Das Zarenreich Das Jahr 1905 Und Seine Wirkungen

Statehood examines the extending lines of development of nation-state systems in Eastern Europe, in particular considering why certain tendencies in state development found a different expression in this region compared to other parts of the continent. This volume discusses the differences between the social developments, political decisions, and historical experience that have influenced processes of state-building, with a focus on the structural problems of the region and the different paths taken to overcome them. The book addresses processes of building social orders and examines the contribution of state institutions to social and cultural integration and disintegration. It analyses institutional and personnel continuities that have outlasted the great political changes of the twentieth century and addresses the expansion of state activity in shaping property relations in agriculture and industry as well as in social security and family politics. Taking a comparative approach based on experiential history, allowing individual experience to be detached from specific national references, the volume delineates a transnational comparison of problems shared within the region as they have been passed down through history, providing definition to the specificity of Eastern Europe and situating the historical experience of the region within a pan-European context. The second in a four-volume set on Central and Eastern Europe in the twentieth century, it is the go-to resource for those interested in statehood and state-building in this complex region.

After crushing the Polish Uprising in 1863–1864, Russia established a new system of administration and control. Imperial Russian Rule in the Kingdom of Poland, 1864–1915 investigates in detail the imperial bureaucracy’s highly variable relationship with Polish society over the next half century. It portrays the personnel and policies of Russian domination and describes the numerous layers of conflict and cooperation between the Tsarist officialdom and the local population. Presenting case studies of both modes of conflict and cooperation, Malte Rolf replaces the old, unambiguous “freedom-loving Poles vs. oppressive Russians” narrative with a more nuanced account and does justice to the complexity and diversity of encounters among Poles, Jews, and Russians in this contested geopolitical space. At the same time, he highlights the process of “provincializing the center,” the process by which the erosion of imperial rule in the Polish Kingdom facilitated the demise of the Romanov dynasty itself.

This book challenges current thinking about the outbreak of World War I and the course of German foreign policy since Bismarck’s chancellorship. In 1914, Germany's opening offensives against France were to be accompanied by a simultaneous offensive by her ally, Austria-Hungary, against Russia. The Austrian offensive was intended to hold the Russians until Germany defeated the French—six weeks, no more. Then, the German army would turn east to support the Austrians. The Austrian offensive was a catastrophic failure. After only days of fighting Russia, Germany was obliged to send troops to support Austria lest she capitulate while most of the German army was still in France. The Austrian army’s severe deficiencies were a constant drain on the German effort throughout the war. After the war, German memoirists and historians claimed that the German leadership had been unaware of these deficiencies before the war broke out. These claims have been accepted by historians down to today. The book presents recently re-discovered documentary evidence that the German general staff and Germany’s political leadership had known of the Austrian army’s weaknesses for decades before the war. The book also reveals a new perspective of Bismarck’s diplomacy beginning shortly after he engineered the Dual Alliance between the two countries in 1879. It demonstrates that as early as 1882 Bismarck became aware that the Austrian army was far weaker than assumed when he concluded the alliance. It was primarily his concern about Austria’s weakness that spurred Bismarck’s energetic diplomacy, seeking alliances and understandings with other countries in the region, and which became the main consideration that guided his foreign policy from then on. For if Austria suffered a defeat, Germany would find itself alone between two dangerous powers: France and Russia. The consequences of his policies resulted in peace down to his departure in 1890. His successors, for a variety of reasons addressed in the book, were not as careful, ignored Austria’s weaknesses despite the warnings of the military attachés, and permitted Austria to become involved in a war. The result was tragically foreseeable.

The First World War marked the end point of a process of German globalization that began in the 1870s. Learning Empire looks at German worldwide entanglements to recast how we interpret German imperialism, the origins of the First World War, and the rise of Nazism.

Half a millennium of European warfare brilliantly retold by masterly historian Brendan Simms At the heart of Europe's history lies a puzzle. In most of the world humankind has created enormous political frameworks, whether ancient (such as China) or modern (such as the United States). Sprawling empires, kingdoms or republics appear to be the norm. By contrast Europe has remained stubbornly chaotic and fractured into often amazingly tiny pieces, with each serious attempt to unify the continent (by Charles V, Napoleon and Hitler) thwarted. In this marvelously ambitious and exciting new book, Brendan Simms tells the story of Europe's constantly shifting geopolitics and the peculiar circumstances that have made it both so impossible to dominate, but also so dynamic and ferocious. It is the story of a group of highly competitive and mutually suspicious dynasties, but also of a continent uniquely prone to interference from 'semi-detached' elements, such as Russia, the Ottoman Empire, Britain and (just as centrally to Simms' argument) the United States. Europe: The Struggle for Supremacy will become the standard work on this crucial subject - and an extremely enjoyable one. Reviews: 'This is a brilliant and beautifully written history. From the Holy Roman Empire to the Euro, Brendan Simms shows that one of the constant preoccupations of Europeans has always been the geography, the power and the needs of Germany. Europe is a work of extraordinary scholarship delivered with the lightest of touches. It will be essential, absorbing reading for anyone trying to understand both the past and the present of one of the most productive and most dangerous continents on earth' William Shawcross 'World history is German history, and German history is world history.This is the powerful case made by this gifted historian of Europe, whose expansive erudition revives the proud tradition of the history of geopolitics, and whose immanent moral sensibility reminds us that human choices made in Berlin (and London) today about the future of Europe might be decisive for the future of the world' Timothy Snyder (author of Bloodlands) About the author: Brendan Simms is Professor of the History of International Relations at the University of Cambridge. His major books include Unfinest Hour: Britain and the Destruction of Bosnia (shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize) and Three Victories and a Defeat: The Rise and Fall of the First British Empire.

This volume analyzes historical processes of mobility by focusing on material objects. Mobility—as a shorthand for various related processes such as migration, transfer, entanglement, and translation—involves human actors, immaterial elements such as ideas and knowledge, but also objects in various forms and functions. For example, as material infrastructures they are the basis for transport and travel; as goods they are the object and purpose of trade or gift exchange. By focusing on the way objects determined certain processes of mobility and how their social meaning and materiality was transformed in these processes, the contributors hope to gain deeper insight into the historical relations between the Ottoman Empire, Eastern Europe, and Persia.

Benjamin Constant distinguished two kinds of government: unlawful government based on violence, and legitimate government based on the general will. In Europe monarchy was for over a thousand years considered the natural form of legitimate government. The sources of its legitimacy were the dynastic principle, religion, and the ability to protect against foreign aggression. At the end of the eighteenth century the revolutions in America and France called into question the traditional legitimacy of monarchy, but Volker Sellin shows that in response to this challenge monarchy opened up new sources of legitimacy by concluding alliances with constitutionalism, nationalism, and social reform. In some cases the age of revolution brought on a new type of leader, basing his claim to power on charisma.