One element of Vick’s reinterpretation concerns the nature of the proceedings at Vienna. The upshot is a striking reinterpretation of the Congress, the practice of diplomacy and the political culture of post-Napoleonic Europe, which substantially enhances our understanding of the era while opening new possibilities for historical investigation and provoking scholarly debate. His book provides three new perspectives on the Congress, all based on extensive research into primary sources-and not just the usual memoirs and diplomatic correspondence of the representatives of the Great Powers, but rarely used manuscripts of contemporary observers, ephemera, and objects of material culture. Balance of power or hegemony, restoration, legitimacy, constitutionalism, nationalism, even the periwigged and knee breech-wearing aristocratic Congress delegates, dancing and flirting with charming salon hostesses-it has all been discussed before, ad nauseum.īrian Vick’s excellent monograph shows that such a jaundiced judgment is false, and that the Congress fully deserves its commemorative moment in the sun. Of course, one might wonder what there isleft to say about that peace conference, which is perhaps best known today as the subject of former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger’s Ph.D. Hidden behind all these moments of bellicosity was a remarkable instance of its opposite, an attempt to restore peace and stability to the European continent after a quarter century of upheaval, the Congress of Vienna of 1814-1815. ![]() In this relatively subdued realm, most of the attention was devoted to the final instance of armed conflict, with official commemorations of, books about, large-scale reenactments of, and multimedia exhibitions displaying the Battle of Waterloo. Overshadowed by the anniversary of the Great War’s outbreak was the bicentenary of another great war’s conclusion, two hundred years after the end of the Napoleonic wars. Standing out was Christopher Clark’s The Sleepwalkers, a global bestseller, whose controversial reinterpretation of the crisis of July 1914 and of the responsibility for its violent outcome ignited a widespread academic and public debate. The centenary of the beginning of the First World War brought forth a steady stream of commemorations and publications. ![]() Modern European history was under the anniversary spotlight in 2014-2015. Introduction by Jonathan Sperber, University of Missouri
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