Question #ac354
1 Answer
Well, according to what I have studied...
Explanation:
Prince Metternich of Austria is credited as the author of this idea, at the congress of Vienna which followed the final defeat of Napoleon I at Waterloo. At this gathering, representatives of the states that had formed the alliance that defeated Napoleon met with the purpose of setting out the terms of the peace that would follow.
All parties at this congress were desperately war-weary after the lengthy and destructive Napoleonic wars. They were also very concerned to prevent a repetition of revolution, as had happened in France, and which had given rise to all of the trouble.
So, a chief concern of all of the nation states of Europe was to ensure peace, stability, and the preservation of the monarchical regimes that prevailed in the powers that had united to defeat Napoleon (Chiefly Russia, Prussia, Austria, and Great Britain.) Various international arrangements were therefore set in place to achieve these goals.
As to the necessity of these arrangements, arguments have ensued between historians and political scientists of various persuasions ever since. One can argue that the Metternich system achieved it's goals, since there ensued the longest period of peace among the great European powers there had been in centuries. Some historians have argued, however, that the "Metternich System" was not the necessary or primary reason for the peace.
There is widespread agreement that the "Metternich System" was a step backward for the cause of freedom and democracy in Europe, as it involved measures to suppress democratic political representation and the national aspirations of many peoples in Europe. These pressures would result in explosions of revolutionary sentiment in 1830, 1848, and 1870, and arguments have been made that the "Metternich System" acted to make these episodes worse than they might otherwise have been.
In short, the question of the "necessity" of this system can probably not be definitively answered.
