European Revolutions

A revolution, simply defined, is a "sudden, radical, or complete change."¹ There were many different types of revolution in European history, ranging from agricultural and industrial to social and political revolutions. In this article, we will examine several of these revolutionary types. What unites them all is that they dramatically altered European life for better or for worse. Revolutions are significant moments in time that change the course of history. Let's take a look at how a few revolutions did just that.

Fig 1: Liberty Guiding the People by Eugéne Delacroix commemorating the French Revolution, 1830

European Agricultural Revolution

There are four agricultural revolutions in human history, ranging from the prehistoric period to the modern era. Each revolution saw the development of significant advances in farming techniques and technology, increasing food availability. More food led to population increases, resulting in increased movement of people and goods across Europe.

Neolithic Agricultural Revolution

The Neolithic Revolution marks humanity's transition from primarily a hunter-gatherer society to one that grows its food. Farming required more labor than gathering but also dramatically increased the available food, allowing for early population growth to accommodate labor needs. Scientists attribute this agricultural revolution to the 'domestication' of humankind because humans needed to work much longer hours in a single place to cultivate the new crops. Conversely, hunter-gatherers worked shorter hours and wandered large distances to find food.

Medieval Agricultural Revolution

The medieval agricultural revolution started in the tenth century and brought greater efficiency to farming, improving rural life. Medieval farmers began implementing a three-field crop rotation system to reduce the possibility of exhausting the soil. This system allowed for two fields with different crops planted in the spring and fall, leaving the third field fallow, or resting, for the year. The three-field system dramatically increased food production to meet a growing population's demands. The surplus food stimulated trade, which led to the migration of people back to urban centers.

Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century Agricultural Revolution

Fig 2: 1851 Illustration of a reaping machine developed in 1828 by Patrick Bell

This agricultural revolution developed alongside the Industrial Revolution, beginning in Britain. Innovations in farming technology, such as the steel plow, allowed for more efficient plantings and harvests. Large-scale mills developed during this period to process crops. The railroads and steamships' development allowed for increased agricultural product distribution across Europe and to far-reaching empires.

Twentieth Century Agricultural Revolution

This revolution is called the Green Agricultural Revolution, which is interesting because it introduced the use of genetic engineering and pesticides to agricultural production. Beginning in the 1950s, farmers began to change nature to meet human needs for food production. While this revolution began in Mexico with the scientific research of Norman Ernest Borlaug, its innovations quickly spread to Europe and the rest of the world.

Industrial Revolution in Europe

The Industrial Revolution began in Britain around 1760, dramatically changing European life. New machines transformed how goods were made and distributed, exponentially increasing economic growth. In addition, the revolution sparked a mass migration as rural cottage industries gave way to urban factories, forcing people to relocate to cities for work. The impact of the Industrial Revolution is considerable and can be seen in just about every aspect of human life.

Causes

The Industrial Revolution began in Britain for several reasons. First, its political situation by the late eighteenth century was relatively stable. This stability allowed for the development of intellectual societies devoted to scholarly pursuits in science, technology, medicine, law, and other subjects. The economic situation in England was also flourishing. There was a surplus of Britain's primary export, cloth, which allowed international trade to flourish and British merchants to collect high profits. Furthermore, the development of England into a global empire also expanded its trade opportunities and profits.

These factors, combined with abundant natural resources of coal and iron, allowed Britain to initiate the Industrial Revolution. From Britain, industrialization spread at varying speeds to the rest of Europe in the first half of the nineteenth century and to the Americas and parts of Asia in the second half.

Technological Innovations

The Industrial Revolution is marked by amazing new inventions that increased manufacturing efficiency at levels previously thought impossible. The spinning jenny and the steam engine were two of the most important machines to develop during this period.

Spinning Jenny

Fig 3: Illustration of a spinning jenny from 1884

James Hargreaves invented the spinning jenny in Britain around 1765, transforming the cotton textile industry. The jenny allowed anywhere from six to twenty-four spindles of thread to be spun simultaneously with only a single operator. The massive increase in thread production allowed British manufacturers to compete with and dominate other cloth producers such as India. In addition, the spinning jenny paved the way for the power loom, which increased production even more.

Steam Engine

Britain's abundance of coal enabled the invention of an engine that burned coal to produce steam to operate a pump. This engine was called the steam engine. The steam engine was first invented in 1698 by Thomas Savery, but it was a highly inefficient design. In 1763 James Watt perfected the steam engine by adding a condenser to the device to prevent energy waste. Watt's improved steam engine was patented in 1769 and revolutionized manufacturing and transportation. The most significant machine to use a steam engine was the steam-powered locomotive, along with a rail system to support its movement, which emerged in 1816.

Fig 4: Replica of George Stephenson's steam-powered locomotive, Rocket

Factories and Factory Workers

Factories developed to produce more goods faster to meet growing demand, particularly in the British textile industry. The first factories opened in the 1770s and 1780s and, over the next fifty years, came to dominate the British urban landscape. By the mid-nineteenth century, Britain boasted that they were the "workshop of the world," producing over half of the world's cloth and iron in these factories.

Industrialization caused the cottage industries, where rural workers spun thread in their homes, which were picked up by a merchant to sell, to close. This loss of work forced these former cottagers to migrate to cities to find jobs. Many men, women, and children took positions in factories operating machines such as the spinning jenny. They worked long hours for very little pay. Many workers lived at the factory in dormitories, and the living conditions were often similar to prisons or poorhouses. Living standards for the new working class only rose, and even then, marginally, in the 1840s with minimal wage increases.

1848 Revolutions in Europe

A popular revolt in Paris took place on February 22, 1848, sparking a wave of revolutionary movements across Europe. Very few countries emerged from 1848 without being affected by political and social unrest. Unfortunately, they were mostly unsuccessful in creating lasting change. The most significant revolutions occurred in France, the Austrian Empire, and the German Confederation.

Revolution in France

Fig 5: The first Campagne des Banquets, held at Château Rouge on July 9, 1847

The 1848 revolution in France was caused by a combination of bad harvests and widespread dissatisfaction with the government of King Louis Philippe. The poorer classes believed that the King only cared about the rich and bourgeois and would not pass measures to improve the quality of life for non-elites. As a result, revolutionary organization began in 1847 with a series of political meetings called the Campagne des banquets. When the government tried to stop the meetings, revolts broke out.

King Louis Philippe bowed to calls for him to step down and abdicated in favor of his grandson on February 24, 1848. But this did not satisfy the revolutionaries. They instead proclaimed France a provisional republic and installed an executive committee to lead it. The Second Republic was born.

When elections the following April failed to provide a socialist or working-class representation to the new government, riots broke out. Faced with the loss of their livelihood after the mostly conservative Constituent Assembly disbanded National Workshops in Paris. In these organizations, the poor could get government-paid jobs doing public works projects. When the workshops were dissolved, the poor set up barricades across the city to fight the middle-class National Guard. The professionally trained soldiers crushed the rioters over three bloody June days, ending the 1848 revolution in France.

Revolution in the Austrian Empire

Fig 6: Barricade in Vienna in May 1848

In 1848 the Austrian Empire ruled by the Hapsburg monarchy included Austria, Bohemia, Galicia (Ukraine and Poland today), Hungary, Croatia-Slavonia, Transylvania, and the northern Italian state of Lombardy-Venice. This vast mix of cultural identities led to conflict over national autonomy. For example, when word of the second French Revolution spread to Hungary in March 1848, the people rose against the Imperial government, demanding civil liberties and voting rights for all men. Lombardy-Venice soon followed Hungary in an uprising, and peasant riots broke out across the rest of the empire.

The Hapsburg government initially bowed to popular pressure for reform. Emperor Ferdinand I promised constitutional reform and abolished serfdom across the empire. He forced conservative State Chancellor and Foreign Minister Prince Metternich to resign and replaced him with moderately liberal advisors. However, these ministers failed to satisfy the revolutionaries. Hungary sought independence, and Lombardy-Venice wanted to join a confederation of Italian states.

Contradictions between revolutionaries about what nationalism would look like if they broke away from the empire ultimately led to the movement's downfall. For example, some Hungarians sought unification and centralization of the Kingdom of Hungary in addition to independence. Minority groups making up half the population disagreed with such a design and refused to cooperate, leading to the revolutionary movement's collapse. The Hapsburg army crushed the remaining revolts in Prague in June 1848 and Lombardy-Venice the following August. Hungary was finally subdued in June 1849.

Revolution in German Confederation

Fig 7: Cheering revolutionaries in Berlin, March 1848, unknown artist

Members of the German Confederation wanted to unite its thirty-eight states under one banner and create a new German state. In March 1848, demonstrations across the Confederation called for liberal reforms, freedom of the press, and a national parliament. Initially, many state leaders capitulated, promising reform and unification. Elections were held for a national parliament, which met in Frankfurt in May 1848. However, its members represented elite interests and largely ignored the more socialist-leaning demands of the working class.

One of the parliament's chief goals was to unite all Confederation territories, but it did not want to include the Italian portions of the Austrian Empire, its largest member. Austria refused to participate, so in March 1849, the parliament created a constitution for a "lesser" German state without them. They asked King Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia to serve as emperor. However, he and other Confederation leaders had already crushed the popular revolts in their territories that prompted the creation of the national parliament in the first place and refused to accept their offer. The parliament had taken too long, lost its opportunity to create change, and fell apart soon afterward, ending the revolution.

European Revolutions of 1989

1989 saw the collapse of communism in Central and Eastern Europe.

Fig 8: The destruction of the Berlin Wall on November 10, 1989

Following a period of economic decline, the Soviet Union under Mikhail Gorbachev attempted a reform movement to reverse their fortunes, which backfired and led to the Union's collapse. Consequently, the Soviets lost control over its territories, leading to peaceful revolutions in the Eastern Bloc that dismantled it and created new, independent countries. In addition, the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States ended in 1989 due to the Union's structural collapse.

The revolutions of 1989 began in Poland with labor strikes and popular demonstrations led by the outlawed union Solidarity. The government bowed to their demands in April 1989, legalizing Solidarity and declaring that the organization would have representation in parliament following the June 1989 elections. Solidarity won almost every seat up for election. As a result, the Communists lost their majority in the Polish government, leading to the appointment of a non-communist prime minister the following August. This action opened the doors to sweeping changes, including eliminating the secret police and introducing monetary reform.

Similar reform happened in Hungary, and they opened their borders to East Germany and Austria. As a result, East Germans flocked to Hungary en masse, passing through it and Austria to resettle in non-communist West Germany. This migration sparked a popular protest movement in East Germany, leading to the destruction of the Berlin Wall that separated East and West Germany in November 1989. Germany reunified the following year, and the Communist regime evaporated. The fall of the Berlin Wall serves as the face of the revolutions of 1989 in the Western world.