Topic 6.6 Notes – Reactions and Revolutions

Why Europeans Kept Revolting After 1815

The Congress of Vienna rebuilt Europe after Napoleon by restoring monarchies, protecting the balance of power, and creating the Concert of Europe, where great powers cooperated to stop revolution and keep order. The map below shows the political settlement they created in 1815. The face of this system was Metternich of Austria, who treated liberalism and nationalism as dangerous because both could tear apart empires and weaken kings.

Europe after the Congress of Vienna, 1815

But the old order could not erase what the French Revolution had spread. People had now seen ideas like popular sovereignty, constitutionalism, and national self-rule.

Different groups wanted different things:

• Liberals wanted constitutions, civil liberties, and representative government.
• Nationalists wanted independence, autonomy, or unification.
• Republicans and radicals wanted broader suffrage, stronger democracy, and often an end to monarchy.
• Peasants and workers wanted relief from dues, poverty, unemployment, and inequality.

Governments answered with censorship, police surveillance, restrictions on universities, and crackdowns on dissent. That set up the pattern for the whole topic: revolution from below versus reform from above.

Early Revolts Against the Conservative Order

These revolts were local, but together they showed the Vienna settlement was under pressure.

War of Greek Independence

Greece rebelled against the Ottoman Empire in 1821. Greek nationalism drew strength from shared language, Orthodox Christianity, and pride in classical Greece. The key turning point was the Battle of Navarino in 1827, when Britain, France, and Russia destroyed the Ottoman-Egyptian fleet. Greece won recognition in 1830, and the Kingdom of Greece was established in 1832.

This mattered because Greek success depended on great-power intervention. Nationalism alone was not enough.

Decembrist Revolt in Russia

In 1825, Russian army officers challenged Nicholas I during a succession crisis. They wanted constitutional reform, and some wanted to end serfdom. The revolt was crushed fast, and leaders were executed or exiled to Siberia. It inspired later Russian revolutionaries and pushed Nicholas toward harsher autocracy.

July Revolution in France

In 1830, Charles X issued the July Ordinances, restricting the press and suffrage. Paris rose up in the Three Glorious Days, forcing him out. Louis-Philippe became “King of the French,” which sounded more national and constitutional, but power still stayed mostly with the bourgeoisie.

Belgian Revolution

Also in 1830, Belgium revolted against union with the Netherlands. Belgium was recognized as independent and neutral in 1839. Another Vienna border had been revised.

Polish November Uprising

Poles rebelled against Russian rule in 1830, briefly taking Warsaw. Nicholas I crushed the revolt in 1831. Poland showed a pattern AP loves to test: nationalism often failed without foreign help.

The Revolutions of 1848

In 1848, revolt spread across France, the German states, the Austrian Empire, and Italy. This map highlights how widely the uprisings spread, from Paris to Berlin, Vienna, Budapest, and northern Italy. The causes piled up at once:

• Hungry Forties crisis, with bad harvests, potato blight, bread prices, and unemployment
• political frustration over censorship, autocracy, and limited suffrage
• nationalist and constitutional demands

Revolutions of 1848 in Europe

France

The February Revolution overthrew Louis-Philippe and created the Second Republic with universal male suffrage and National Workshops. The June Days then exposed a major split. Workers wanted social reform; middle-class liberals feared radicalism. Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte won the presidency, seized power in 1851, and became Napoleon III.

German states

The Frankfurt Parliament tried to build a united constitutional Germany. Delegates argued over Greater Germany including Austria or Lesser Germany led by Prussia. Frederick William IV refused the crown. The parliament had no army or real state power, so it failed.

Austrian Empire and Italy

Metternich fell in Vienna. Lajos Kossuth led Hungarian nationalism, but different national groups inside the empire clashed with each other. Russia helped Austria crush Hungary. In Italy, Mazzini was tied to the Roman Republic, but Austrian and French intervention restored conservative order.

Most revolutions failed because liberals split from workers, nationalists fought each other, peasants left once feudal burdens ended, and monarchs regained military control. Even so, serfdom ended in much of the Habsburg lands, nationalism and constitutionalism survived, and the Concert of Europe broke down as a united system.

Russia and Reform From Above

Russia followed a different path. The tsars tried to modernize without surrendering autocracy.

Alexander II

Russia’s defeat in the Crimean War exposed weakness. Alexander II answered with the Emancipation Edict of 1861, freeing the serfs. But peasants still faced redemption payments, land shortages, the mir village commune, and poverty. Other Great Reforms included zemstvos, judicial reform, military reform, and some educational expansion. Reform changed Russia, but it satisfied almost nobody.

Revolutionary response

Populists or narodniks looked to peasants as the force for change. People’s Will turned to terrorism and assassinated Alexander II in 1881.

Sergei Witte

Witte pushed state-sponsored industrialization through tariffs, foreign investment, the gold standard, and the Trans-Siberian Railroad. Heavy industry grew, but so did an exploited urban working class.

1905 Revolution and Stolypin

Defeat in the Russo-Japanese War, peasant poverty, labor unrest, liberal demands, and nationalism all fed the 1905 Revolution. Bloody Sunday, led by Father Georgy Gapon, triggered strikes, soviets, and the Potemkin mutiny. The October Manifesto created the Duma, but the Fundamental Laws of 1906 kept the tsar dominant. Peter Stolypin mixed repression with land reform to create loyal private farmers. Russia’s pattern stayed the same. Reform was meant to save autocracy, but it created new pressures against it.