Nationalism in Europe Class 10 Social Science — Revision Notes

TL;DR: Nationalism emerged as a powerful force in Europe during the 18th and 19th centuries, reshaping political boundaries and identities. It challenged the…

Nationalism emerged as a powerful force in Europe during the 18th and 19th centuries, reshaping political boundaries and identities. It challenged the old

Meaning and Development of Nationalism

• Nationalism is a sense of belonging to a nation and prioritizing national interests
• Rose against the autocratic rule of kings and emperors in Europe
• Combined with liberalism to demand democratic rights and constitutional governments
• Spread through newspapers, literature, music, and patriotic symbols

Unification Movements

• Italian unification under Cavour and Garibaldi (1859-1870) created a unified Italian state
• German unification led by Otto von Bismarck and Prussia (1871) established the German Empire
• Both used military strength and diplomacy to consolidate fragmented territories
• Nationalism became a tool for both liberal reformers and conservative rulers

Impact on European Politics

• Weakened the Concert of Europe established after Napoleonic Wars
• Led to conflicts over territory, colonial possessions, and regional power
• Contributed to the rise of aggressive expansionism and imperial rivalries
• Tensions between nationalist aspirations eventually sparked World War I

Nationalism and Culture

• Romantic movement celebrated folk traditions, languages, and local customs
• National anthems, flags, and monuments became symbols of identity
• Education systems promoted national history and language as pillars of identity
• Artists and writers portrayed the nation as organic community with shared destiny

Key Terms

• Nation-state: A sovereign political unit based on a shared national identity rather than dynastic rule
• Liberalism: Political ideology advocating for individual freedoms, constitutional government, and democratic rights
• Unification: Process of bringing together fragmented regions or kingdoms into a single nation-state
• Romanticism: Artistic and cultural movement emphasizing emotion, nature, and national identity

Sorrieu's prints, and why the chapter opens with a picture

In 1848 the French artist Frédéric Sorrieu prepared a series of four prints visualising his dream of a world made up of democratic and social Republics. The first shows the peoples of Europe and America marching in a long train, offering homage to the Statue of Liberty as they pass by. A female figure holds the torch of Enlightenment in one hand and the Charter of the Rights of Man in the other.

The details are the argument. On the earth in the foreground lie the shattered remains of the symbols of absolutist institutions. The United States and Switzerland lead the procession, as they had already become nation-states. France follows, carrying the revolutionary tricolour, and the peoples of Germany bear the black, red and gold flag — at that point an aspiration rather than a fact, since Germany did not yet exist as a unified nation. Behind them come Austria, the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, Lombardy, Poland, England, Ireland, Hungary and Russia.

Above the scene Christ, saints and angels look on, symbolising fraternity among the nations of the world. The print is therefore a compact statement of the chapter's theme: nationalism in the nineteenth century was tied to liberalism and democracy, and it was imagined as a brotherhood of nations rather than a rivalry between them. That optimism is precisely what changes by the end of the chapter.

What a nation-state actually was, and why Europe had so few

In 1848 there was no Germany, no Italy and no Switzerland in the sense we use those names now. Germany, Italy and Switzerland were divided into kingdoms, duchies and cantons whose rulers had their own autonomous territories. Eastern and Central Europe was under autocratic monarchies with a mix of peoples inside them.

The Habsburg Empire is the clearest illustration of the problem. It included the Alpine regions of the Tyrol, Austria and the Sudetenland, as well as Bohemia, Lombardy and Venetia, Galicia, and Hungary where the Magyars formed a majority. Alongside these were the Bohemians and Slovaks, the Slovenes in Carniola, the Croats and the Roumans. The only tie holding this patchwork together was a common allegiance to the emperor.

So creating a nation-state meant either welding many small states into one, as in Germany and Italy, or breaking a multi-national empire apart. Both processes are in this chapter, and they pull in opposite directions — which is why nationalism could be a liberating force in one place and a destructive one in another.

The French Revolution and the first expression of nationalism

The first clear expression of nationalism came with the French Revolution in 1789. From the very beginning it introduced measures and practices that could create a sense of collective identity among the people of France.

• The ideas of la patrie, the fatherland, and le citoyen, the citizen, emphasised the notion of a united community enjoying equal rights under a constitution.
• A new French flag, the tricolour, replaced the former royal standard, and the Estates General was renamed the National Assembly, elected by a body of active citizens.
• New hymns were composed, oaths taken and martyrs commemorated, all in the name of the nation. A centralised administrative system formulated uniform laws for all citizens.
• Internal customs duties and dues were abolished and a uniform system of weights and measures was adopted, which turned a collection of regions into a single economic space.
• The regional dialects were discouraged and French, as it was spoken and written in Paris, became the common language of the nation.
• Students in France declared that it was the destiny of the French nation to liberate the peoples of Europe from despotism, and Jacobin clubs were set up in other parts of Europe by those who supported them.

Napoleon — the paradox of liberty imposed by conquest

Napoleon destroyed democracy in France, yet in the administrative field he incorporated revolutionary principles to make the whole system more rational and efficient. This double character is what examiners test.

• The Civil Code of 1804, usually known as the Napoleonic Code, did away with all privileges based on birth, established equality before the law and secured the right to property.
• In the territories he controlled, Napoleon simplified administrative divisions, abolished the feudal system and freed peasants from serfdom and manorial dues.
• In the towns, guild restrictions were removed. Transport and communication systems were improved, and peasants, artisans, workers and new businessmen enjoyed a new-found freedom.
• Businessmen and small-scale producers of goods began to realise that uniform laws, standardised weights and measures and a common national currency would facilitate the movement and exchange of goods and capital.
• But the balance turned. Increased taxation, censorship and forced conscription into the French armies to conquer the rest of Europe came to outweigh the advantages of the administrative changes.
• Initially, in many places such as Holland and Switzerland, as well as in Brussels, Mainz, Milan and Warsaw, the French armies were welcomed as harbingers of liberty. The enthusiasm soon turned to hostility as it became clear the new administrative arrangements did not go hand in hand with political freedom.

Liberalism, conservatism and the economics of unification

Two political ideas dominate the first half of the nineteenth century, and one economic development quietly did more for German unification than either.

• The term liberalism derives from the Latin root liber, meaning free. For the new middle classes it stood for freedom for the individual and equality of all before the law.
• Politically it emphasised government by consent, the end of autocracy and clerical privileges, a constitution and representative government through parliament, and the inviolability of private property.
• Liberalism did not mean universal suffrage. In revolutionary France the right to vote and to get elected was granted exclusively to property-owning men, and women and non-propertied men were excluded — a point the chapter makes deliberately.
• Economically, liberalism stood for the freedom of markets and the abolition of state-imposed restrictions on the movement of goods and capital.
• In 1834 a customs union, or zollverein, was formed at the initiative of Prussia and joined by most of the German states. The union abolished tariff barriers and reduced the number of currencies from over thirty to two.
• Conservatism dominated after 1815. In 1815 representatives of the European powers who had collectively defeated Napoleon met at Vienna, hosted by the Austrian Chancellor Duke Metternich, to draw up a settlement. The Bourbon dynasty was restored to power in France, and the conservative regimes set up were autocratic, not tolerating criticism or dissent.

Revolutionaries, romanticism and the revolts

Because conservative regimes were autocratic, those who wanted change had to work in secret, and culture became a political weapon.

• Giuseppe Mazzini, born in Genoa in 1807, became a member of the secret society of the Carbonari and was sent into exile at the age of twenty-four. He founded two underground societies, Young Italy in Marseilles and Young Europe in Berne. Metternich described him as the most dangerous enemy of our social order.
• The Greek war of independence began in 1821. Poets and artists across Europe supported the struggle, and the English poet Lord Byron organised funds and later went to fight, dying of fever in 1824. The Treaty of Constantinople of 1832 recognised Greece as an independent nation.
• Romanticism was a cultural movement that sought to develop a particular form of national sentiment through folk art, poetry and dances rather than through science and reason.
• The German philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder claimed that true German culture was to be discovered among the common people — das volk — and that the true spirit of the nation was popularised through folk songs, folk poetry and folk dances.
• In Poland, which had been partitioned and where Russian was imposed, language became a weapon of national resistance. Polish was used for Church gatherings and religious instruction, and the clergy who did so were punished, some being deported to Siberia.
• The 1830s were years of great economic hardship, with population growth, unemployment and rising food prices. In 1845 weavers in Silesia revolted against contractors who had drastically reduced their payments.
• In February 1848 in Paris, food shortages and widespread unemployment brought people onto the streets. Louis Philippe was forced to flee, a National Assembly proclaimed a Republic, granted suffrage to all adult males above twenty-one and guaranteed the right to work.

The two unifications, and the turn towards imperialism

The liberal revolutions of 1848 failed, and unification was then achieved by conservative statesmen using armies and diplomacy rather than by popular movements.

• On 18 May 1848, 831 elected representatives marched to take their places in the Frankfurt Parliament convened in the Church of St Paul. They drafted a constitution for a German nation headed by a monarchy subject to a parliament, and offered the crown to Friedrich Wilhelm IV, King of Prussia, who rejected it. Women were admitted only as observers to the visitors' gallery.
• Prussia then took on the leadership of German unification. Its chief minister Otto von Bismarck carried it out with the help of the Prussian army and bureaucracy, through three wars over seven years with Austria, Denmark and France, all ending in Prussian victory.
• In January 1871 the Prussian king, William I, was proclaimed German Emperor in a ceremony held at Versailles.
• Italy had been divided into seven states, of which only Sardinia-Piedmont was ruled by an Italian princely house. The north was under Austrian Habsburgs, the centre ruled by the Pope and the southern regions under the Bourbon kings of Spain.
• After the failures of 1831 and 1848, the responsibility fell to Chief Minister Cavour, who was neither a revolutionary nor a democrat and spoke French better than Italian. Through a tactful diplomatic alliance with France, Sardinia-Piedmont defeated the Austrian forces in 1859.
• In 1860 Giuseppe Garibaldi and his armed volunteers, the Red Shirts, marched into South Italy and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies with the support of the local peasants. In 1861 Victor Emmanuel II was proclaimed king of united Italy.
• By the last quarter of the century nationalism no longer retained its idealistic liberal-democratic sentiment and became a narrow creed with limited ends. The most serious source of tension was the Balkans, a region of geographical and ethnic variation under Ottoman rule whose inhabitants were broadly known as Slavs.

Worked Examples

• Marianne — the allegory of France — A female figure personifying the French Republic. Her attributes were the red cap, the tricolour and the cockade, and her statues were erected in public squares to remind citizens of the national symbol of unity.
• Germania — the allegory of the German nation — She wears a crown of oak leaves, as the German oak stands for heroism. She was visualised as Germania before a German nation-state existed.
• The Act of Union of 1707 — Between England and Scotland, resulting in the United Kingdom of Great Britain. It shows a nation formed by the extension of one dominant group's power rather than by revolution.
• The zollverein of 1834 — A customs union at Prussia's initiative that abolished tariff barriers and cut the number of currencies from over thirty to two — economic unification arriving before political unification.

Common Mistakes Students Make

• Writing that liberalism in the nineteenth century meant universal adult suffrage. It did not: the vote was confined to property-owning men, and women and non-propertied men were excluded.
• Crediting the unification of Italy to Mazzini. His movements failed in 1831 and 1848; unification was achieved under Cavour's diplomacy, Garibaldi's volunteers and the leadership of Sardinia-Piedmont.
• Confusing Cavour and Garibaldi. Cavour was the chief minister who worked through diplomacy and the alliance with France; Garibaldi led the armed volunteers into the south.
• Saying Napoleon spread democracy. He destroyed democracy in France; what he exported were administrative and legal reforms such as the Civil Code, and these came without political freedom.
• Placing the Frankfurt Parliament after unification. It met in 1848 and failed, and unification followed later under Bismarck by an entirely different method.
• Treating nationalism as a single unchanging force. In the first half of the century it was allied to liberalism and democracy; after 1871 it became narrow and intolerant, and in the Balkans it was a source of conflict.
• Confusing the allegories: Marianne is France, Germania is Germany. Germania's crown of oak leaves and Marianne's red cap are the details usually asked for.

Where This Shows Up in Real Life

Why economic union so often precedes political union

The zollverein removed tariff barriers between German states and reduced the currencies from over thirty to two, and it did this decades before Germany existed as a state. Traders, manufacturers and consumers began to experience themselves as members of a single economic space long before they were citizens of one country, and that experience created a constituency for unification. The same logic explains why customs unions and common markets have repeatedly been the first step in later attempts to bring states together.

Language as an instrument of both rule and resistance

The French Revolution discouraged regional dialects and made the French of Paris the national language, using language to build a nation. In partitioned Poland, Russian was imposed and Polish was pushed out of schools, so the clergy began using Polish for Church gatherings and religious instruction as an act of resistance, and many were punished for it. The chapter therefore shows the same tool being used to construct a nation in one case and to defend one in another.

Culture as politics when politics is banned

Under the conservative regimes established after 1815, open criticism and dissent were not tolerated, so nationalists worked through secret societies and through culture. Folk songs, folk poetry and folk dances collected by figures such as Herder and the Grimm brothers carried a political claim about who the nation was, and music and language did political work in Poland when parties and newspapers could not. This is why a history chapter spends time on poets and painters.

Board-Style Questions with Model Answers

Describe the first print of Frédéric Sorrieu's 1848 series and explain what it represents. (5 marks)

The first print shows the peoples of Europe and America marching in a long train, offering homage to the Statue of Liberty as they pass by it. Liberty is personified as a female figure carrying the torch of Enlightenment in one hand and the Charter of the Rights of Man in the other. On the earth in the foreground lie the shattered remains of the symbols of absolutist institutions, indicating that absolutist rule has been overthrown. The United States and Switzerland lead the procession, as they had already become nation-states; France follows carrying the revolutionary tricolour, and the peoples of Germany carry the black, red and gold flag, expressing an aspiration to unite under a democratic constitution since Germany did not yet exist as a nation. Behind them come Austria, the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, Lombardy, Poland, England, Ireland, Hungary and Russia. Above the scene Christ, saints and angels look on, symbolising fraternity among the nations of the world.

Explain the measures introduced by the French revolutionaries to create a sense of collective identity among the French people. (5 marks)

The ideas of la patrie, meaning the fatherland, and le citoyen, meaning the citizen, emphasised a united community enjoying equal rights under a constitution. A new French flag, the tricolour, replaced the former royal standard. The Estates General was renamed the National Assembly and was elected by a body of active citizens. New hymns were composed, oaths taken and martyrs commemorated in the name of the nation. A centralised administrative system was put in place which formulated uniform laws for all citizens. Internal customs duties and dues were abolished and a uniform system of weights and measures was adopted. Finally, regional dialects were discouraged and French as spoken and written in Paris became the common language of the nation.

What was the Napoleonic Code? Mention any three of its provisions and two grievances against Napoleonic rule. (5 marks)

The Napoleonic Code is the Civil Code of 1804. Among its provisions, it did away with all privileges based on birth, it established equality before the law, and it secured the right to property. In the territories under his control Napoleon also simplified administrative divisions, abolished the feudal system and freed peasants from serfdom and manorial dues, while guild restrictions were removed in the towns. However, there were serious grievances: increased taxation placed a heavy burden on the people, and censorship together with forced conscription into the French armies to conquer the rest of Europe caused deep resentment. As a result the initial enthusiasm that greeted the French armies in places such as Holland, Switzerland, Brussels, Mainz, Milan and Warsaw soon turned to hostility, as it became clear that the new administrative arrangements did not go hand in hand with political freedom.

What did liberal nationalism stand for in early nineteenth-century Europe, in politics and in economics? (5 marks)

The term liberalism derives from the Latin root liber, meaning free. Politically, liberal nationalism stood for freedom for the individual and equality of all before the law, government by consent, the end of autocracy and clerical privileges, a constitution and representative government through parliament, and the inviolability of private property. It is important to note that it did not stand for universal suffrage: in revolutionary France the right to vote and to get elected was granted exclusively to property-owning men, so women and non-propertied men were excluded. In the economic sphere, liberalism stood for the freedom of markets and the abolition of state-imposed restrictions on the movement of goods and capital. A practical expression of this was the customs union or zollverein formed in 1834 at the initiative of Prussia, which abolished tariff barriers and reduced the number of currencies from over thirty to two.

Describe the process of the unification of Italy. (5 marks)

Italy had long been divided into seven states, of which only Sardinia-Piedmont was ruled by an Italian princely house; the north was under the Austrian Habsburgs, the centre was ruled by the Pope and the southern regions were under the Bourbon kings of Spain. Giuseppe Mazzini sought a unitary Italian Republic and founded Young Italy for the purpose, but his revolutionary uprisings in 1831 and 1848 failed. The responsibility then fell to Sardinia-Piedmont under King Victor Emmanuel II, whose chief minister Cavour led the movement. Cavour was neither a revolutionary nor a democrat and spoke French better than Italian, and he worked through a tactful diplomatic alliance with France by which Sardinia-Piedmont defeated the Austrian forces in 1859. In 1860 Giuseppe Garibaldi led armed volunteers into South Italy and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies with the support of local peasants, and succeeded in driving out the Spanish rulers. In 1861 Victor Emmanuel II was proclaimed king of united Italy.

Why did nationalist tensions emerge in the Balkans? (5 marks)

The Balkans was a region of great geographical and ethnic variation comprising modern-day Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, Greece, Macedonia, Croatia, Slovenia, Serbia and Montenegro, whose inhabitants were broadly known as Slavs. A large part of the region was under the control of the Ottoman Empire. As the ideas of romantic nationalism spread and the Ottoman Empire weakened, the subject nationalities struggled to win back their independence, and each claimed that the territory it sought had once been part of its area of rule. As their claims overlapped, the various Slavic nationalities came into intense conflict with one another. Matters were made worse by the rivalry of the great European powers — Russia, Germany, England and Austro-Hungary — each eager to extend its own control over the area, which led to a series of wars and finally to the First World War.

Assertion–Reason Questions (CBSE Format)

For each question choose: (a) both A and R are true and R is the correct explanation of A; (b) both are true but R is not the correct explanation; (c) A is true but R is false; (d) A is false but R is true.

Quick Self-Check

Key Terms Glossary

Nation-state

A state in which most citizens develop a sense of common identity and shared history, as distinct from a multi-national dynastic empire.

Absolutist

A form of monarchical government that is centralised, militarised and repressive, literally meaning a government with no restraints on its power.

Plebiscite

A direct vote by which all the people of a region are asked to accept or reject a proposal.

Liberalism

From the Latin liber meaning free; in the nineteenth century it stood for individual freedom, equality before the law, government by consent and the inviolability of private property.

Conservatism

A political outlook that stressed the value of traditional institutions such as monarchy, the Church, social hierarchies and the family, dominant after 1815.

Zollverein

A customs union formed in 1834 at Prussia's initiative that abolished tariff barriers and reduced the number of currencies from over thirty to two.

Utopian

A vision of a society that is so ideal it is unlikely ever actually to exist.

Allegory

The representation of an abstract idea through a person or thing, as with Marianne for France and Germania for Germany.

Romanticism

A cultural movement that sought to develop national sentiment through folk art, poetry, music and dance rather than through science and reason.

Das volk

The common people; Herder held that true German culture was to be discovered among them.

Carbonari

A secret society of Italian revolutionaries, of which Mazzini was a member.

Ideology

A system of ideas reflecting a particular social and political vision.

One-Minute Revision

• Sorrieu, 1848: four prints of a world of democratic and social Republics. US and Switzerland lead — they were already nation-states.
• The French Revolution of 1789 was the first clear expression of nationalism: tricolour, la patrie and le citoyen, uniform laws, weights and measures, one language.
• Napoleon destroyed democracy in France but exported the Civil Code of 1804 — no privileges by birth, equality before the law, right to property.
• Welcome turned to hostility because of taxation, censorship and forced conscription, and because reform came without political freedom.
• Liberalism meant freedom and equality before the law — but the vote went only to property-owning men.
• Zollverein, 1834, Prussian initiative: tariff barriers abolished, currencies cut from over thirty to two.
• 1815 Congress of Vienna, hosted by Metternich, restored the Bourbons and set up autocratic conservative regimes.
• Mazzini founded Young Italy and Young Europe; Metternich called him the most dangerous enemy of our social order.
• Frankfurt Parliament, 18 May 1848, Church of St Paul, 831 representatives — the crown was refused by Friedrich Wilhelm IV and it failed.
• Germany unified by Bismarck through three wars in seven years; William I proclaimed emperor at Versailles, January 1871.
• Italy: Cavour's diplomacy and the French alliance, Garibaldi's volunteers in the south, Victor Emmanuel II proclaimed king in 1861.
• After 1871 nationalism became narrow and intolerant, and the Balkans became the flashpoint leading to the First World War.

Syllabus reference: NCERT Class 10 History — India and the Contemporary World II, The Rise of Nationalism in Europe. It sets up the vocabulary used again in Nationalism in India.

Frequently Asked Questions

How did nationalism change the map of Europe?

Nationalism led to the unification of Italy and Germany and the breakup of empires, replacing dynastic kingdoms with nation-states based on shared culture and language.

What role did culture play in spreading nationalism?

Literature, music, folk traditions, and patriotic symbols helped people identify with their nation and reject foreign rule or dynastic control.

Why is the French Revolution treated as the beginning of nationalism when France already existed as a kingdom?

France existed as a territory ruled by a monarch, but its people were subjects rather than citizens, and the country was divided by internal customs duties, differing local laws, varied weights and measures and regional dialects. The Revolution transferred sovereignty from the monarch to a body of French citizens and then deliberately built a common identity through a national flag, a national assembly, uniform laws, a single system of weights and measures and one common language. It is the shift from subjects of a ruler to citizens of a nation that marks the beginning of nationalism.

How were the unifications of Germany and Italy similar, and how did they differ?

Both were completed between 1859 and 1871, in both cases the popular liberal revolutions of 1848 had already failed, and in both cases one state took the lead — Prussia in Germany and Sardinia-Piedmont in Italy — with a conservative chief minister directing the process. The main difference lies in method and popular involvement. German unification was achieved almost entirely by Bismarck through the Prussian army and bureaucracy in three wars, whereas Italian unification combined Cavour's diplomacy with Garibaldi's armed volunteers, who marched into the south with the support of local peasants.

What is the difference between a nation and a state, as this chapter uses the terms?

A state is a political and administrative unit with a government exercising authority over a territory, while a nation is a body of people who feel they share a common identity, culture and history. The two need not coincide. In 1848 the Germans and Italians felt themselves to be nations but had no single state, while the Habsburg Empire was one state containing many nationalities held together only by allegiance to the emperor. A nation-state is the case where the two are made to coincide, which is what the nationalists of this period were trying to bring about.

Why did nationalism change character after 1871?

In the first half of the century nationalism was allied to liberalism and democracy and imagined as a fraternity of nations, which is the vision Sorrieu's prints express. After the unifications were achieved the major European powers began to use nationalist sentiment to promote their own imperial aims, and it became a narrow creed with limited ends. In the Balkans the competing claims of the Slavic nationalities overlapped, and the rivalry of Russia, Germany, England and Austro-Hungary over the region turned those claims into a series of wars, culminating in the First World War.

More Class 10 Social Science Revision Notes

• Nationalism in India
• Resources and Development
• Agriculture
• Power Sharing
• Federalism
• Sectors of Indian Economy

🤖 Stuck on any of these? Ask Syllab's free AI Tutor to explain step by step →

More free resources for this chapter

• Revision Notes →