History 1401E Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Francophobia, Austro-Prussian War, Otto Von Bismarck
26 Mar 2016
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Document Summary
Napoleon gave a kick start to russian powers, was especially helpful to prussians. German poliical scene had been dominated by the struggle between prussia and austria: neither side had a decisive advantage, napoleon"s reconstrucion of germany gave prussia that advantage. The austrian posiion was much weaker than it looked: in austria, the napoleonic experience strengthened the status quo, austrian poliical culture became staic, if not reacionary. The diference being that when they next went to war in 1813-1815, it was not to be defeated but to make a paricularly powerful contribuion to the defeat of napoleon. For all the poliical repression, social, economic and cultural reforms coninued. By 1850, prussia had the healthiest inances in the confederaion and austria had the weakest. Prussia"s rise to hegemony in germany was the foundaion of the customs union in 1834, which brought together 18 states of the confederaion in a single free-trade area.
