WWI Flashcards
Long-term reasons for the outbreak of WWI
- Nationalist / Chauvinist sentiments running high in Europe
- Germany’s neighbours feel threatened by Germany’s size, power politics and armament
- Germany feels encircled, fear an attack by France and Russia
- Russian and Germany mobilise, Germany declares war on Russia, asks France to remain neutral ->
Assassination of Austrian crown prince and his wife in June 1914 - Germany declares war on France and marches through Belgium, which is neutral
- Great Britain declares war on Germany
- employing women to work in factories to keep up the growing demand for supplies on the front
- industrial working class, cooperation of government and business -> corporalism
- to end the war, Germany would have to loose a lot of resources and territory => therefore they kept on fighting
chauvinism
superior feeling of dominance, nationalism and patriotism, aggressiveness towards one group, even ethnical
Berlin University commemorates the liberation from Napoleon
likeliness for military
patriotistic attitude
internal revolution for democracy in Germany
end of the monarchy, tyrant flees and settles down in the netherlands
recruitment of troops in the colonies
from India, Africa, China, South-East-Asia, South-America, United States
mass politics: women’s movements and feminism
managing the “masses”
- > the right to own property
- > the right to participate in politics
- > the right to own property
Clara Zetkin & Rosa Luxemburg
social changes as a science
sociology, Ferdinand Toennies (competition Emile Burkham (solidarity, rate of suicide higher in new groups) gustave le bern (democracy is an important part of the government -> beaurocracy)
technocracy
- > political decisions based on scientific and expert’s knowledge
- > scientization / scientification
eugenics
science + political problems combined
best matches for reproduction
disabled, invalid genetics are not good for society
belle époque
classical modernism second wave of industrialization Urbanization Secularization women's gradual emancipation critique of older norms new art forms
strength of nations
relations between nations in Europe
The Crimean War
Russia tries to gain formal acceptance of Russian dominance over the Ottoman Empire => Mediterranean
Ottoman sultan declares war on Russia
-> receives support from Great Britain, France and the Kingdom of Sardinia (“doubtful strategy” in hindsight)
Britain is critical of Russia’s attempt
Effects:
- France + prestige + influence
- Russia: needs many years to recover and focuses on internal reform (liberation of peasants 1861)
- Britain: (“splendid isolation”) => turns away from Europe
- Ottoman Empire: remains weak
- Austria becomes an enemy of Russia
Demise of the “Concert of Europe”
Bismarck’s “alliance system”
Russia, Austria, Germany => Three Emperor’s League 1872/73
Triple Alliance Renewal 1881
hypothesis that the triple alliance is a reason for World War I => Bismarck
The “Eastern Question”
Declining power of the Ottoman Empire due to the internal nationalist conflicts, financial problems and conflicts with neighbouring countries
> imperial disintegration, lingering conflicts in the Balkans
The European state system in 1890
intense rivalry and enmity between France and Germany
Germany allied to two weak partners
Austria-Hungary and Italy
Reassurance treaty between Russia and Germany: not very solid; France approaches Russia
> anxieties in Germany about encirclement
Great Britain is trying to stay out of continental affairs
new imperialism
conquer new territory
economic exploitation of colonies
the “scramble of Africa”
clash of colonies for prestige, international achknowledgment, feeling of superiority and resources and states
imperialism
state policy, practice or advocacy of extending power and dominion, especially by direct territorial acquisition or by growing political and economic control of other areas
economic interests (trading companies)
> but investment into the colonies are higher than the gains
individual actors
king leopold II
domestic factors
nation-building, public opinion, diverting attention from social
> consumption of colonial luxury goods
imagined nationalism
part of a community through reading newspaper
