Key Terms

Question 1

Congress of Vienna

Answer 1

A meeting of the Quadruple Alliance- Russia, Prussia, Austria, and Great Britain restoration from France, and smaller European states to fashion a general peace settlement that began after the defeat of Napoleon’s France in 1814.

Question 2

Holy Alliance

Answer 2

An alliance formed by the conservative rulers of Austria, Prussia, and Russia in September 1815 that became a symbol of the repression of liberal and revolutionary movements all over Europe.

Question 3

Karlsbad Decrees

Answer 3

Issued in 1819, these decrees were designed to uphold Metternich’s conservatism, requiring the Germanic states to root out subversive ideas and squelch any liberal organizations.

Question 4

Liberalism

Answer 4

The principle ideas of this movement were equality and liberty; liberals demanded representative government and equality before the law as well as individual freedoms such as freedom of the press, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of worship, and freedom from arbitrary arrest.

Question 5

Laissez Faire

Answer 5

A doctrine of economic liberalism that calls for unrestricted private enterprise and no government interference with the economy.

Question 6

Nationalism

Answer 6

The idea that each people had its own genius and specific identity that manifested itself especially in a common language and history, and often led to the desire for an independent political state.

Question 7

Socialism

Answer 7

A backlash against the emergence of individualism and the fragmentation of industrial society, and move toward cooperation and a sense of community; the key ideas were economic planning, greater social equality, and state regulation of property.

Question 8

Marxism

Answer 8

An influential political program based on the the socialist ideas of German radical Karl Marx, which called for a working class revolution to overthrow capitalist society and establish a Communist state.

Question 9

Bourgeoisie

Answer 9

The middle class minority who owned the means of production and, according to Marx, exploited the working class proletariat.

Question 10

Proletariat

Answer 10

The industrial working class who, according to Marx, were unfairly exploited by the profit seeking bourgeoisie.

Question 11

Romanticism

Answer 11

An artistic movement at its height from about 1790 to the 1840s that was in part a revolt against classism and the Enlightenment, characterized by a belief in emotional exuberance, unrestrained imagination, and spontaneity in both art and personal life.

Question 12

Corn Laws

Answer 12

British Laws governing the import and export of grain, which were revised in 1815 to prohibit the importation of foreign grain unless the price at home rose to improbable level, thus benefiting the aristocracy but making food price high for working people.

Question 13

Battle of Peterloo

Answer 13

The army’s violent suppression of a protest that took place at Saint Peter’s Fields in Manchester in reaction to the revision of the Corn Laws.

Question 14

Reform Bill of 1832

Answer 14

A major British political reform that increased the number of male voters by about 50 percent and gave political representation to new industrial areas.

Question 15

Great Famine

Answer 15

The result of four years of potato crop failure in the late 1840s in Ireland, a country that had grown dependent on potatoes as a dietary staple.

Question 16

Greater Germany

Answer 16

A liberal plan for German national unification that included the German-speaking parts of the Austrian Empire, put forth at the national parliament but rejected by Austrian rulers.