Week 6-7

I offer you to to respond to one of the two questions posed below:

1. The Revolutions of 1848-1849 shook Europe, leaving, however, but few marks of change in their wake. No new state had emerged and of the new regimes brought to power as a result of revolutionary turmoil only that in France merits mention. So, how shall one then evaluate 1848? Could one judge it as success from the perspective of the revolutionary participants, or was it, on the contrary, a triumph for the forces of order? Then again, perhaps the categories of failure and success do not capture the event and its spirit? Be that as it may, I would like to hear your opinion on that subject.

2. Both the unification of Italy and the creation of Germany passed within a short period of time and with a relative ease (especially the Italian unification). That might compel one to reflect over the question of why, given that ease, neither of the processes had taken place before. Did both the Italians and the Germans simply ripen for the national sovereignty? Were the geopolitical conditions auspicious for the execution of such designs? Or is one mistaken appraising the said events as swift and easy, being as they were far from accomplished?

Week 5 Birth of Ideologies

The parallel upheavals in the domains of politics, economics and social life running from the last third of the eighteenth century well into the nineteenth left a number of unresolved quandaries in their wake. Having revealed the power of a human being in shaping his own affairs, the Revolutions - both the French and the Industrial - stopped short of elucidating the relationship between the collective and the individual in an unambiguous fashion. That question constitutes one of the central intellectual legacies of Modernity at its birth.

The new ideologies represented then tentative answers to the aforementioned dilemma. I offer you then to take a closer look at the three texts assigned for this week (de Maistre, Hobhouse and Marx) to show where each of the authors - ideologues - locates the crucible of social creativity. In other words, how does each of the authors understand "agency"? What is the mainspring of historical action? In your answer you might proceed by comparing/contrasting visions represented in your texts.

Week 4 Industrial Revolution

The riddle posed by the Industrial Revolution is nearly inscrutable. How could we account for the sudden flourishing of that acquisitive instinct that, long dormant, seized upon novel socio-economic contingencies and fortuitous inventions to transform the landscape of the Continent beyond recognition?

Stemming from obscure origins, the Industrial Revolution left highly dubious fruits - at least in its very immediate wake, before being tempered by the aggrieved public reaction.

My question to you then is to evaluate the immediate consequences of the Industrial Revolution. Looking at the glowing account of mechanization presented by Andrew Ure and the exceedingly grim stories of exploitation and mistreatment offered by the early factory workers, one cannot help wondering about the possibility of ever reconciling these views. To attempt to do justice to both of them is the task for you.

Week 3: Napoleon and Europe

There should be no doubt about it - Napoleon's imposing figure towered over those of his contemporaries, leaving behind the never-dying legend which still stokes the fire of public imagination.

Yet, how "exclusive" was his contribution in the final account? I am repeating the question posed in class - was Napoleon a progenitor of sweeping changes, or a mere instrument of multiple impersonal forces which fed into spread of the Revolution and its tenets beyond the French borders first into Europe and then into the rest of the world? We could turn this issue into a hypothetical quandary - could same, or similar, all-European transformations be brought into effect without Napoleon's involvement?

In your answer, I would like you to engage the primary sources assigned for this week - i.e. Napoleon's speeches to his army and Fichte's Addresses to the German Nation.

Week 2: Terror and Revolution

This week you were asked to read excerpts from the speech of Robespierre and Edmund Burke's seminal text "Reflections on the Revolution in France." The two thinkers, one - direct participant, the other - an observer, found themselves at the opposite poles of the political spectrum stretched into hitherto unknown parts of the public opinion thanks to the workings of the Revolution itself.

In the context of the reading materials assigned, I offer you the possibility of answering ONE of the two questions posed below:

1. How did both of the thinkers understand the meaning of "republic"? What made the "republic" functional in Burke's view - and how did his vision differ from that of Robespierre?

2. Robespierre is using the force of his rhetoric to justify the use of Terror. Burke, on the other hand, writing a few years before the Revolution turned to the terroristic means, laments the destruction resulting, as he puts it, from the "rash and ignorant counsel". What is your position on the issue of radicalism and Terror? Could the Revolution have succeeded without having recourse to violent means, by way of steady and liberal progression towards its goal?

Week 1: Introducing the Blog

The blog is established with a two-fold purpose in mind. First, as formal students for the course on the modern Europe, you will be required to submit an entry every week responding either to the principal question posed by me or to the comment made by one of your peers in reference to a weekly question (i.e. commenting the comment). My hope, however, is that, this blog would evolve into a forum where ideas inspired by class materials and reading assignments would be exchanged without fear and inhibition. Let's try to make this blog into a place of interests not only to ourselves but to the invisible visitors from the outside.