Politics and society in 19th century Europe

October 17th

Up to the end of the 15th century, the civilization of Catholic Europe stood
behind the other great areas of civilization of the world in most aspects.
Suddenly, in the 16th century, this civilization, which was despised by the other
great civilizations, takes a dramatic ascendancy over all the other civilization,
and ever since the situation has become more and more dramatic.
Nothing in Medieval Europe anticipated the way things would later evolve. The
main preconditions for the early modern development of the West were put in
the Middle Ages. Beneath the surface of the medieval civilisation there must
have been some seeds of future tremenduous development.
The centre of civilisation in the world has shifted across history. Leaving aside
the Far East (India, China, Japan, Indochina) and the Central and the South
American regions we can study the Middle East, the Mediterranean Basin and the
Northen Europe.
The first centre of civ was constituted by the great river plains of the Middle East
(Egypt and Mesopotamia).
The second centre was the Mediterranean Basin as a whole, for a very long time,
up to the 15th century (the fall of the Byzantine Empire).
The third centre shifted to North-Western Europe (British Islands, Valley of the
Rhine, Northern Italy, Western and North-Western part of Germany, River regions
of France).

Geographical factors:
Why was civilisation invented in the first two regions and not the North-Western
Europe?
People got concentrated in those stranger areas because they could do
agriculture on a higher degree than anywhere in the world. Agriculture was
invented in Prehistoric times - the first great economic revolution - hunting and
gathering economy becomes a producing economy - from Paleolithic to Neolithic,
in various places of the world.
In Neolithic times, the territory of Romania was at the highest level of
development (the culture of Cucuteni).
The second great transformation in human mankind was the invention of the
state, which took place in the great river valleys of the Middle East. The state
regulated production through irrigations, thus developing agriculture on a large
scale. The main use for writing was to keep administrative records, so it was
necessary for writing to emerge right after.
Instead of several huge river valleys, we have in Western Europe a complicated
network of small river valleys surrounded by forests and mountains => small
compartments => political pluralism, constant change, constant struggles.

Factors for pluralism:

-the conflict between church and empire/monarchs.
-feudalism (negative development) - positive legacy = contractualism
-geographical compartmentation
-the towns enjoyed a high degree of autonomy towards the state and inserted
themselvs into conflicts - dominated by town dwellers (bourgeoisie)
(Life in town != townlife
(townlife - the city was a separate universe, sharply distinguishing itself from its
surroundings.)

Symbolic division of society

-those who pray (clergy)
-those who fight (nobles)
-those who work

The Standenstaat - the state of estates (clergy, nobility, a part of the

commoners: the bourgeoisie)

The Geographic expansions (the great discoveries) showed that the Western civ
was advanced.

Capitalism
= economic system in which the producer is separated from the means of
production, and labour is sold on the market as a commodity.
-accumulation and reinvestment of capital for productive purposes and profits
-economy can stand on its own, separated from politics

Political feudalism - Western Europe and Japan ONLY.

Social feudalism - evenly widespread => feudalism was considered a necessary
step in the evolution of all society by 19th century researchers e.g. Marx
(FALSE!)
Neither the owner, nor the peasants had absolute ownership over the domain -
the ownership was conditional. - standing economy, everything needed for
consumption was produced on the domain - unmarketable products.
The feudal domain had to be transformed into a capitalist farm by refashioning
the economical unit in such a way that a surplus of an item existed for
commerce by salarizing the peasants => workers were separated from the
means of production, being workers who sold their labour.
First time: England, 16th century - the lower nobility (the gentry) commercialized
English agriculture, transformed the domains into wool producing capitalist farms
to be sold on the Londonese market as well as on other markets. => capitalism
was born
Capitalistic behaviour: maximization of profit (condemned by the church and
devalued by chivalry)

Marx considered that value systems or cultural forms or ideological forms or the
superstructure of society are transformed according to previous transformations
taking place at the level of the infrastructure. Transformations are induced into a
society from bottom up.

Weber says that capitalism behaviour was born well before the transition from
feudalism to capitalism. The new Christian denominations created by the
reformation were responsible for making people behave like capitalists, esp.
Calvinism (France, Low countries, Scotland and England and mostly the colonies
soon-to-be the USA)
The Catholic God - a Roman judge - money for access to heavens (indulgentia)
The Orthodox God - a loving father - love for access to heavens
The Calvinist God - the intentions of God are opaque, but He can give signs -
blessed people make fortunes

Rationalization => predictability

||= the retreat of God after leaving behind a set of orderly laws

Factors for pushing the Western civilization further:

-capitalism
-quantitative science (Keppler, Bacon, Descartes, Galilei, Newton)

Government:
-after the Standenstaat - absolute monarchies, where rulers behave like the
Newtonian God (apply the laws they had made to all individuals equally)