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Foreign Policy1 and the Nationality Problem in the Habsburg Monarchy, 1800–18672

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 February 2009

Enno E. Kraehe
Enno E. Kraehe
Affiliation:
University of North Carolina
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Extract

In view of the many paradoxes that have studded the history of the Habsburg monarchy, it is fitting at the outset to observe that as the nineteenth century opened Austrian foreign policy proceeded with complete obliviousness to the nationality problem and for this very reason was the principal contributor to the nationality problem of the future. It was a time of unprecedented territorial change, indeed of the founding of the Austrian empire itself, and the net result of the changes was an increment to the ethnic diversity of the Habsburg lands. The acquisition of western Galicia in the third partition of Poland added several million Poles. By the Treaty of Campo Formio in 1797 Walloon and Flemish subjects in the Netherlands had been exchanged for the Italian, Croatian, and Serbian population of Venice, Istria, and Dalmatia, and the prospect was held out for adding more Germans in Upper Bavaria and Salzburg. The Treaty of Lunéville in 1801 did not change the territorial holdings of the Austrian Habsburgs; it did, however, affect them indirectly by providing for the transfer of the members of collateral branches of the family who ruled in Modena and Tuscany to unspecified territories in Germany. Two years later, in 1803, the Imperial Recess of the Holy Roman Empire named these territories: Salzburg, for Ferdinand; and the Breisgau and Ortenau, on the Upper Rhine, for the Duke of Modena. Both awards represented Austrian losses, Breisgau and Ortenau having been Austrian lands to begin with, Salzburg having been previously promised.

Type
Foreign Policy
Information
Austrian History Yearbook , Volume 3 , Issue 3 , January 1967 , pp. 3 - 36
Copyright
Copyright © Center for Austrian Studies, University of Minnesota 1967

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References

3 The main facts about these exchanges are conveniently summarized in d'Arenberg, Prince Jean-Engelbert, Les princes du St-Empire à l'époque napoléonienne (Louvain: Publications Universitaires de Louvain, 1951), pp. 3–46Google Scholar; and in my Metternich's German Policy, Vol. I: The Contest with Napoleon, 1799–1814 (Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1963), pp. 25–33.

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22 As quoted in Guillaume de Bertier de Sauvigny, Metternich and his Times, translated by Peter Ryde (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1962), p. 167.

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28 Protocol of the state conference of March 5, 1818, Kriegsarchiv (Vienna), Hofkriegsrath, Präsidium, Fasz. II-XXI, Fos. 226–231.

29 See ante, p. 9.

30 Srbik, , Metternich, Vol. I, pp. 202–204Google Scholar; Srbik, , Deutsche Einheit, Vol. I, p. 201Google Scholar.

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32 See Lauber, Emil, Metternichs Kampf um die europäische Mitte (Vienna: A. Luser, 1939)Google Scholar. Lauber is almost alone in holding that the compromise on Saxony and Poland was not an Austrian victory.

33 As quoted in Bertier, Metternich and his Times, p. 167.

34 As quoted in ibid., p. 161.

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41 Engel-Janosi, Friedrich, “Österreich und die Anfänge des Königreiches Griechenland,” in Engel-Janosi, Friedrich, Geschichte auf dem Ballhausplatz (Graz: Styria Verlag, 1963), pp. 44–45Google Scholar.

42 See Jelavich, Barbara, A Century of Russian Foreign Policy, 1814–1914 (Philadelphia, Pa.: Lippincott, 1964), pp. 84–86Google Scholar.

43 Texts of these agreements are in Martens, Fëdor Fëdorovich, Recueil des traités et conventions conclus par la russie avec les puissances étrangères (15 vols., St. Petersburg: A. Devrient, 1874–1909), Vol. V, Pt. I, Nos. 135, 136, and 138.Google Scholar See also Andics, Erzsebet, Das Bündnis Habsburg-Romanow. Vorgeschichte der zaristischen Intervention in Ungarn im Jahre 1849 (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1963), pp. 9–15Google Scholar. This valuable and richly-documented work seems to me to exaggerate Metternich's pro-Russian policy during the Polish revolution of 1830 and to play down Austro-Russian rivalry in favor of class solidarity.

44 Schroeder, Metternich's Diplomacy at its Zenith, pp. 25–30 and 229–236.

45 Betley, Belgium and Poland in International Relations, 1830–1831, p. 22; Jelavich, A Century of Russian Foreign Policy, p. 93.

46 Srbik, Metternich, Vol. III, pp. 141–142.

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49 Some writers (for example, Andics, in his Das Bündnis Habsburg-Romanow, p. 14) make much of the promise as a basis for Russian intervention in Hungary in 1849. It is true that the Austrians melodramatically invoked it then, but it is worth noting that the promise was not in the Münchengrätz conventions themselves.

50 The subject is discussed in various papers in these volumes. See also Hehn, Paul N., “Prince Adam Czartoryski and the South Slavs,” The Polish Review, Vol. VIII (1962), pp. 76–86Google Scholar.

51 Taylor, A. J. P., The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, 1848–1918 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1954), p. 5Google Scholar. See also Schroeder, Paul W., “Austria as an Obstacle to Italian Unification and Freedom,” Austrian History News Letter, No. 3 (1962), pp. 15–17Google Scholar.

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55 Taylor, The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, pp. 18–27.

56 Srbik, , Deutsche Einheit, Vol. II, pp. 14–15Google Scholar; Friedjung, Heinrich, Österreich von 1848 bis 1860 (2nd ed., 2 vola., Stuttgart: J. G. Cotta, 1908–12), Vol. I, p. 12Google Scholar.

57 Andics, Das Bündnis Habsburg-Romanow, pp. 40–49 and 79–80.

58 Ibid., p. 53.

59 Ibid., p. 85.

60 Kiszling, Fürst Felix zu Schwarzenberg, pp. 72–96; Srbik, , Deutsche Einheit, Vol. II, pp. 13–14Google Scholar.

61 On Schwarzenberg's domestic policy, see Redlich, Josef, Das Österreichische Staats- und Reichsproblem (2 vols., Leipzig: P. Reinhold, 1920–1926), Vol. I, pp. 323–482Google Scholar; Kiszling, Fürst Felix, zu Schwarzenberg, pp. 61–107 and 166–202; and Friedjung, , öuml;sterreich von 181,8 bis 1860, Vol. I, pp. 255–484Google Scholar.

62 The best work on Schwarzenberg's German policy is Heller, Eduard, Fürst Felix zu Schwarzenberg, Mitteleuropas Vorkämpfer (Vienna: Militär Wissenschaftlicher Verlag, 1933)Google Scholar.

63 To my knowledge, all writers, whether they blame Schwarzenberg or not, take it for granted that he always intended to withdraw the March constitution eventually.

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65 Note A. J. P. Taylor's quaint view that the question of whether or not the whole monarchy should belong to the Confederation “was primarily a matter of domestic politics to display that Austria was entirely a German state.” Taylor, The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, p. 43.

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69 Friedjung, , Österreich von 1848 bis 1860, Vol. II, pp. 236–237Google Scholar; and Taylor, The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, p. 64, to name two historians who make the charge.

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71 See Friedjung, , Österreich von 1848 bis 1860, Vol. II, p. 231Google Scholar.

72 Ibid., p. 234.

73 Engel-Janosi, Friedrich, Der Freiherr von Hübner 1811–1892. Eine Gestalt aus dem Österreich Kaiser Franz Josephs (Innsbruck: Universitäts-Verlag Wagner, 1933), pp. 111–115Google Scholar.

74 This and the discussion which follows are based on Borries, Kurt, Preussen im Krimkrieg (Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer, 1930)Google Scholar; Borries, Kurt, “Zur Politik der deutschen Mächte in der Zeit des Krimkrieges und der italienischen Einigung,” Historische Zeitschrift, Vol. CLI (1934–1935), pp. 294–318Google Scholar; Eckhart, Franz, Die deutsche Frage und der Krimkrieg (Berlin: Ost Europa Verlag, 1931)Google Scholar; and Meyer, Arnold Oskar, Bismarcks Kampf mit Österreich am Bundestag zu Frankfurt 1851–1859 (Berlin: K. F. Koehler, 1927)Google Scholar.

75 Bismarck, to von Manteuffel, Otto, Frankfurt a. M., February 7, 1855, von Poschinger, Heinrich (ed.), Preussen im Bundestag 1851 bis 1859 (4 vols., Leipzig: S. Hirzel, 1882–84), Vol. II, Doc. No. 87Google Scholar.

76 See Borries, “Zur Politik der deutschen Mächte in der Zeit des Krimkrieges,” pp. 295–296; Eckhart, Die deutsche Frage und der Krimkrieg, p. 214; and many others.

77 See Hallberg, Charles W., Franz Joseph and Napoleon III, 1852–1864 (New York: Bookman Associates, 1955), pp. 45–112, who does not explicitly argue this but provides much evidence for itGoogle Scholar.

78 Taylor, The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, p. 105.

79 See Sumner, B. H., “The Secret Franco-Russian Treaty of 3 March 1859,” English Historical Review, Vol. XLVIII (1933), pp. 65–83CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

80 Hallberg, Franz Joseph and Napoleon III, p. 194; Pflanze, Otto, “Nationalism in Europe, 1848–1871,” Review of Politics, Vol. XXVIII (1966), p. 134Google Scholar.

81 Srbik, , Deutsche Einheit, Vol. II, pp. 333–335Google Scholar.

82 The legend persists that Prussia insisted on command of the federal armies and that Austria refused. Actually Austria offered the command to Prussia provided that the latter operated within the framework of the federal rules. Prussia, however, wanted freedom of action, which would have violated federal law and opened the way for Prussian hegemony in the North. See instructions for General Willisen, May 8, 1859, in Ibbeken, Rudolf et al. , (eds.), Die auswärtige Politik Preussens 1858–1870/71 (10 vols., Oldenburg: G. Stalling, 1932–34), Vol. I, No. 378Google Scholar.

83 The literature on these matters is hard to summarize, but two articles of mine cover the subject fairly well: “Austria and the Problem of Reform in the German Confederation, 1851–1863,” The American Historical Review, Vol. LVI (1950–51), pp. 276–294; and “Practical Politics in the German Confederation: Bismarck and the Commercial Code,” The Journal of Modern History, Vol. XXV (1953), pp. 13–24.

84 The standard works on this subject are Steefel, Lawrence D., The Schleswig-Holstein Question (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1932)Google Scholar; and Clark, Chester W., Franz Joseph and Bismarck. The Diplomacy of Austria before the War of 1866 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1934)Google Scholar. See also Pflanze, Otto, Bismarck and the Development of Germany (2 vols., Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1963), Vol. I, pp. 233–262Google Scholar.

85 Hallberg, Franz Joseph and Napoleon III, pp. 334–338.

86 For the details, see especially Pflanze, Bismarck and the Development of Germany, Vol. I, pp. 284–311; and Becker, Otto, Bismarcks Ringen um Deutschlands Gestaltung (Heidelberg: Quelle and Meyer, 1958), to name two of the more recent panoramic accountsGoogle Scholar.

87 Barker, Nancy Nichols, “Austria, France, and the Venetian Question, 1861–1866,” The Journal of Modern History, Vol. XXXVI (1964), pp. 145–154CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

88 Pflanze, , Bismarck and the Development of Germany, Vol. I, pp. 302–307; Pflanze, “Nationalism in Europe, 1814–1871,” p. 134Google Scholar.