19th Century Perspective and Political Developments
European states struggled to maintain stability during an age of nationalism and revolutions.
European global control and tensions among the Great Powers intensified.
There was tension between objectivity and scientific realism, and between subjectivity and individual expression in Europe.
Nationalist encouraged loyalty to the nation with romantic idealism, liberal reform, political unification, racialism with a concomitant anti-Semitism, and chauvinism justifying national aggrandizement. This idea of nationalism led to the popularization of the idea of nation-states.
Although during the 19th century, western European Jews became more socially and politically acculturated, and Zionism, a form of Jewish nationalism, developed as a response to growing anti-Semitism throughout Europe.
Nationalism is the awareness of being part of a national community. It is based on a shared culture, language, history, traditions, and institutions. Under nationalist sentiment, divided nations, like Germany and Italy, desired unification, and subject nations, like Hungary, desired self-determination.
There was a romanticized self-importance that led to an increased view of national identity and, in some cases, racial superiority, like what is seen in the 1940s in Germany.
New conservative leaders coming out of the French Revolution, like Napoleon III, Cabour, and Bismarck, used popular nationalism to create or strengthen the state
Hungarians were the largest minority group in the Austrian empire. They tried to break away form the empire and create their own autonomous nation in 1848.
Franz Joseph realized he could not hold together such a large and diverse empire without some concessions
The Crimean War:
Italian Unification:
Otto von Bismarck was appointed prime minister of Prussia by Kaiser Wilhelm I in 1862.
German Unification:
During Bismarck:
After Bismarck:
In 1831, Charles Darwin went on a British naval expedition on the HMS Beagle to the South Pacific.
Social Darwinism:
Prior to WWI, Europeans believed that progress was inevitable, caused by the rise of positivism.
New discoveries and methods found in the late 19th and early 20th centuries led to a loss of confidence in the certainty of the universe and of progress causing a shift from positivism to modernism and irrationalism
Economic motivations:
Political motivations:
Racial motivations:
Many of the African nations who were getting colonized by the Europeans put up stiff resistance, but European advances gave them a clear upper hand.
European:
Non-European:
Changes:
Continuities:
The imperialistic goal of gaining control of Africa because of access to raw material and new markets among many of the European states caused diplomatic tensions
The scramble for Africa caused a lot of tension among states
Debate over imperial venture caused tensions between some states because some thought it a bad thing
Joseph Conrad went to the Belgian Congo and witnessed the inhuman conditions
JA Hobson argued imperialism was bad economic investment in long run because depended on markets that were inherently unstable
Nationalism in states controlled by Europeans started to challenge the imperialism forced upon them which led to uprisings against European powers all over the world
AP Euro Final Project - Tovi Lieberman
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