Age of Nationalism, 1850-1890 Book

Among the generally excellent surveys in the Norton History of Modern Europe - the exception being Leonard Krieger's unenlightening book on the eighteenth century - Norman Rich's contribution is outstanding.

In 250 smoothly written pages, he covers in detail the industrial revolution and its social impacts; major intellectual trends in science, social thought, and the arts; domestic developments in Britain, France, Prussia and Germany, the Austrian empire, Italy and Russia; and the complex international relations among them. He brings sharp insight to each of these subjects.

Even his brief intellectual portraits are well done. Writing about Karl Marx, for example, Rich identifies some of the flaws and fallacies in his theory of economic class struggle as the basis of history, but acknowledges the appeal and impact of this "political theology". Rich's perceptive summary of Nietzsche, though not complete, is far superior to the caricature popularized by Bertrand Russell and others. Nietzsche's rejection of naïve optimism, and his theory of the will to power and creativity, were "more profound than the ideas of either Marx or Freud." The other greatest dissenter and prophet of the era, Dostoyevsky, concluded that "'evil is buried more deeply in humanity than the cure-all socialists think.'"

Three themes are interwoven throughout Rich's book. The first is the technological revolution that started in Britain, then spread to France, Germany, and elsewhere. Rich explains the innovations in mining and metallurgy, in distribution of electricity, in machines, manufacturing, and transportation that enabled tremendous increases in industrial production.

Agricultural innovations including new crops, improved equipment, and artificial fertilizers multiplied farm production, brought great improvements to the health and longevity of consumers, and accelerated population growth. This provided the abundant labor needed for industrialization. A side effect was widespread internal migration from farms to cities.

A second theme throughout the book is the growth of nationalism across Europe. This spirit helped achieve the unification of Italy (under the King of Sardinia) and Germany (under the King of Prussia and his forceful prime minister, Bismarck). Cultural nationalism put great strain on the sprawling Austrian empire, resulting in recognition of Hungary as a separate kingdom within the Hapsburg realm from 1867.

The book's third theme is the competition for advantage among the major nations through diplomacy, and occasionally war. Rich's explanation of these efforts and their results is exceptionally brilliant and worthy of study.

The supreme master of this game during the late nineteenth century was Otto von Bismarck, who governed Prussia and then Germany from 1862 until 1890. A meticulous pragmatist, Bismarck pursued his long term goals through intensive focus on the conditions of the moment. He always considered the motives and every possible action of the other players before making his own move.

"Bismarck possessed that most rare quality of men of political genius - moderation, the ability to recognize where to draw the line…. He did not wage war until he had ascertained that all other means had been exhausted and that all possible odds - military, diplomatic, and moral - were on his side. Each of his wars was fought with a clear, limited purpose. When he decided that the advantages to be gained by war no longer justified the risks involved, he became Europe's staunchest defender of peace."

With this method and discipline, Bismarck unified the dozens of independent states that constituted Germany; strengthened the nation's government and military; enabled its rapid industrialization; won short wars against Austria and France with limited objectives and considered terms of settlement; and after 1871, maintained two decades of continental peace through a system of alliances and agreements with all the major powers except France, designed to respect the interests of each and deter aggressive behavior by any.

It was not Bismarck, but the new German emperor William II who replaced these prudent arrangements with an aggressive nationalism that polarized Europe into two hostile camps after 1890.

Rich concludes his book with words of tragic irony:

"… the prevailing mood in Europe as the nineteenth century drew to a close was one of optimism. Human reason seemed to have demonstrated its capacity to cope with human problems. After three quarters of a century without a general European war, people had begun to count on the future."

In this hopeful mood, no one could foresee the horrors of Communism and Nazism, or the catastrophic devastation of two world wars.