APEH unit 5: State Building
Elizabeth I gave more rights to the parliament, which gives more say of the people in the government.
England changes from absolute monarchy to a democracy
No English monarch could rule absolutely because that monarch was required to SHARE POWER with the English PARLIAMENT, which was a legislative body that represented the interest of the people in England.
3 points of Tension:
Divine Right Monarchy: they believed God granted absolute power to rule. It was believed if it was granted by God, it was hard to challenge and refute.
Charles I (succeeded James I on the throne of England) believed the king could do whatever he wants and seize any land he wants. It became a problem for the House of Commons in parliament because land could only be taken by the due process of law, but Charles argues with his divine right to rule.
Thirty Years War: England had lots of debt from their participation in the Thirty Years War. Charles spent money that wasn’t authorized by the parliament. Charles’ era called Personal Rule is when he dissolved the parliament’s power and just did whatever he wanted. However, when he needed money to fix a rebellion in Scotland, he assembles a short parliament (they do not help him) He calls a Long parliament, but when he dismisses them, they come back
Anglican Church: in defiance of the Catholic Church. Puritans rose up to remove Catholicism from the Anglican Church. They wanted to purify the church of England. Father of Charles, James I, wan’t interested in carrying out the demands of the Puritans. Finally, Charles marries a Catholic.
English Civil War: caused by the conflict between Parliament, the King, and other elites over their respective roles in the political structure. Will England be ruled by an absolute monarchy or as exist as a constitutional monarchy?
Charles went to North England, raised an army consisting of nobility and royal gentry. Parliament created a new model army.
The new Model Army is successful, but Charles refuses to admit defeat.Oliver Cromwell makes England a true republic with the name Protectorate. After the war, England was ruled by the Army and Cromwell (military dictatorship). Cromwell tries to work with Parliament to rule England, but they were not doing what he wanted. He dismisses them. Oliver rules England just as the very thing he fought to abolish.
English people wanted a king again because they believed it was the only way to restore stability again. Parliament gives the throne to Charles II, but he didn’t work well. James II is next and appointed Catholics to important positions, which angered the puritan population. Parliament hates the monarchs and offers the throne to James’ daughter and her husband: Mary and William of Orange.
William of Orange: Glorious Revolution. The idea of Divine Right of Monarchy is demolished.
English Bill of Rights: limited power of monarchy, protected the parliament. Parliament has the power to raise taxes, pass a law, that cannot be annulled by the King.
Massive Revolution: Agricultural Revolution
New planting and new technologies to make agricultural practices efficient.
Increased the amount of food available and increased the life span
Economic change: expansion of the cotton industry
Adam Smith criticizes it in the Wealth of Nation
Development of Market Economy
Mercantilism: state-driven economic system that emphasizes the build up of mineral wealth by means of a favorable balance of trade
Command Economy: State makes most economic decisions
Mercantilism is like Soviet Russia.
Mineral Wealth: gold and silver
Only a finite amount of wealth
Mercantilism led to more rivalries
Favorable balance of trade: by having more exports vs imports
Expansion of Empire
Colonies provide an abundance of raw materials and then made into goods sold as market in the colonial states
Navigation Acts: can only trade with Britain
Effects: increase demand of sugar, rice
New consumer culture was on the rise
Increasing demand of labor: slavery, African slave trade in the triangular trade
The DUTCH golden age: The English and the dutch were away from absolutism
Dutch Republic: The Republic of the United Netherlands
They rejected monarchies and wanted constitutionalism. The Dutch opted for a republic where the means depended on the people and the government listened to the representatives of the people.
Each province in the Netherlands had its own assembly called an estate. Each estate was ruled by an oligarchy :form of government which few people ruled, rather than only one absolute ruler.
Made up of wealthy businessmen and rural landowners. They dealt with domestic policies, while a stadholder that dealt with military defense.
The federal govt aka States General had less power than the estates. Handling foreign policy and war.
Dutch Dominance in Trade: they were the wealthiest European state due to their geography
Balance of Power: States operated on the principle of self-interest. Their main goal was to make sure each state had the same amount of power, so that no one state could dominate the rest.
To maintain this balance of power, rulers would strengthen and build up their armies.
Led to new efforts of diplomacy: when states come to agreements by talking instead of going to war.
The partition of Poland: The idea of maintaining the balance of power sealed the fate of Poland and essentially wiped it off the map for about 150 years. Poland was a constitutional monarchy and was not united. The Commonwealth of Poland’s monarch was weak compared to the absolutist states, such as Russia led by Catherine II, Prussia led by Frederick II, and Austria led by Joseph II, which surround Poland.
In 1772, these states signed a treaty which was ratified by Poland, granting about half of their territory.
Ottoman empire had ambitions to push into central Europe, so they invade Austria in the Battle of Vienna.
Louis XIV’s reasons for war
expansion of French territory
Weaken Hapsburg influence in Europe
Increase his own glory
Fought the Dutch War, Nine Years War (push into HRE to gain territory)
Grand Alliance is formed (Hapsburg, Dutch Republic, England, Spain, Sweden, and Portugal) fighting against France
War of Spanish Succession: Charles II dies and Philip V succeeds. Philip V is actually the grandson of Louis XIV. People feared this arrangement because it was possible that Spain and France could be combined and ruled by one throne of Louis XIV. The balance of power in Europe would be ruined.
War broke out to prevent this scenario with England, United Provinces, Austria, and Prussia fighting against Spain, France, and Bavaria.
War ends in a draw with the Treaty of Utrecht (1713) which allows Philip V on the throne of Spain, but Spain and France must remain separate. This maintains the balance of power in Europe.
How did the military of various states change?
Prior: States would declare war and then raise their armies
Now: States paid for professional standing armies with increasing sizes.
Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden: built a professional standing army with organized ranks of authority. Firearms, cannons.
Military Expansionists in Europe paid for these armies by increasing taxes and expanding bureaucracy. Significant in showing a military revolution.
The Rise of Absolutism:
Absolutism: political power is taken away from the nobility and church and towards the monarch. Caused by the weakening of the Catholic Church and economics (Merchant classes were emerging due to global trade and people sought absolute monarchs to provide economic and political stability).
Monarchs weakened the power of the nobility and create bureaucracies that handle most administrations of the king.The Bureaucrats were answerable to the king, while the nobility was less so.
England:
James I (divine right of kings): His rule presented problems in England due to their Magna Carta, which limited the power of the monarch. Parliament pushes back at his absolutism and fights a civil war to establish the limited power of the monarch.
Spain:
Philip II in the 2nd half of the 16th century: united Iberian peninsula by capturing Portugal and attacking the Ottomans in the Mediterranean.
The rebellion in the Spanish Netherlands and the failure of the Spanish Armada (unable to invade England) led to decline of power
France:
Louis XIV: believed he was the State and all power belonged to him.
affected by the rebellion of the nobility and the commoners known as the Fronde in 1648.
Cardinal Mazarin / judicial nobility encouraged commoners to riot
Young Louis and his mother had to flee
How he rose to power/ Consolidating more power to himself
Intendant system: monitored territories of France for Louis. Intendants made sure the people of France were obeying the laws passed by Louis
Palace of Versailles: nobles lived in his court and Louis could keep an eye on their behavior. They fought over who would get the favor of the king. By creating competition among the nobility, he gained their loyalty and cooperation, further consolidating his power
Religious Uniformity throughout France: In 1685, he revokes the Edict of Nantes. Hundreds of thousands of Huguenots migrate to more tolerant places, leading to a decrease in France’s merchant class.
Wars of Expansion: Jean Baptiste Colbert, his financial manager, based the French economy based on Mercantilism. Effects: decreased the debt in France, allowed domestic industries to thrive, expanded colonial holdings, and created a favorable balance of trade. Louis’ endless wars costs too much money, unraveling Colbert’s work.
Russia:
Peter the Great (1682): Russia is still under medieval standards. European nations in the West adopted new technologies, methods of finance and education, while Russia ran under a feudal system of society
Peter visits these Western Nations and convinces Russia to Westernize. He transforms their political, cultural, and religious institutions.
Nobles were to serve in the army, answerable to Peter (political)
Requires the nobility to shave their beards and wear western-style clothing (cultural) Had a fashion police that shave people’s beards and made sure they were dressed accordingly. According to the Russian Orthodox Church, a bushy beard was a sign of piety. Peter was challenging the church. Beard Tax: people could keep their beards if only they paid a price
eliminated the role of the Patriarch (pope of the Orthodox Church) and replaced it with the Holy Synod which were run by officials and ministers, called procurators, who would obey Peter (religious)
Most of the Peasantry hated his reforms, however, his westernization allowed Russia to catch up to the Western European industrialized nations. Catherine the Great continues this