EUROPE’S POLITICAL
DIRECTION- 1850-1900
In the late 19th century the politics of
France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom began to shape and define the
politics of Europe. Nationalism had become a major force in Europe and
political thinking began to alternate between socialist and conservative
thinking.
The socialists began to represent progressive thinking
particularly one which took into account the interests and welfare of the
working class like happened in France towards the close of the 19th
century.
The collapse of the monarchy and the setting up of the Third
Republic in France reverberated with consequences throughout Europe.
The stage was thus
set for the era of free elections, sovereign parliaments, emergence of
political parties with both left and right leanings, universal male suffrage
which was already being accomplished in many countries particularly Britain by
1880. Belgium, Italy and Austria took a
longer time in the granting of universal suffrage to men in 1914 before the
outbreak of The First World War.
In Germany, Bismarck was at a continual loggerhead with
the Roman Catholic Church and the Catholic Center party during the 1870s and
did not come to terms with them until much later in the decade. His attempts to
outlaw the socialist party was only rebuffed and overcome after he left office
in 1890.
In France, the Dreyfuss affair involving the trial of a
Jewish French officer called Colonel Alfred Dreyfuss charged with treason
pitted the conservative Catholics and military establishment in a struggle over
what direction France should take and the need to separate the authority of the
Church and State.
The entry of the
radical Republicans and the socialists in the mêlée charged the polity and led
to a heated debate as to the future of the Third Republic. The pro-Dreyfuss
forces won the struggle and forced the separation of Church and State by 1905
reducing the influence of the Catholic Church on the French government and the
involvement of the Church in national politics.
This era of reform also saw the rise of Church based
groups that tried to mitigate the effects of extreme capitalism on the less
endowed by investing in social causes such as charities, orphanages and social
welfare causes.
Groups such as the Salvation Army arose in Britain in
1878 to engage in social missions with a view to practicalising the virtues of
the gospel. Pope Leo XIII proclaimed new policies to encourage Roman Catholics
to come to terms with the new political order, whereby institutions like parliaments,
a free press, and universal suffrage were fast becoming the order of the day.
The ordinary people were encouraged to persevere in the
face of the excesses of capitalism and a political liberalism that Europe had
never experienced before. The period 1870-1914 saw the alternating swing of
power between moderate conservatives and liberal forces that were more
concerned with the effect of the government policies on the lives of the
individual rather than on the pursuit of Grand National aspirations as was
associated with the moderate conservatives.
Both groups however, tended to mute their differences
when confronted with bigger and more demanding national issues. The pursuit of
reforms, liberalization of the political system and safeguarding of the rights
of individuals and workers was one platform that the contending parties tended
to agree upon.
As the emerging groups began to find a more common
platform to fight national and social issues, (except for a small group of
radical politicians who came to view parliamentary rule with great suspicion),
the next big challenge emerged from the growing socialist movement that
anchored its program on the right and need for workers to take over the means
of state planning and production through whatever means they deemed necessary
including revolution.
As the 19th century came to a close, even the
radical wing of the socialist parties in the main European states, began to
realize that their vision was best harnessed through participation in the political
process. The ideas of violent change as founded in the doctrines of Karl Max
were beginning to be muted in favor of an evolutionary process of change and
reform.
The socialists in furtherance of their Marxist beliefs
had taught that the working class and the ruling class were locked in a great
class conflict that could be resolved only with the working class seizing the
instruments of state power, establish proletarian control and unseat the forces
of capitalism from the realm of political power.
The rise in universal suffrage gave the socialist parties
in Europe the platform they needed to win mass support and introduce their
beliefs into the political system. This in itself played down the need to
agitate for violent overthrow of government in the bid for reform at any cost.
As dialogue, collective bargaining and the electoral
process continued to make political changes possible in a civil manner, many of
the leading socialist groups and reformers began to embrace the idea of change
through dialogue and the electoral system. Newspapers, mass literacy efforts
and social activities helped to push the message forward.
By the 1880s, Germany’s socialist parties had begun to
win wider support for their policies in the face of the anti-socialist stand of
the Bismarck years. By 1900, the socialists had become a major political force
gaining over two million votes in key elections and holding onto a considerable
minority of seats in the German parliament as deputies. By 1913, the German socialist
party pulled four million votes to emerge as the largest political group in the
country.
Socialist parties in Austria, the Scandinavia and the Low
Countries made similar gains. France and Italy, where the socialist parties
were more fragmented and ideologically incompatible saw a slower growth in
number; though by 1899, a socialist became a cabinet member shocking orthodox
Marxists who forbade collaboration between socialists and bourgeois
politicians. By 1913, France had more than 100 socialists seated in parliament.
In Britain, the socialist movement though strong from the
start was less ideological and found expression in the new labor party that
emerged to carry the socialist inclinations along.
Though labor had its roots in strong trade unions in the
1890s and saw its base grow among the working class, its inherent defense of
the working class against the extremes of capitalism naturally bequeathed to it
the mandate to carry the socialist flag. Though labor did not win any national
election as it lagged behind the liberal party, yet by 1914, it came to rank as
one of the major parties.
In many countries, the socialists became a sizable
minority winning municipal and parliamentary seats which gave them the
opportunity to implement welfare policies among the urban poor and also enforce
their ideologies and policies in all the places they controlled. They were able
to put the social question on the political map ahead of the constitutional
issues that had hitherto reigned.
As the reactionary forces of conservatism came to dread
the spread of socialist ideologies, the success of the movement also began to
soften the pressure put on society by the leaders.
By the end of the
19th century, Germany began to be visited by revisionist thinkers
who argued that socialism could be accomplished without revolution while
encouraging accommodation between the socialists and leftist-leaning workers
and political groups believing that gains could be achieved piecemeal and
gradually without rocking the political boat.
REFORMATION OF THE
19TH CENTURY SOCIETY
As the political spectrum experienced changes and the
effects of the new industrial society began to re-order the priorities of
governments in the 1890s, the need for universal literacy and enlightenment
became a major issue in the public domain.
It became the norm
in Europe for governments to insist on universal basic primary education in
order to inculcate the skill of writing and reading across the entire populace.
Mass education and universal literacy became a major plank of government policy
and investment. It was obvious, the industrial society was being driven on the
twin planks of literacy and specialized skills acquisition that required serious
investment in basic education.
It was also obvious that a government with an educated populace
could more easily sell its programs and build on the nationalistic goals it
needed to set. Nationalism became a vital ingredient of the new educational
curriculums that were set. The use of national languages to create a national orientation
of the populace became the standard practice.
Together with mass education, was the widening of the
scope of military training and conscription that gained wide acceptance all
over the continent with the exception of Great Britain? The victories of
Prussia in its European wars fought in the second half of the 19th
century lent a handy agreement to this view. The state bureaucracies were also
expanded to give governments more direct control of the civil populace.
Government control of schools, hospitals, industries,
economic activities, border patrols, issuance of travel documents, regime of
visas, introduction of tariffs and levies, control of national borders, pension
schemes and elaborate welfare schemes became the order of the day bringing
government closer and in more direct control of the populace.
As the scope of education, checks and controls, welfarist
policies and the civil service brought a new definition of nationalism,
stateism and central control became more of the norm in European politics
bringing a new concept of the state, an unparallel development in European
history.
PRE WORLD WAR 1
DIPLOMACY AND POLITICAL ARRANGEMENTS
By the end of the 19th century, the political
map of Europe had been roughly drawn along a system of alliances, power
groupings and blocs. This complex system of political alliances and groupings
divided Europe into two power blocs, armed and ready to defend its nationalist
interests. The idea of one Europe had not yet crystallized.
Germany at about this time had begun to construct a large
navy designed to guarantee its place in the comity of nations as a great
imperial power. This together with its rapid pace of industrialization left
Great Britain feeling threatened. France sat astride a huge colonial empire but
its nationalistic aspirations especially in the face of the humiliating loss of
Alsace-Lorraine were yet to be fully pacified.
In the rise of Japan in the Far East, Russia encountered
a major opponent determined to check Russia’s expansion into China and Korea
and the Orient in general. This state of affairs precipitated the
Russo-Japanese war of 1904-1905 resulting in defeat for Russia and Japan’s
ascension in Korea and predominance in China. This turn of events forced Russia
to gaze once more at the Balkans as a theatre of expansion while turning its
gaze away from Asia.
The fragile and tenuous peace in Europe was further
compromised with the forced removal from power of Europe’s major stabilizing force,
Otto von Bismarck in 1890 as the Chancellor of Germany by Emperor Wilhelm II
who on coming to power sought to rein- in and curb the power and prestige of
the very influential Chancellor.
The exit of the experienced Bismarck in the hands of a
young, inexperienced but ambitious Emperor, placed the political situation in
Europe in the form of a tinderbox waiting for a spark to ignite. To compound
the situation, Germany failed to renew its alliance with Russia upon the expiration
of its treaty of 1887 in 1890 and France seized that opportunity to reach an
understanding with Russia in the late 1890s.
Britain equally fearful of Germany’s increasing naval
power chose to swallow its pride and come to an understanding with its long
standing rival and competitor France when the triple Entente with Russia,
France and Britain was formally signed in 1907, leaving Europe in the grip of two mutually hostile rival
political camps.
In 1908, Austria-Hungary annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina
causing tension between it and Russia as well as Serbia who particularly felt
that the two annexed territories rightly belonged to her. In 1912, Russia
supported an attack on the Ottoman Empire by a loose confederation of the Balkan
states that were resolved to free themselves from the domination of the Ottoman
Turkish Empire and win over Macedonia.
Though the Balkan states won, they were soon engulfed in
internal strife and discord following the second Balkan war in 1913. The
situation further intensified the hostilities between the Balkan states
particularly Serbia origin.
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