Page 122 - Berkshire Encyclopedia Of World History Vol I - Abraham to Coal

absolutism, european 7

Absolutism tempered by assassination. • Count Muenster
(nineteenth century)

land and Scotland then imported a Dutch king,William high offices to the highest bidder, making his colonial
of Orange, to rule under limits, issuing the Bill of Rights bureaucracy more accountable and, unfortunately for his
of 1689. When Britain (the union of England and Scot- successors, more resented. Religious freedom under the
land after 1707) economically eclipsed the Dutch Repub- Bourbon reforms paradoxically required a degree of reli-
lic in the eighteenth century, the British used Dutch gious intolerance: Jesuits were now seen as retrograde
ideas about banking, insurance, and stock exchanges, all obstacles to progress rather than as purveyors of abso-
of which were slow to be reproduced in absolute monar- lutist civilization and were expelled from the Spanish
chies such as Austria, Prussia, and France. empire in 1767.While Jesuits were also expelled from the
Portuguese empire in the name of enlightened despotism
Absolutism and the in 1759, Joseph II of Austria abolished discriminatory
Enlightenment measures against Protestants and Jews in the 1780s
While more stodgy and less dynamic than their Dutch without expelling the Jesuits. He even abolished serfdom
and British counterparts, absolute monarchies in most in 1781 by royal edict.
other parts of Europe did not remain static during the sec-
ond half of the eighteenth century.This partial makeover Absolutism and
was in contrast to Muslim and Chinese contemporaries Totalitarianism
who clung much more closely to hidebound tradition. Absolutism, however enlightened, should not be con-
Most significantly, enlightened absolutism in Europe fused with modern totalitarianism. Absolute kings were
recast the kings as devotees of the philosophes. Frederick far less powerful than modern dictators.Technologies of
the Great of Prussia, the son of FrederickWilliam, learned surveillance and propaganda used by Adolf Hitler, Joseph
fromVoltaire to make his bureaucracy even more profes- Stalin, and Idi Amin were unavailable to Louis XIV,
sional and less arbitrary than his martinet father. His gov- Frederick William, and Kangxi. Absolute monarchs
ernment allowed some expressive freedoms and used claimed sovereignty from God, while totalitarian dicta-
fewer tortures, all in the spirit of the Age of Reason. He tors claimed sovereignty from a majority of their people.
forced his people to adopt more rational ways of farming, The French Revolution’s most radical phase introduced
even making them cultivate the American potato over tra- a more efficient form of centralization.The most effective
ditional favorites. Nevertheless, Frederick’s devotion to enlightened despot, Napoleon, ushered in the transition
reform was selective at best. He kept his own serfs despite between the two kinds of leaders, judiciously choosing
rhetorical objections to the idea of serfdom, and he re- the people as a more solid and credible foundation for
served bureaucratic positions and their accompanying power than God.
privileges for the Junkers, the Prussian aristocratic land-
Charles Howard Ford
owners. Catherine the Great of Russia was even more
timid in her pursuit of change. While she seemed to See also Elizabeth I; Napoleon; Parliamentarianism
patronize the activities and agree with the intentions of
the Enlightenment, she expanded serfdom into newly
acquired territories and dropped all taxes on the nobility Further Reading
entirely in 1785. Other monarchs went much further Alexander, J.T. (1989). Catherine the Great: Life and legend. Oxford, UK:
than Frederick and Catherine in their embrace of directed Oxford University Press.
Berenstain,V. (1998). India and the Mughal dynasty. New York: Henry
progress for all of their people. Adhering to the Enlight- N. Abrams.
enment’s economic views, Charles III of Spain encour- Bulliet, R., et al. (2001). The Earth and its peoples: A global history (2nd
ed.):Vol. 2. Since 1500. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
aged free trade within his empire with his famous decrees
Burke, P. (1994). The fabrication of Louis XIV. New Haven, CT: Yale Uni-
of 1778 and 1789. He also ended the practice of selling versity Press.