[Author’s Name]
[Institution’s Name]
Essay on The Age of Nation-States
The 20-odd years that followed the conservative suppression of Europe's 1848 Revolutions were a decidedly tumultuous era, filled with international and civil wars, the birth of new forms of political radicalism and new culture movements, and the coalescence of new states.England was the most successful state at reforming through nonviolent means of the lot. The British Parliament was generally successful at absorbing new groups and political positions into the existing political framework, thus alleviating the need for violent revolt to bring about change.
In 1867 the Second Reform Act was passed by the Conservative forces led by Benjamin Disraeli, which greatly increased the British electorate and pushed Britain much closer to a genuine democracy. In the election of 1868, however, the liberals gained, and the liberal prime minister William Gladstone came to power. Gladstone's ministry of 1868-74 was one of the high points of British liberalism. In Europe, the Second Empire continued its decline. In the late 1860's, the North German Confederation continued to grow in strength under the domination of Prussia, with growing influence in the Catholic states of south Germany.
Although the Second Empire had entered a liberal parliamentary phase in 1869 with the installation of the Liberal Empire under Émile Ollivier, the Second Empire could not survive the shock of German unification.In the summer of 1870, the Second Empire challenged the North German Confederation to war, using as a pretext the candidacy of a Hohenzollern prince for the then-vacated Spanish throne.
The resulting Franco-Prussian War was a crushing defeat for the French, as better-armed and -organized German armies easily defeated the overconfident Imperial armies. A bloodless revolution in Paris broke out in Paris, and the Third Republic was declared. Forced into an English exile with his wife, Eugénie, and his three daughters, Napoléon III was forced to watch as France was compelled not only to recognize the unity of Germany.....
