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preface
At the Congress of Vienna in 1815, representatives of Austria, Russia, Prussia and Great Britain, the allies that defeated Napoleon, came together to discuss the restoration of peace in Europe. They wanted to force a peace treaty with France and create an international mechanism, European coordination, so as to prevent Europe from being hit again by revolutions in France or elsewhere.
Liberalism challenged the period of European Restoration
This meeting represented the tendency of the conservatives, which were opposed to liberalism and nationalism, which embraced the creation of the state according to racial or national guidelines and demanded reforms in the name of popular sovereignty, which conservatives officially attributed to the French Revolution and the Napoleonic era. Vienna in the early 19th century was the perfect place for representatives of the highest powers in Europe to gather. Schönbrunn Palace on the outskirts of the Habsburg capital, as well as Vienna's elegant Baroque architecture, still reflect the solemnity of absolutism and traditional court life, despite the fact that years of war have bankrupted the Austrian monarchy.
At the Vienna Conference from September 1814 to June 1815, Austrian organizers arranged elaborate dinners, elegant balls, cheerful fireworks displays and organized hunts to help ease the boredom of the participants. The artists were ready to paint portraits of members of the diplomatic delegation. The aristocratic guests tried to guess which of the hundreds of maids and porters were Austrian spies, amusing themselves in this way. The eccentric and comical behaviour of some delegates brought both a comic tone to the meeting and almost as much outrage.
A Spanish diplomat insisted that his country was entitled to sovereignty over several small Italian states. Other delegates, enraged by his demands, invited him on a hot air balloon ride to drive him in the direction of the Alps. The Congress of Vienna, which the English poet Lord George Gordon Byron (1788-1824) called "that vile event", provided an opportunity for informal discussion, which has been an important part of European diplomatic tradition.
In fact, during the Vienna Conference, the formal meeting was held only once, the meeting at which the final agreement was signed, and the negotiation of this final agreement was completed in smaller formal or informal gatherings of representatives of States. In view of the changes in the territorial boundaries of many countries in the preceding 25 years, delegates redrew maps of Europe, especially Central Europe, and engaged in a protracted struggle between conservatives, monarchs, aristocrats, state churches and liberals in Europe after the eventual defeat of Napoleon in 1815 – and the Congress of Vienna was still held during Napoleon's Hundred Days reign.
"Liberalism" as an economic and political philosophy means that government constraints that might interfere with individual development need not exist. It fits perfectly into the middle class of the "bourgeois century". The middle class is a very diverse social group, consisting of both merchants and manufacturers with enormous wealth and small shopkeepers struggling to make ends meet. Rapid population growth has led to an increase in lawyers, notaries, and other middle-class professionals. Entrepreneurs are gradually gaining respect.
Moreover, the middle-class emphasis on individual freedom was manifested not only in the economic and political spheres, but also in the literature, art, and music of Romanticism. These works celebrate the realization of one's self-achievement through subjectivity and emotion. One German liberal boasted: "We are the times." ”
Vienna Conference
The liberal movement is closely linked in many regions to the rise of nationalism as a source of loyalty and sovereignty. Language, cultural traditions, and the search for a nation-state whose borders are consistent with national patterns of residence often define nationalism. Nationalism threatened the territorial disposal measures imposed at the Vienna Conference. The Austrian Habsburg monarchy itself ruled over 11 major non-stately peoples, including Hungarians and Poles, which once had completely independent states.
At the same time, German and Italian nationalists began to call for the political unity of their own peoples. The delegates to the Congress of Vienna decided to ensure that France could not rule Europe again. Thus, before Napoleon's first defeat and abdication in 1814, representatives of the four Prussian-Austro-Russian and British countries formed the "Quadripartite Alliance", which aimed to prevent France or any other country or political movement from threatening the legitimate supreme ruler of Europe.
Peace of Paris
Long before the Congress of Vienna, the Treaty of Paris was signed in March 1814. The mediator became Charles Maurice de Talleyrand (1754-1838), who served Napoleon with flexibility rooted in a magical sense of survival. He took full advantage of tensions between the Allies, especially Prussia and Austria. The victorious powers agreed to the return to the throne, Louis XVIII, the brother of the executed Louis XVI of France and the Count of Provence, Louis XVIII. It is likely that the Allies had forced the French to sign a harsher treaty.
But they were dealing not with the defeated general Napoleon, but with the restored Bourbon monarch, who wanted to consolidate his throne against the challenge of liberalism within France. France retained lands annexed before November 1, 1792, including Savoy, Germany, parts of the Austrian Netherlands, and the former papal city of Avignon. France renounced its territorial claims to the rest of the Austrian Netherlands, the Dutch Republic, the German states, the Italian city-states, and Switzerland. The Caribbean islands of Trinidad, Tobago, Saint Lucia, and part of Santo Domingo were ceded to the British.
The Allies did not claim any war reparations against France. However, complex territorial issues in Central and Southern Europe remain to be resolved. The Vienna Conference was almost entirely the result of diplomats representing Austria, Prussia, Britain and Russia. The conference had a threefold objective: first, to redistribute the European territories after the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars; Achieve a balance of power to prevent any one country from becoming too powerful and potentially aggressive; 3. Stifling the possibility of any revolutionary movement in the future. At the beginning of the conference, defeated France served only as an interested observer (although the official language of the conference was French).
However, Talleyrand's cunning private negotiations allowed France to gradually become a formal participant in the discussion. The leading figure at the Congress of Vienna was Austrian Chancellor Prince Clemens von Metternich (1773–1859), born in the Rhineland, Germany, the son of a nobleman who served the court of the Habsburg monarchs. Forced to leave his homeland in 1792 due to the French invasion, he became involved in the diplomatic service of Vienna, becoming Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1809.
Metternich was a handsome playboy with perfect powder in his hair, in the formal receptions and busy social affairs of grand balls at home, or in the trivial intrigues of high society. He was proficient in five Chinese and was determined and shrewd in his pragmatic diplomacy. Until 1848, international affairs in Europe were dominated by Metternich. British Foreign Secretary Viscount Castlereagh Robert. The British representative was Robert Robert, Viscount Castlereagh (1769-1822), Foreign Secretary. The cold and extremely shy Viscount Castlereagh came to Vienna in the hope of making England the arbiter of European affairs.
Today, the British Empire is the most powerful country in Europe, and one out of every five people in the world belongs to the British Empire. The British government sought to eliminate the threat from France, both in terms of commercial interests and security. Moreover, both Viscount Castlerey and Metternich were anxious about the possible consequences of Russian expansion in Central Europe. At present, it seems that only Russia can disrupt European affairs through unilateral actions. Tsar Alexander I of Russia (reign: 1801-1825) wanted the League to formally affirm what he saw as the religious foundations of the European Union.
Alexander I was first and foremost an extremely devout believer, and while he became more conservative and reactionary, he sometimes fell into intense mysticism and melancholy. A document drawn up by Alexander I became the basis of the Holy League. The document stated that henceforth the relationship between the supreme monarchs of Europe (i.e., "representatives of God") would be based on "the noble truths taught by the divine religion of our Savior." The document was signed by both Emperor Franz I of Austria and Frederick Wilhelm III of Prussia, but the future George IV (reign: 1820-1830), prince and regent of England, resigned.
Viscount Castlereagh called the agreement "a piece of paper noble mysticism and nonsense". The three countries pledged to support each other in the event of a threat to the faith and peace of the state religion. The noble moral rhetoric of the Holy League contains a justification for its suppression of any liberal and nationalist movement that emerged in Europe.
Vienna Conference System
The map of Europe established at the Congress of Vienna has been used for generations. Under Metternich's firm leadership, the mechanism that came to be known as the Vienna Conference System restored the principles of European dynastic legitimacy and the balance of power among nations. Poland lost its independence completely when it was last partitioned by the Russian-Prussian and Austrian states in 1795, and the question of its future was at the top of the contentious issue at the conference. Russian troops occupied most of Poland, which Tsar Alexander intended to annex to the Russian Empire.
The Anglo-French-Austrian countries, fearing the expansion of Russian and Prussian power in Central Europe, formed an alliance to resist any possible Russian and Prussian attacks in Central Europe. In May, the conference proclaimed the Kingdom of Poland. The territory of this country would include the lands that Péau-O had seized in an earlier partition. But the country, which came to be known as the "Kingdom of the Polish Conference" (which had about 20% of its territory before the First Partition in 1772), was a Russian protectorate despite a constitution, and its throne was occupied by the Tsar himself.
Moreover, large swathes of land that were once part of independent Poland were still part of Prussia and Austria. Russia also retained Finland, conquered during the Napoleonic Wars. To counterbalance Russia's territorial expansion in eastern Europe, Prussia gained northern Saxony, which had allied with Napoleon, as well as Polish-speaking Posen and the seaport city of Gdansk.
Resources:
StauterHalsted Keely.Violence by Other Means: Denunciation and Belonging in Post-Imperial Poland, 1918–1923[J]. Contemporary European History,2021,(1)
Defense of Western Civilization or "Polish Imperialism?" [J]. The Polish Review,2013,(4)
Toivo U. Raun.Tuomo Polvinen. Imperial Borderland: Bobrikov and the Attempted Russification of Finland, 1898–1904 . Translated by Steven Huxley. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press. 1995. Pp. ix, 342. $29.95[J]. The American Historical Review,1997,(3)