payment page
Enlightenment Roots of Rising Ideologies
The years between 1815-1830 saw the rise of a number of related and competing ideologies, each holding a powerful influence in their own time. Largely, these ideologies were reactions to or products of Enlightenment thinking, although they all went in a variety of different directions. Many of the new movements therefore dealt with ideas that had been around for a while, but it was only in this period that the ideas gained formal, coherent structure. The influence of these ideologies has continued into the present day, helping shape the current political and cultural landscape.
Classical Liberalism
Beginning in Spain and France during the 1820s, liberalism soon spread to England as well. Mostly consisting of businessmen and professionals, the liberals advocated for modern, efficient self-government, although they were not always in support of universal male suffrage. They also supported freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, constitutions, and laissez-faire economic policies, such as free trade and low tariffs. They were also generally against unions.
Liberalism in the early 19th century is not the same from what we think of as “Liberalism” today. In fact, much of what was liberal in the 19th century (free trade, keeping government out of business) is now considered conservative. In reality, liberalism then was the ideology of the bourgeoisie, and thus was geared towards protecting their interests. Still, the liberals invariably argued that what was for their benefit was actually to the benefit of everyone.
Radicalism and Republicanism
Radicalism appeared in the 1820s in England as the “Philosophical Radicals.” This unconventional group, consisting partially of workers and partially of industrialists, had its greatest leader in the colorful Jeremy Bentham. The Radicals were anti-church, anti-monarchy, and generally opposed to the old ways. They were a force unto themselves until 1832, after which they merged with the British Liberals.
The European counterpart to Radicalism was usually referred to as Republicanism, which grew out of the French Revolutionary tradition. Republicanism sought complete political equality in the form of universal suffrage and, similar to their British cousins, opposed monarchy and the Catholic Church.
Socialism and Communism
Counter to liberalism was Socialism, which sought economic equality for all, and was very much against the laissez-faire ideal of liberalism. Socialists looked at the free-market economies of Western Europe amid the Industrial Revolution and saw exploited workers leading miserable existences while manufacturers profited enormously. They argued that the poor should receive some of these profits, since worker's labor supported the entire system. To achieve this, they wanted to nationalize parts of the economy, such as industrial and financial sectors, in order to distribute benefits more equally to the various members of society.
Robert Owen, a manufacturer in Manchester, put some of these ideas into practice by paying higher wages than other manufacturers and providing social support. Frustrated with the slow pace of change in Britain and founded New Harmony, Indiana, in 1825 as an experimental socialist community in the United States. Other leading socialist thinkers included the Frenchmen Saint-Simon and Charles Fourier. Fourier wanted to organize society into groups called “phalansteries,” in which everyone would be able to do whatever work they wanted, and all be paid the same wages, with some phalansteries actually set up in the United States.
However, the socialist experiments of Owen and Fourier were too marginal to have very much effect on Europe. Isolated and comprised only of very committed socialists, these experiments were, essentially, dead ends. However, socialism itself helped give rise to one of the most powerful ideological forces of the twentieth century. Some German exiles in France, especially Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, combined the socialist ideas of Owen, Fourier, and Saint-Simon with Republicanism in the 1840s to give rise to “Communism,” an ideology aimed against the power of the liberal bourgeoisie.
Nationalism
Nationalism was the most politically powerful ideology in this period. France and Great Britain's strong nation-states had inspired jealousy throughout the rest of Europe; other nations, disorganized as they were, wanted to unify. German intellectuals living in (and hating) the loosely organized Bund provided much of the vocabulary for nationalism, stating that each nation had a particular Volksgeist, or national spirit. Soon, just about every European language group wanted to have their own nation. This idea especially frightened the Austrian Empire. Since Austria contained dozens of subjugated language groups (including the Magyars, Czechs, Slovaks, Slavs, Rumanians, Serbs, and Croatians), the upsurge in nationalism threatened to tear it to pieces. The Austrian government’s position as prime reactionary was certainly due in large part to its fear of dissolution were nationalism to win out.
This fear was somewhat justified as nationalist movements spread across Eastern Europe. In Eastern Europe, the Poles wanted their own state, and in Austria, the Magyars wanted their own kingdom of Hungary. Throughout the Austrian Empire, the various language groups revived the study of their languages and hoped to carve their own nations out of the empire. A particularly potent nationalist force known as Pan-Slavism also began to circulate among various Slavs in Russia, Poland, and Austria.
Nationalism also thrived in central Europe, even if underground. Quickly outlawed by reactionary forces, nationalist groups formed secret societies such as the Italian Carbonari and German Buschenschaft. These societies distributed propaganda leaflets and plotted rebellions, such as Joseph Mazzini’s “Young Italy,” which tried to organize a coup in the Italian state of Sardinia. Soon exiled, Mazzini remained a leading writer on nationalist issues. In Germany, the Carlsbad Decrees pushed nationalism underground, but it was still very much alive in Germany in the 1820s and 1830s.
Conservatism
The final important ideology of the period was Conservatism, a reactionary philosophy supporting monarchy and the old ways. Championed by Edmund Burke, who had been horrified by the French Revolution, Conservatism argued for prudent and gradual change to be made as slowly as possible.
