19th-Century Perspectives and Political Developments
What you must understand
This era is defined by competing ideologies and state-building. Know liberalism (rights, constitutions, free markets), conservatism (order, tradition, monarchy, church), nationalism (cultural identity plus political claims), and socialism/Marxism (class conflict, critique of capitalism). Understand the revolutions of 1830 and 1848: their triggers (economic distress, liberal and national demands), their uneven outcomes, and why conservative order largely reasserted itself.
State-building cases: Italian unification (Cavour's diplomacy, Garibaldi's campaigns, Piedmont's monarchy) and German unification (Bismarck's Realpolitik, Prussian military reform, wars against Denmark, Austria, and France, and the 1871 Empire). Also cover Russia's autocracy and emancipation of the serfs, Austria-Hungary's dual monarchy, and the Second Industrial Revolution with its new science-based industries.
Traps
- Nationalism could be liberal or illiberal; do not treat it as one position.
- 1848 failed partly because revolutionary coalitions split along class lines.
- Bismarck was a conservative who used nationalism instrumentally.
- Do not confuse Italian and German unification leadership structures.
Rule of thumb
For any 19th-century movement, ask: Who is included in the nation or the franchise, and who benefits economically? That answers most causation questions.