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Maartje Abbenhuis engages with the historiographical implications of recent scholarship on the Congress of Vienna and its aftermaths and highlights how these new histories help us to complicate and globalise our understanding of this major diplomatic event and its varied impacts

Image courtesy of interviewee. March 21, 2024

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This video video discusses the significance of the year 1815 in European history, particularly focusing on the Congress of Vienna, which marked the end of the Napoleonic Wars and aimed to restore order among European monarchies. This video video congress led to treaties that reshaped Europe's political landscape and established diplomatic practices intended to prevent future conflicts. Notably, it resulted in a century of relative peace in Europe until the outbreak of World War I in 1914.

Historians have traditionally celebrated the outcomes of the Congress of Vienna for creating stability among European powers. However, recent scholarship has begun to reevaluate this perspective by examining the broader implications of the treaties, including social tensions, the reestablishment of monarchical power, and the exclusion of diverse societal voices. New studies point to the involvement of various groups, including women and representatives of interest groups, in shaping the decisions made during this diplomatic gathering.

This video video emphasizes that the events of 1815 had global ramifications, influencing colonial expansion and international relations beyond Europe. It suggests that the understanding of historical precedents, such as the norms established at the Congress of Vienna, is crucial for analyzing contemporary international affairs and power dynamics. The reexamination of 1815 underlines the interconnectedness of historical events and how they continue to shape global relations today.

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1815 is in European history,

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always considered a really important moment in time.

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It's when the Napoleonic wars finally came to an end,

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and there was an attempt, a successful attempt

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by the old monarchs of Europe to restore

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what they thought was the right for order in Europe.

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So they pretty much without exceptional, traveled

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to the capital of, the Austrian,

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the Habsburg Empire in Vienna in 1815.

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And over a series of meetings

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and many months, they came up with a, a, a series

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of agreements, which we now call the Congress of Vienna

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of 1815.

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And these agreements were written down on paper.

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They were signed, they were treaties that set in motion,

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a new map of Europe

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and a plan for the future,

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which would keep these monarchs

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and the aristocrats that had ruled Europe

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before the French Revolution would put them back in charge

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of the, their countries.

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But one of the things that they were most alert

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to was the danger of there being another French revolution

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and the danger of one power, or one country,

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or one monarch, or one leader,

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or one government deciding to use war to and,

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and power to, to do what Napoleon had done, which was try

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to take over, the European continent.

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So what they decided on was to create a map of Europe

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that sort of focused on restoring historical borderlines,

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but also to ensure that, rivalries

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between the various countries would be minimized so

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that war could be avoided.

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And there were many ways in which they did that.

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Um,

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but the most important one was

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that they set in motion these principles of talking

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to each other and collectively coming up with solutions for,

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for moments of crisis, for cross border issues.

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So the idea was

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to avoid one power being more powerful than any others.

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Now, this moment in time has obviously been much studied.

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It's partly

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because it was the end of the Napoleonic wars,

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which were hugely disruptive globally,

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and changed all sorts of, things all over the world.

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Um, but they were also studied a lot because 400

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or so years after 1815, this, this set

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of treaties stabilized European diplomatic

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relations in such a way that

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We don't see a Europe wide war war until the outbreak

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of the First World War, which occurred in 1914.

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So in many ways, for many, many years,

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his historians would look at the 1815 moment

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and talk about its success, how successful the Congress

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of Vienna was in creating a stable piece

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for Europeans for almost a hundred years.

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And the res result was that then they asked questions like,

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but what caused it to collapse?

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What caused it to fail in 1914?

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And so we get very much a, a discussion about

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the Congress of Vienna as this great good,

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as something about this treaty

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and about the way in which the,

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the arrangements were weighed as being, something

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that was positive in the world.

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And World War I breaking out was the negative.

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So it's about, about one is peaceful and good, and,

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and then we have to,

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and then you compare it to the things that happen next.

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So you get World War I, and then you get the treaty Oriah

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and the other treaties at the end of the First World War,

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which all are explained as failures

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because they didn't prevent World War ii,

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which comes very quickly after.

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And so it becomes part of a scholarship of, comparing

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and contrasting diplomatic terms and agreements.

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And it becomes very much about the specifics of the moment,

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the mostly men in the room

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as the historian saw it,

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and not about, the results that were good

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for some, but not good for all.

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So in the last 20 15, 20 years,

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but certainly in the last, 5, 6, 7 years, there's been a

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renaissance, among historians and,

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and scholars of, European relations,

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and scholars of poli politics

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and international relations revisiting this treaty

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and this 1815 moment

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and asking new kinds of questions about that moment,

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because

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of the ways in which we now are rethinking the value

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of what happened in 1815, as well.

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So, so the 19th century is this great era of globalization,

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industrialization, capitalism expands the industrial

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illusion takes off, but is also a great era

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of imperial expansion, which came at the cost.

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It was hugely violent, hugely costly,

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and it was caused by the same power

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that are being celebrated in another, history

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for having created this peaceful treaty.

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Right? It's, and so we are asking much, much more.

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We are expanding the way we are thinking about

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what happened in 1815 and what it meant at the time

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and afterwards, and who was involved and,

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and not looking as strictly as, as historians of diplomacy

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and as scholars of IR used to do just at treaty terms

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and the diplomats who signed it.

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So that's, that's kind of where the Renaissances come from,

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from asking new kinds of questions, which has led

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to a whole bunch

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of really excellent new work being done in the last few

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years about repositioning this,

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this core moment in European history

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and saying, well, what did that mean globally?

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What did that mean for different groups

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and societies and actors?

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How did different kinds of groups of people, help

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to shape that moment?

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What ideas did it lead to, and so forth?

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One of probably the easiest ways to do that is to begin with

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what the historiography used to sort of promote.

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So one of the most important scholars of the 1815 Congress

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of Vienna and its meaningful power

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and politics in Europe was a,

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was a great historian called Paul Schroeder,

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who wrote a book called The Transformation

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of European Politics in 1994.

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And his argument was that the Congress of Vienna was the

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most successful peace treaty of all time

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because it stabilized the relationship between these,

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these very powerful European states that

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were a great powers, as well as a, a, a large number

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of small states in Europe as well.

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And because their relationships were relatively stable

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as his argument for almost a hundred years, we, we,

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historians should look at,

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or we scholars of international affairs should look at

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that moment and tri sea, try unpack

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why it's considered, why it was so effective.

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Um, very recently,

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we historians have moved away from sort

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of looking just at winners and losers and success and,

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and failure as being easily, easily,

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easily assessed.

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You know, this tick boxes, this worked, this worked,

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this worked, therefore was a success,

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or this word didn't work,

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this didn't work, therefore was a failure.

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And we've started embracing a much more,

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holistic approach to looking at moments

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of international agreement, right, like a treaty.

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And therefore we've started looking more broadly at

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how many, what happened, who took part, who was part

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of the decision making, but also what were the implications

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of these decisions beyond there was no war

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for a hundred years between these states as a collective.

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And in doing so, what we've come up with is

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that this is part of an opening up of, of, of the study

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of diplomacy

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and the study of international affairs more generally that

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that's been happening over the last 20 years or so.

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And so what this has happened is that the study of 1815,

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has looked beyond just the few diplomats

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who we used to, who, whose stories used to identify

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as the core creators of what the terms of

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what the treaty said.

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And we look much more at the complex relationships that,

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occurred in Vienna in 1815, and who was talking to whom

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and who was making decisions with.

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And in doing that work, scholars like Glenda Luga

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and Brian Vick, have really shown how

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there were large numbers of participants

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that weren't representatives of a government or of a monarch

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or of a prince or of a go of, of, of one

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of these European states,

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but they were, representatives of interest groups of,

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or they were part of a community who wanted their

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voice heard in this moment.

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And, so, so a very recent book by,

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wonderful scholar professor Dr.

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Glenda Slugger, called The Invention

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of the International Order, for example,

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makes this wonderful argument about how the engagement

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of these other groups, particularly of a large number of,

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women and people with economic interests in whatever,

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what was gonna come out of these peace agreements

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and outta this treaty, were really active in Vienna in 1815,

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in shaping the space, in shaping the decision making, in,

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in influencing what came, what was prioritized in the final

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treaty and influencing some of the monarchs directly.

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Um, and so we're opening up this,

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the way we read this moment,

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Brian Vick's work on 1815 looks at it beyond Europe and,

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and argues convincingly

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that Europe was never just interested in

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other Europe PEs, right?

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This is not just the French and the British

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and the, the Prussians

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and the Russians talking

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to each other about their own interests.

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They're looking, they're, they're always thinking globally.

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They've all got empires of various descriptions.

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They're considering their relationships outside

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with non-European states, with, with their own people

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who have, who have, who have ambitions for, for,

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for imperial expansion or for investment somewhere.

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And so he opens up the thinking about 1815 and,

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and brings in these more global aspirations

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and ideas into this moment.

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And in so doing, arguing that 1815

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and what happened at the Congress

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of Vienna had important ramifications for

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the expansion of imperialism, industrialization,

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all these things that are come to the fore,

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through the course of the early 19th century.

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So one of the things that I work on is neutrality.

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And one of the things 1815 does in terms of neutrality is

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that it entrenched this notion that not going to war

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with your greatest rival enables you

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to then focus on expanding your interests elsewhere, even if

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that comes, you know,

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even if you use military force to do that.

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But peace at home enables war outside, outside,

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your most scary space or your, the the most.

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So if you secure your home, hold on home,

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then you can expand your power and your influence

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and your interests elsewhere much more easily.

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And so who wins

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and who loses is quite, is quite important.

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So if you call the Congress

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of Vienna a successful peace treaty, yes,

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but at what cost for whom?

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Whom for whom is it successful?

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And if you say, well, it was ex extremely useful in

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solidifying, European security, then that

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enabled many

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of the power differentials we see in our world

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today to be created.

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The winners of 1815,

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have a long history of winning

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after at the cost of other people and other,

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and other communities.

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So,

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and the final scholar

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who works in this field who's really made a massive,

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massive impact on seeing 1815 different is a distinguished

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professor who works on 1815,

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as it was interpreted by European people from the ground up

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and who saw, the peace treaties

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and the, cooperative, attempts

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to create cooperation across European countries as a way

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of stabilizing their affairs

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and making their lives more secure.

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And she's done a lot of work on developing the idea

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of security culture.

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So the nature, the, the notion that to feel secure, you need

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to create agreements with your neighbors

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and like-minded, peoples elsewhere to

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make sure that the, your stability carries on going forward.

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And this is really important

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because again, security cultures are about who's who

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for whom is something safe

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and for whom is something not safe.

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And, and her work is really,

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really important in creating this sense of this.

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This is not just something that was created by a few

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elite aristocrats who are in charge of countries.

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This is something that's internalized within,

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within Europe itself at the time.

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And that has ramifications, for how people

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operate both locally, with each other economically,

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you know, by traveling across a border or whatever,

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or much on a much wider scale by, by selling and, buying

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and selling goods internationally and so forth.

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So, so this renaissance has really

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made people think more broadly about 1815

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and it's ramifications in all sorts of ways as opposed

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to sort of entrenching it in treaty terms.

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And, and in the, in the few, in the few diplomats

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who created them at the time, why IC 1815 as a,

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as a really important international moment

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and an international

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or global moment, is that yes,

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it was a treaty signed between European powers

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to deal with issues that came out of a war that

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devastated Europe, the continent of Europe,

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and almost all Europeans lives for many, many years.

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It was also a, a treaty that reestablished,

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monarchical power

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and the power of the aristocracy in many European countries.

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And so that created social tension at home

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for many of these countries.

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And, and we see revolutionary uprisings

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and things for, for decades to come.

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But those are by looking inwards

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and by looking only within sort of the boundaries

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of the European continent, I think the, the,

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the one of the wider implications

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of the 1815 moment is missed.

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And so what recent scholarship has really done is said,

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well, Europe is never something that is just European.

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And certainly in an 1815 most European, countries

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and most European communities had all sorts

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of relationships outside Europe.

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And the 1815 moment, which brought peace to Europe

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also set in motion all sorts of things

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that changed the way in which Europeans engage with the rest

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of the world and how the rest of the world engage

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with Europe because a Europe's no longer at war,

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which changes economic opportunities.

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It opens up, it opens up, it ends the, the, the blockades

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of Europe that had existed between the French

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and the British and, and also,

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and all sorts of other, openings up.

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And it ends war, which had been fought in, in the Americas

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and elsewhere as part of the Napoleonic war as well.

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For me, the question of how this matters today

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is that the reverberations of this meant that,

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and this is kind of Glenda Lucas work shows this as well, is

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that entrenched European

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or Western standards of diplomacy in a core moment.

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It created this, it, it sort of entrenched in the,

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the, the standards by which international relations

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are still, functioning today

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because it created a power differential.

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Europe became a stronger unit as a whole in the world

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and in expanding its power over so much of the world,

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which it already had influenced for hundreds of years,

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but now through the course of the 19th century, it,

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it manages to overpower other great powers

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that are existence and also the Qing China,

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the Moul empires in India elsewhere, right?

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That Europe doesn't control all of the world in 1815,

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but by 1914, by the time the First World War breaks out,

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the European empires are so large

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and so inclusive, they don't include the whole world,

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but they include a huge amount of the world,

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that the standards by which, these states

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and their norms and their laws

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and their ways of, making treaties even

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to exchange goods or, or to trade

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or monetary policies, they're all being created

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and being sustained by, by these European principles.

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And so Glenda Luger's book is so useful

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because it shows just how,

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important the framing of those principles were around 1815

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to helping set in motion a rules-based order

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that we still function under to a large degree today,

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and how it, how it ended up excluding other ways

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of running the world or other ways of organizing business

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or setting, legal parameters around relationships.

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And given that the world today is in, in slight,

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it's an understatement in some crisis,

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and there are such challenges

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to whether this particular rules-based order should

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continue, it's kind very important, I think

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to look at where the origins

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or how that rules-based order came into being and,

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and what principles and what ideas dominated it.

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And I think that isn't something

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most scholars will go back to 1945, the end

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of the second World War to do that,

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or sometimes they go to 1919, the end

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of the first World War to do that.

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And what the new work on 1815 suggests is

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that actually it would be more useful to go back to 1815

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because after 1815, that's when the sort

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of first world hegemony formed

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didn't form in the wake of World War I.

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It formed after 1815 through the 19th century,

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and then it was entrenched and changed somewhat

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after World War I, with the rise of the United States

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and Soviet Russia.

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But it's part of this long history of,

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of norms rather than a short history, of norms.

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And that's why I, I think it's vitally important that

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that understanding of where those norms come, came from and,

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and what alternatives could have been,

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what alternatives were presented at that time even

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might help us today open up more conversations about

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where do we as a world that's in crisis, need to go

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with our thinking about the future Reading this opens up a

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new or different understanding of 1815.

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And there is a lot of popular history of 1815,

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which is really interesting and really, useful

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because it really focuses on what happens in Vienna in 1815

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and who, who goes to bed with whom and who's talking to whom

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and, and, and so forth and, and who's spying on whom.

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And that's really fabulous research.

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But by reading these other broader books on 1815,

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it really shows how important moments of international,

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treaty making multilateral agreements were,

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and particularly this one in setting of motion,

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all sorts of things

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that at the time people may not have even been

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alert to that was gonna happen.

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But the implications of which over the many,

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many decades since then, have shaped our world.

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It, it's, it's useful for, for understanding today

401
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and for revisiting

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what we think we know about the 19th century

403
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because what we think we know about the 19th century

404
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for many Europeans is, is very limited.

405
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And, and it's very much still focused on this,

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Europe centered who's running, who's running the government,

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what are their agreements,

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who are these diplomats, what are they saying?

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And it's not about making Europe part of a world of,

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of international relations, which it is today, and

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and was then too.

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And so it, it helps us expand our understanding of,

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of the EU today,

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but also of all sorts of just understanding

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that history doesn't come out of one core moment,

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but it is a process that usually takes time

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and it's worth reading

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and worth contemplating just to, just

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to expand our understanding of international affairs

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as they have shaped over time.

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And rather than, and seeing them only as a product

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of a very short or very recent events

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and actually saying that actually matters that we understand

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where Russian power has come from

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and how that has changed over time,

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or where United States power or Chinese power or,

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or all the, all the great states today that we need

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to concern ourself with where they came from.

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And 1815, I think this new scholarship really does show

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how important that was in setting the norms and standards

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and ideas that still shape, how we work today

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and how we see how the world functions today.

Congress of Vienna: Restoring European Order in 1815

00:00:00 - 1815 is in European history, always considered a really important moment in time. It's when the Napoleonic wars finally came to an end, and there was an attempt, a successful attempt by the old monarchs of Europe to restore what they thought was the right for order in Europe. So they pretty much without exceptional, traveled to the capital of, the Austrian,
00:00:35 - And over a series of meetings and many months, they came up with a, a, a series of agreements, which we now call the Congress of Vienna of 1815. And these agreements were written down on paper. They were signed, they were treaties that set in motion, a new map of Europe and a plan for the future, which would keep these monarchs
00:01:06 - before the French Revolution would put them back in charge of the, their countries. But one of the things that they were most alert to was the danger of there being another French revolution and the danger of one power, or one country, or one monarch, or one leader, or one government deciding to use war to and,
00:01:37 - to take over, the European continent. So what they decided on was to create a map of Europe that sort of focused on restoring historical borderlines, but also to ensure that, rivalries between the various countries would be minimized so that war could be avoided. And there were many ways in which they did that.
00:02:07 - but the most important one was that they set in motion these principles of talking to each other and collectively coming up with solutions for, for moments of crisis, for cross border issues. So the idea was to avoid one power being more powerful than any others. Now, this moment in time has obviously been much studied. It's partly because it was the end of the Napoleonic wars, which were hugely disruptive globally,
00:02:43 - but they were also studied a lot because 400 or so years after 1815, this, this set of treaties stabilized European diplomatic relations in such a way that We don't see a Europe wide war war until the outbreak of the First World War, which occurred in 1914. So in many ways, for many, many years,

Rethinking the Congress of Vienna's Legacy

00:03:14 - and talk about its success, how successful the Congress of Vienna was in creating a stable piece for Europeans for almost a hundred years. And the res result was that then they asked questions like, but what caused it to collapse? What caused it to fail in 1914? And so we get very much a, a discussion about
00:03:44 - as something about this treaty and about the way in which the, the arrangements were weighed as being, something that was positive in the world. And World War I breaking out was the negative. So it's about, about one is peaceful and good, and, and then we have to, and then you compare it to the things that happen next. So you get World War I, and then you get the treaty Oriah and the other treaties at the end of the First World War, which all are explained as failures
00:04:14 - which comes very quickly after. And so it becomes part of a scholarship of, comparing and contrasting diplomatic terms and agreements. And it becomes very much about the specifics of the moment, the mostly men in the room as the historian saw it, and not about, the results that were good
00:04:45 - So in the last 20 15, 20 years, but certainly in the last, 5, 6, 7 years, there's been a renaissance, among historians and, and scholars of, European relations, and scholars of poli politics and international relations revisiting this treaty and this 1815 moment and asking new kinds of questions about that moment,
00:05:16 - of the ways in which we now are rethinking the value of what happened in 1815, as well. So, so the 19th century is this great era of globalization, industrialization, capitalism expands the industrial illusion takes off, but is also a great era of imperial expansion, which came at the cost. It was hugely violent, hugely costly, and it was caused by the same power that are being celebrated in another, history
00:05:49 - Right? It's, and so we are asking much, much more. We are expanding the way we are thinking about what happened in 1815 and what it meant at the time and afterwards, and who was involved and, and not looking as strictly as, as historians of diplomacy and as scholars of IR used to do just at treaty terms and the diplomats who signed it. So that's, that's kind of where the Renaissances come from, from asking new kinds of questions, which has led

Revisiting the Impact of the Congress of Vienna

00:06:20 - of really excellent new work being done in the last few years about repositioning this, this core moment in European history and saying, well, what did that mean globally? What did that mean for different groups and societies and actors? How did different kinds of groups of people, help to shape that moment? What ideas did it lead to, and so forth? One of probably the easiest ways to do that is to begin with what the historiography used to sort of promote.
00:06:56 - of Vienna and its meaningful power and politics in Europe was a, was a great historian called Paul Schroeder, who wrote a book called The Transformation of European Politics in 1994. And his argument was that the Congress of Vienna was the most successful peace treaty of all time because it stabilized the relationship between these,
00:07:28 - were a great powers, as well as a, a, a large number of small states in Europe as well. And because their relationships were relatively stable as his argument for almost a hundred years, we, we, historians should look at, or we scholars of international affairs should look at that moment and tri sea, try unpack why it's considered, why it was so effective.
00:07:59 - we historians have moved away from sort of looking just at winners and losers and success and, and failure as being easily, easily, easily assessed. You know, this tick boxes, this worked, this worked, this worked, therefore was a success, or this word didn't work, this didn't work, therefore was a failure. And we've started embracing a much more, holistic approach to looking at moments
00:08:30 - And therefore we've started looking more broadly at how many, what happened, who took part, who was part of the decision making, but also what were the implications of these decisions beyond there was no war for a hundred years between these states as a collective. And in doing so, what we've come up with is that this is part of an opening up of, of, of the study of diplomacy
00:09:00 - that's been happening over the last 20 years or so. And so what this has happened is that the study of 1815, has looked beyond just the few diplomats who we used to, who, whose stories used to identify as the core creators of what the terms of what the treaty said. And we look much more at the complex relationships that, occurred in Vienna in 1815, and who was talking to whom

Influence Beyond Diplomacy in 1815

00:09:31 - And in doing that work, scholars like Glenda Luga and Brian Vick, have really shown how there were large numbers of participants that weren't representatives of a government or of a monarch or of a prince or of a go of, of, of one of these European states, but they were, representatives of interest groups of, or they were part of a community who wanted their voice heard in this moment.
00:10:04 - wonderful scholar professor Dr. Glenda Slugger, called The Invention of the International Order, for example, makes this wonderful argument about how the engagement of these other groups, particularly of a large number of, women and people with economic interests in whatever, what was gonna come out of these peace agreements and outta this treaty, were really active in Vienna in 1815,
00:10:36 - in influencing what came, what was prioritized in the final treaty and influencing some of the monarchs directly. and so we're opening up this, the way we read this moment, Brian Vick's work on 1815 looks at it beyond Europe and, and argues convincingly that Europe was never just interested in other Europe PEs, right? This is not just the French and the British and the, the Prussians
00:11:06 - to each other about their own interests. They're looking, they're, they're always thinking globally. They've all got empires of various descriptions. They're considering their relationships outside with non-European states, with, with their own people who have, who have, who have ambitions for, for, for imperial expansion or for investment somewhere. And so he opens up the thinking about 1815 and,
00:11:38 - and ideas into this moment. And in so doing, arguing that 1815 and what happened at the Congress of Vienna had important ramifications for the expansion of imperialism, industrialization, all these things that are come to the fore, through the course of the early 19th century. So one of the things that I work on is neutrality. And one of the things 1815 does in terms of neutrality is
00:12:13 - with your greatest rival enables you to then focus on expanding your interests elsewhere, even if that comes, you know, even if you use military force to do that. But peace at home enables war outside, outside, your most scary space or your, the the most. So if you secure your home, hold on home, then you can expand your power and your influence and your interests elsewhere much more easily.

Evaluating the Costs of the Congress of Vienna

00:12:42 - and who loses is quite, is quite important. So if you call the Congress of Vienna a successful peace treaty, yes, but at what cost for whom? Whom for whom is it successful? And if you say, well, it was ex extremely useful in solidifying, European security, then that enabled many of the power differentials we see in our world today to be created.
00:13:15 - have a long history of winning after at the cost of other people and other, and other communities. So, and the final scholar who works in this field who's really made a massive, massive impact on seeing 1815 different is a distinguished professor who works on 1815, as it was interpreted by European people from the ground up
00:13:44 - and the, cooperative, attempts to create cooperation across European countries as a way of stabilizing their affairs and making their lives more secure. And she's done a lot of work on developing the idea of security culture. So the nature, the, the notion that to feel secure, you need to create agreements with your neighbors and like-minded, peoples elsewhere to make sure that the, your stability carries on going forward.
00:14:15 - because again, security cultures are about who's who for whom is something safe and for whom is something not safe. And, and her work is really, really important in creating this sense of this. This is not just something that was created by a few elite aristocrats who are in charge of countries. This is something that's internalized within, within Europe itself at the time. And that has ramifications, for how people
00:14:49 - you know, by traveling across a border or whatever, or much on a much wider scale by, by selling and, buying and selling goods internationally and so forth. So, so this renaissance has really made people think more broadly about 1815 and it's ramifications in all sorts of ways as opposed to sort of entrenching it in treaty terms. And, and in the, in the few, in the few diplomats
00:15:20 - as a really important international moment and an international or global moment, is that yes, it was a treaty signed between European powers to deal with issues that came out of a war that devastated Europe, the continent of Europe, and almost all Europeans lives for many, many years.

European Peace and Global Power Dynamics

00:15:51 - monarchical power and the power of the aristocracy in many European countries. And so that created social tension at home for many of these countries. And, and we see revolutionary uprisings and things for, for decades to come. But those are by looking inwards and by looking only within sort of the boundaries of the European continent, I think the, the, the one of the wider implications
00:16:23 - And so what recent scholarship has really done is said, well, Europe is never something that is just European. And certainly in an 1815 most European, countries and most European communities had all sorts of relationships outside Europe. And the 1815 moment, which brought peace to Europe also set in motion all sorts of things that changed the way in which Europeans engage with the rest
00:16:54 - with Europe because a Europe's no longer at war, which changes economic opportunities. It opens up, it opens up, it ends the, the, the blockades of Europe that had existed between the French and the British and, and also, and all sorts of other, openings up. And it ends war, which had been fought in, in the Americas and elsewhere as part of the Napoleonic war as well. For me, the question of how this matters today
00:17:26 - and this is kind of Glenda Lucas work shows this as well, is that entrenched European or Western standards of diplomacy in a core moment. It created this, it, it sort of entrenched in the, the, the standards by which international relations are still, functioning today because it created a power differential.
00:17:59 - and in expanding its power over so much of the world, which it already had influenced for hundreds of years, but now through the course of the 19th century, it, it manages to overpower other great powers that are existence and also the Qing China, the Moul empires in India elsewhere, right? That Europe doesn't control all of the world in 1815, but by 1914, by the time the First World War breaks out,
00:18:29 - and so inclusive, they don't include the whole world, but they include a huge amount of the world, that the standards by which, these states and their norms and their laws and their ways of, making treaties even to exchange goods or, or to trade or monetary policies, they're all being created and being sustained by, by these European principles.

Framing Principles of the 1815 Order

00:19:00 - because it shows just how, important the framing of those principles were around 1815 to helping set in motion a rules-based order that we still function under to a large degree today, and how it, how it ended up excluding other ways of running the world or other ways of organizing business or setting, legal parameters around relationships.
00:19:36 - it's an understatement in some crisis, and there are such challenges to whether this particular rules-based order should continue, it's kind very important, I think to look at where the origins or how that rules-based order came into being and, and what principles and what ideas dominated it. And I think that isn't something most scholars will go back to 1945, the end of the second World War to do that,
00:20:06 - of the first World War to do that. And what the new work on 1815 suggests is that actually it would be more useful to go back to 1815 because after 1815, that's when the sort of first world hegemony formed didn't form in the wake of World War I. It formed after 1815 through the 19th century, and then it was entrenched and changed somewhat after World War I, with the rise of the United States
00:20:37 - But it's part of this long history of, of norms rather than a short history, of norms. And that's why I, I think it's vitally important that that understanding of where those norms come, came from and, and what alternatives could have been, what alternatives were presented at that time even might help us today open up more conversations about where do we as a world that's in crisis, need to go
00:21:12 - new or different understanding of 1815. And there is a lot of popular history of 1815, which is really interesting and really, useful because it really focuses on what happens in Vienna in 1815 and who, who goes to bed with whom and who's talking to whom and, and, and so forth and, and who's spying on whom. And that's really fabulous research. But by reading these other broader books on 1815,
00:21:43 - treaty making multilateral agreements were, and particularly this one in setting of motion, all sorts of things that at the time people may not have even been alert to that was gonna happen. But the implications of which over the many, many decades since then, have shaped our world. It, it's, it's useful for, for understanding today and for revisiting what we think we know about the 19th century

Reassessing Europe's Role in Global History

00:22:13 - for many Europeans is, is very limited. And, and it's very much still focused on this, Europe centered who's running, who's running the government, what are their agreements, who are these diplomats, what are they saying? And it's not about making Europe part of a world of, of international relations, which it is today, and and was then too. And so it, it helps us expand our understanding of,
00:22:42 - but also of all sorts of just understanding that history doesn't come out of one core moment, but it is a process that usually takes time and it's worth reading and worth contemplating just to, just to expand our understanding of international affairs as they have shaped over time. And rather than, and seeing them only as a product of a very short or very recent events and actually saying that actually matters that we understand
00:23:38 - and how that has changed over time, or where United States power or Chinese power or, or all the, all the great states today that we need to concern ourself with where they came from. And 1815, I think this new scholarship really does show how important that was in setting the norms and standards and ideas that still shape, how we work today and how we see how the world functions today.

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