenomenon, for it saw the overcoming of oppression. The Romantic emphasis on diversity was evident from the trend of studying folk lore. This could have influenced the growth of nationalist sentiment. These ideas were in stark contrast to the rational, cosmopolitan ideas associated with the enlightenment. Also, the Romantics had a highly idealised notion of the people – this is evident from Lamartine’s speech in favour of universal male franchise – but one in which they saw themselves outside of the body of people. The beginnings of the springtime of the people were a coalition of ideological reaction to the oppression of the old order, but cracks began to appear in the Romantic idea of a revolution as the coalition of the liberals, radicals and socialists developed cracks as differences of principle became clear.

 While the revolutionary activity began in Sicily in January, this did not have much of an impact outside of Italy. It was the events of Paris that really triggered the events. On the 12th of February, the liberal opposition in Paris reduced the majority of Guizot’s conservative government and announced the intention to hold a propaganda banquet on the 22nd of February. The government’s banned this banquet, which in turn led to a popular demonstration encouraged by radical leaders. Parisian banquets end in street demonstrations; crowds clash with soldiers and police; barricades are built. The army refused to fight while the National Guard turned insurgent. The provisional government made up of moderates, socialists and radical ‘pure republicans assumed power’. In March, the Luxembourg Commission was set up to examine worker’s conditions in response to the workers demands – that is, both the right to work and the right to work relief. The National workshops were set up to provide employment. In April, the elections to the constituent assembly produced a monarchist majority. There were protests against this assembly in May, which was put down by the National Guard. In June, the abolition of the National workshops led to demonstrations that were put down ruthlessly. General Cavaignac came to power. In November, the constituent assembly finished the constitution and called for presidential elections in December. The outcome was the election of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte as president, despite nothing else to recommend him politically than the family name. He appointed conservative ministers.

 News of the revolution in Paris spread quickly. Metternich QUOTE. There was street fighting in Vienna. The flight of Metternich on the 13th of March was symbolic of the collapse of the old order in the Austrian empire. By April, nationalist movements in different parts of the Habsburg Empire were beginning to make their presence felt. Cracow, the Italian domains of the Habsburgs, and the Croats all made known their desire for national self determination. In May, elections for the Austrian Constituent assembly occurred. Franchise was limited, with property being a prerequisite. There was mass reaction to this, organised by the democrats. The conservative ministers of the regime resigned and the court fled from Vienna to Innsbruck. In the former Habsburg controlled Lombardy and Venetia; elections produced the decision for union with Piedmont Savoy for a constitutional monarchist program. The conservative elements and the army offered support to the smaller nationalist movements in keeping with the Habsburg policy of ‘divide and rule’. In June, elections to the Austrian, Hungarian and Croat National assemblies are held. The Austrian army, under General Windischgraetz was victorious in street fighting at Prague. The Slav congress and the Czechs are successfully put down. The Austrian Negotiations with the Piedmontese regarding Venetia were unsuccessful. In July, the Italian situation was resolved with Radetsky’s victory as Custozza. By August, the Imperial family had returned to Vienna. In September, serfdom was abolished. In March 1849, the Austrian Constituent Assembly was dissolved, and the demand to return to the pre 1848 German confederation was made.

As for the Prussian situation, in March 1848, conflict had broken out on the streets of Berlin. The demonstrators were victorious and a constitutional government was declared by Frederick William. He appointed liberal ministers and also announced his willingness to lead the German national movement. The Question of Prussia over the course of 1848 was closely linked to that of German nationalism, therefore the situation in Posen, Baden and so on affected the Prussian revolution in its aftermath. In May, elections to the Prussian constituent assembly took place, which showed a majority for the constitutionalists and the conservative monarchists. This was a blow to the revolutionary forces as evidently the idea of paternalistic despotism held strong in the minds of the people. In August, Prussia signed the armistice of Malmo, thus sealing the Schleswig-Holstein question without even consulting the provisional government of Germany. The radicals in the German assembly tried to overthrow the Malmo agreement, but are unable to do so. The attempt to protest this was crushed by the Prussian forces. In November, the King appointed Brandenburg as prime minister. The Constituent Assembly called for a tax boycott in response to this. The choice of a conservative sent the popular masses to rioting, especially in the provinces. This was suppressed by the army. In December, the constituent assembly was dissolved and a constitution that favoured the monarch and the executive was created.

In Eastern Europe, large estates still played an important role and serfdom was prevalent, while in the West, peasants were legally free and large landholdings were not of primary importance. Peasant violence against feudal landlords and their exploitation was widespread. The Peasants complained of taxation, the lost right to uses the commons, forests and also against aspects of capitalism. These socio economic tensions had existed prior to 1848, but in the peasants coloured this conflict with the political ideas of the urban revolutions, waving tricolours and shouting the slogans of the capital cities. In France, however, in order the fund the National Workshops and Work relief measures and to balance these costs, land tax was raised by 45 per cent. Troops were dispatched to settle disorder with regard to collective rights. This alienated the peasantry from the new government, thus pushing them further to conservatism, which ultimately manifested itself in the election of the President. In the Habsburg lands and in Prussia, work relief measures were undertaken, and peasants were given greater control over the land. In areas where serfdom prevailed, the countryside was likely to throw its weight behind whoever promised them its abolition. Rich grain growing areas in central and Western Europe relied upon the paternalistic attitude of their rulers to safeguard their interests. It was in areas where non grain agriculture was undertaken, like production of grapes, where peasants were reliant on the market for food, that they were receptive to ideas of the left, as the distribution of land was more egalitarian in these areas. Thus peasant anger was directed at the nobility, making it more receptive to socialist ideas.

 In the cities, the ‘labouring poor’ used the freedom of association to their advantage in negotiating for what they wanted. Craftsmen, workers and labourers created organisations like trade unions and political clubs to put for grievances to local and state authorities. This was most evident in Paris. The Luxembourg Commission in Paris even allowed for representatives of each trade to discuss social and economic reorganisation. But these workers, who had been hardest hit by industrial expansion, were not concerned with further revolution and political power. They merely wanted to protect their livelihood and were concerned with their own welfare. Machine breaking reflects this concern. This is explained by the pre-revolutionary economic crises of unemployment, falling real wages, loss in control of production and problems of the labour market. The biggest difference between the popular masses of the town and the countryside was that in urban areas, the poor were aware of the political nature of their demands. Socialist doctrines had already begun to take effect in Paris, under the leadership of men like Blanc. Eric Hobsbawm says that the urban poor were disproportionately effective, as they were not in a majority, but were concentrated in ‘hungry masses’ in sensitive areas such as capital cities. They did not have a well formed political ideology, but were rioters in the radius of Jacobin, socialist and democratic-republican ideologies propagated by the intellectuals. The petty bourgeoisie, especially craftsmen and small shopkeepers, were often on the democratic left of the political spectrum. Their bitterness stemmed from the economic effects of industry on the master craftsman. Jonathan Sperber sees organised left wing politics as carrying over from the long established tradition of guilds.

Cracks begin to appear in the revolutionary framework after the initial revolutions of 1848. Ideological differences became more apparent amongst the revolutionaries themselves. There was also a conflict between those who wished to maintain order and those who wanted further ‘social revolution’. This often took the form of a widening gap amongst the liberals and between the liberals and supporters of social reform and democracy. In all of the states that had experienced revolution, different groups felt the time was ripe to push for all necessary demands. This led to more disorder, though these usually petered out due to lack of organisation. But this often forced the new liberal governments to employ the pre-existing state apparatus to restore order. Even in France, where this tendency was least indulged and commissars of the people were sent to the provinces to consolidate the new government, depending on the discretion of the commissar, a considerable number of officials from the old regime were retained. In the rest of the continent, officials were largely retained, such as generals and army personnel. At the lower administrative levels, the gendarmes, tax collectors etc who interacted with the peasants changed least of all.

 One of the charges that has been levelled against the liberals is that they abandoned their ‘working class’ allies once they had achieved their own ends or for failing to see the revolution through till the end. Identified with the bourgeoisie in Marxist perspective, they preferred order to revolution especially when the prospect of ‘red’ revolution threatened property. In France, whether supporters of the Bourbon, Orleans or even of a republic, among the ‘notables’ a national class consciousness emerged. In the Habsburg empire, former members of the liberal opposition like Alexander Bach found place is the restored government, while in Prussia, liberal bankers were perfectly content to live with the restored monarchy, In return, concessions were made to the liberal businessmen in economic, legal and even cultural spheres.

In many parts of Europe, legislatures and constituent assemblies had not existed until the revolution. The formation of these bodies was of prime importance. The question of suffrage thus becomes important, with the liberals in most parts of Europe in favour of suffrage for all those of independent means. This was challenged by the radicals, who favoured broad based democracies. The labouring poor, who benefitted the most from the idea of universal suffrage, were quite sceptical of elections. In fact, they often imitated or even sought the advice of local clergymen and notables who were often conservative. Radicals, who had strongly advocated universal suffrage, found that the idea of democracy was undermined by the masses, which ended up voting conservatively. An example of this would be in France, where 84% of the people voted in the April elections to the National assembly. It made it amply clear that revolutionary tendencies were only really restricted to Paris and other urban centres. Elections to legislative assemblies showed the largest share of votes was received by the liberal centre or right. In the aftermath of these elections conflict occurred between the radicalized workers and the moderate and conservative assemblies. These assemblies met in the capital cities which were inhabited by the radical masses. This is best illustrated by the ‘June Days’ in Paris. This was a demonstration against the government against the abandonment of the National Workshops. It culminated in the accumulation of power in the hands of General Cavaignac.

 An organic doctrine of state could give rise to a nationalist movement. In this regard, the ideas of Rousseau and Burke paved way for the ideas of Fichte and Hegel. Race, language, geography, culture and religion were all uniting factors. When all of these coincided, then very strong nationalism appeared. Herder based nation on Lang and culture as did Fichte. But Fichte also argued superiority of German culture. In 1848, a political assertion of national self-determination occurred in many parts of Europe. In Central Europe, the revolutions and mass demands often took the character of nationalist movements.

 In January 1848, the first of the revolutionary outbreaks had taken place in Italy. In February, the rulers of Naples and Tuscany granted constitutions under duress from the people. In Piedmont, Charles Albert also backed the idea of a constitution. A.J.P. Taylor saw Charles Albert as a ‘Romantic Conservative’, that is, given to the idea of a benevolent despotism, and made liberal concessions out of pragmatic necessity to garner support for his plans of expansion. But in the disturbances in Vienna he saw the chance to extend his own territories. In Rome, Pope Pius IX too took up the revolutionary cause. In Lombardy and Venetia, which were part of the Habsburg Empire, the agitation took up an anti Austrian character. Revolution in Vienna encouraged the Milanese to join the revolutionary fold. On March 22nd, the Kingdom of Sardinia declared war on Austria. Groups from all parts of Italy came to take part in this was that was beginning to look like a war not national liberation under liberal ideas. However, the Italian forces were eventually defeated, the decisive blow being dealt by Austrian military leader Radetsky at the battle of Custozza on July 24th. The moderates had rallied behind the king of Piedmont for the cause of Italian liberation, but this was an uneasy situation for they were constantly fearful of the republicans and the social revolution. This military weakness of the Italians, the refusal to call on France for help and the hesitations of Piedmont led to the eventual defeat of the Italians. The moderates were discredited, and leadership of the liberation movement passed to the radicals.

 Germany existed in 1848, with frontiers, a common language and national feelings, but it lacked an administration and an army. It was a made of a number of states. The two largest component states, Prussia and the Habsburg Empire, also contained areas that were not part of Germany – that is, Polish Prussia and Hungary. In one of his proclamations, the Prussian King Frederick William announced his willingness to undertake leadership of the nationalist movement. The idea of Germany was not one that appealed to the empire, for it would place her in a questionable position over the non- German areas. Also, the revolutions of February led a group of liberals and radicals to meet at Heidelberg, where they decided the need for a German parliament. While the liberals and radicals agreed upon this, the liberals had no intention of overthrowing the monarchy or attacking property, unlike the radicals who stood for social revolution. The pre-parliament called the Vorparliament met in March and decided on elections to a National assembly based on universal manhood suffrage, thus creating the Frankfurt parliament. This body was a disproportionate representation of the German people, as it was largely middle class, with a large number of professionals. This was a blow to the radicals, for it indicated, according to Grenville, that unified Germany would be the product of ‘liberal evolution’ in cooperation with princes rather than as a revolutionary recreation of society. Unfortunately, this Parliament had no real power, for the majority of Germans had stronger feelings for their respective states that for the German nation. The revolutionaries were the exceptions, but their ideas for social reform were unacceptable to the liberals. But in March, the constitution of the Frankfurt parliament declared it sovereign above the princes and parliaments of the various component states despite having no government and no army. Archduke John of Austria was elected head of state by the assembly. The parliament of Frankfurt has been criticized for suppressing other nationalist movements. The situation in Poland is an example of this. The Prussian government had initially supported the Polish nationalists and had agreed to divide Posen along ethnic lines, but backtracked on this. Combined with the suppression of the nationalist assembly in Cracow in Galicia, this was a blatant chauvinistic denial of Polish nationalism. The German nationalists the provinces of Schleswig and Holstein in Denmark tried to join the German nation, despite the general liberal opinion that minorities did not have the right to national self determination. The second attempt at the armistice of Malmo finally led to the withdrawal of troops from Denmark. This decision of the Parliament was enforced by Prussian arms against the indignation of the Frankfurt radicals. This was encouraged by the Frankfurt assembly. However, the Frankfurt parliament did not seriously consider forcing non German areas, such as those in the Habsburg Empire, to join Germany. However, the Frankfurt parliament was divided – while the majority believed in unification hand in hand with existing institutions and the princes, a minority worked for social revolution. This made unification both in the name of a German monarch and by popular vote impossible in 1848.

 Hungary had enjoyed special rights, which had furthered by the April laws- they had their own constitution, autonomy and political unity. The Magyars were essentially ‘royalists’, and therefore had no intention of separating from the Habsburg empire. They ruled over a large agrarian population made up of Serbs, Croats, Romanians, Ukrainians, Slovaks and even a German minority, but strong centralist tendencies prevented them from recognising the nationalism of these groups. Even Magyar radicals refused this recognition. Following a policy of ‘divide and rule’, the Habsburg court at Vienna offered their support to the nationalities. The Croat army was to be the one that attacked the Diet at Budapest and also revolutionary Vienna under Josip Jelacic. However, in most parts of Hungary, the peasants credited the Hungarian diet with reforms under the leadership of Kossuth. The Hungarian Diet was essentially a moderate-radical coalition. It alone amongst all the revolutionary states was brought down by the Habsburg armies and not internal weaknesses. Around August 1848, the Austrian armies under Windischgraetz began to move against the various constitutional governments and nationalist movements and forced to accept the idea of the Habsburg Empire and Pragmatic Sanctions.

 Rene Albrecht-Carrie points out that what is unique about 1848 is that the revolutionary situations were able to play out without fear of an international war. The key here is France’s non intervention – she stayed out of the Italian political scenario even though her mediation could have proved decisive. In September, France was supposed to intervene in France, but this was called off at the last minute. This worked very well for Britain, whose idea of foreign affairs called for an elimination of Austrian presence in Italy so that it could act as a more effective buffer against Russia in the Balkans and therefore maintain the balance of power. France stayed out of the Italian situation as it did not want to actively aid the creation of two neighbouring states mightier than itself. The excuse not to support Piedmont was that France could not support of monarchy in the light of its own republican revolution, but it is notable that the French did not rush the Venice’s aid despite its republican character (Taylor, 1955). While the Tsar did intervene in Hungary, for the most part, the Russian attitude was one of contempt for the German princes. Like the British, it was in the Tsar’s interests to keep Prussia from expanding to the North and to maintain Denmark, which would help to maintain the balance of power in the Baltic Sea.

By 1849, it was evident that the old order had survived the challenge of the revolutions of 1848. On the surface, very little had changed in Europe. The Habsburgs were restored to fully glory in Austria, while the paternalistic rule of the Hohenzollerns was re-established in Prussia. Though France was once again a republic, the election of Louis Napoleon to the post of President signalled, according to Hobsbawm, that order was compatible with the system of elections. George Macaulay dubbed 1848 as ‘the turning point at which history failed to turn’. Hobsbawm counters this with the assertion that it was not that Europe failed to turn but that it failed to do so in a revolutionary fashion.

 In Marxist histories, the revolution was to have been a bourgeois, but the bourgeoisie withdrew from it. Perhaps under French leadership, this would have been accomplished, but the French also preferred order and stability to further revolutionary changes. The proletariat was as yet lacked ideology and was inexperienced. As for Namier’s assertion that this was the Revolution of the intellectuals, Hobsbawm says that they played no larger a role than in any other revolutionary movement, though they did play an important role. The Romantically coloured ideologies of the intellectuals were countered by the masses who were driven by their daily socioeconomic concerns. In the aftermath of 1848, it became clear that the countryside and the propertied classes were more conservative. The fear of ‘red revolution’ led them to cling to policies and governments that would protect their interests. This is evident in the elections of people like Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, who had not really been a political presence in France. His election to power symbolised the people’s remembrance of Napoleon as the people’s emperor. Migrations to cities by the less well off peasants, especially in Central Europe after the formal abandonment of feudal collections, led to the growth of ethnic tensions. Rather than adopt the strong culture of the cities, as immigrants in the past had, these new groups clung to their identities.

In light of the events of the revolutions, the Romantic admiration of boldness and innovation was not to be encouraged amongst the public. Subversion was now met with hostility, both by critics and by the people. In the revolutions, many artists had suffered or had been killed, like Petofi, the Hungarian poet. Verdi had returned to Milan in patriotic fervour, only to return to Paris. Wagner was forced to flee Dresden, where he had conducted the opera. The felling was that high hopes had perished, and that an effort had to be made to stay as close as possible to the ‘real’. It was characterised by a disparaging attitude towards man’s imagination and was a direct response to the celebration of the creativity of the genius that Romanticism so celebrated. In art, the passion of the romantics was replaced by ordinary life, with depictions of the often sordid workday. Politically, the focus was on Realpolitik. Realism in politics took the line of judging by facts and not principles. This was embraced by leaders and thinkers on throughout the political spectrum. Schwarzenberg and Napoleon III represented the conservative right, while Otto von Bismarck’s unification of Germany too was governed by Realpolitik. Marx and Engels led the school of scientific socialism, which found its roots in history and not principle, and which based its study on the interaction of classes.

The abolition of serfdom was the most important outcome of the revolutions of 1848. This had been secured by peasant uprisings and had been given legal status by the parliaments created by revolution, but these new rights were not retracted in the aftermath of the revolutionary year. This created greater class differentiation in the countryside as it was the more prosperous peasants who were able to take advantage of the opportunities of the changing times. Less well off peasants often had to sell their lands. A drift out of the countryside was also evident. This crystallised in the urbanisation of Central Europe.

As a political mass movement, the revolutions of 1848 witnessed unprecedented political participation, whether organised or not. They also displayed the role that improved communications and transportation had on political mobilization. Monarchies and absolutism would no longer be blindly supported. Instead, the old order would have to find new ways to defend itself, for divine right was no longer justification enough for the masses. The people were far too mobilised to limit those allowed to vote. Effective integration of potentially discontented social groups into the political system was important. The masses were integrated into wider society by means of education, while the institutionalisation of trade unions gave them a legal political voice.

1848 also witnessed the introduction of constitutional government in former absolutist states. While this lasted past the revolution is Prussia and Piedmont-Savoy, this was withdrawn in Austria and in the Papal states etc. While national unification was not accomplished to a large extent in 1848, it did set the stage for future attempts, especially those of Italian and German unification. This was also the first wave of nationalist threats against the Austrian empire.

The political reaction led to a growth of repression. Rights of association, speech and publication were restricted further by legislation. Long term measures included strengthening of police forces. A greater conservatism became apparent among the middle classes. It becomes clear that 1848, like 1789, was the product of the tensions of a Europe in transition, in this case, one that was moving towards industrialisation. The failure of the revolutionaries and the ability of constant recovery of the old order led to the return of conservative power. The old elites now came to think of ways to retain their power while keeping the populace happy by granting concessions. The beginnings of the modern state can be seen in the revolutions of this year.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

‘Europe Reshaped: 1848 -1878’ – J.A.S. Grenville

‘Europe After 1815’ – Rene Albrecht Carrie

‘Revolution of 1848’ –Roger Price

‘Struggle for Mastery in Europe :1848-1918’ – A.J.P. Taylor

‘Europe in the Nineteenth Century :1830-1880’ – Harry Hearder

‘Europe Since 1848: From Modern to Postmodern and Beyond’ – James A. Winders

‘The Age of Capital 1848-1875’ – Eric J. Hobsbawm

‘The European Revolutions :1848-1851’ – Jonathan Sperber

‘Europe Since Napoleon’ – David Thomson