Difference between revisions of "Category: Politics and social sciences" - New World Encyclopedia

Die im Reichsrat vertretenen Königreiche und Länder und die Länder der heiligen ungarischen Stephanskrone (German) A birodalmi tanácsban képviselt királyságok és országok és a magyar szent korona országai (Hungarian)
File:Location-Austria-Hungary.png Austria-Hungary in Europe
Kingdoms and countries of Austria-Hungary
File:Austria-Hungary-flag-1869-1918-naval-1786-1869-war.gif War Flag File:Austria-Hungary flag 1869-1918.gif Merchant Flag Flag of Austria File:Kuk-doppeladler.jpg Coat of arms File:Flag of Hungary.png Flag of Hungary File:Coat of Arms of Hungary 1867.jpg Coat of arms Before the 1867 Compromise Flag of the Habsburg empire After the 1867 Compromise (Black-yellow flag was kept as Imperial Flag)
Official languages	In Cisleithenia, German and minority tongues. In Hungary, Hungarian and Latin.
Established church	Roman Catholic
Capital & Largest City	Vienna pop. 1,675,000 (1907)
Head of state	Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, King of Bohemia, etc.
Area	680,887 km² (1907)
Population	48,592,000 (1907)
Currency	Rhine guilder; Corona (from 1892)
National anthem	Volkshymne (People's Anthem)
Existed	1867-1918

Austria-Hungary (German: Österreich-Ungarn, Hungarian: Osztrák-Magyar Monarchia, Czech: Rakousko-Uhersko, Slovak: Rakúsko-Uhorsko, Polish: Austro-Węgry, Ukrainian: Австро-Угорщина, Slovene: Avstro-Ogrska, Serbo-Croatian: Аустро-Угарска, Austro-Ugarska), also known as the Dual Monarchy or K.u.K. Monarchy, was a dual-monarchic union state (1867 - 1918) in Central Europe.

It replaced the Austrian Empire (1806 - 1867) on the same territory and originated in a compromise between the ruling Habsburg dynasty and the Hungarians in order to maintain the state. As a multi-national empire in an era of national awakening, it found its political life dominated by disputes among the eleven principal national groups. Its economic and social life was marked by a rapid economic growth through the age of industrialization and social modernization through many liberal and democratic reforms.

The Habsburg dynasty ruled as Emperors of Austria over the western and northern half of the country and as Kings of Hungary over the Kingdom of Hungary which enjoyed some degree of self-government and representation in joint affairs (principally foreign relations and defence). The federation bore the full name of "The Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Crown of St. Stephen".

Capital of the union state was Vienna.

The lands of the Empire

Many texts refer to the non-Hungarian ("Austrian") half part of Austria-Hungary as Cisleithania -- because most of its territory lay west (or to "this" side, from an Austrian perspective) of the Leitha river (although Galicia to the north-east also counted as "Austrian"). This region (consisting of more than simply Austria) strictly speaking had no collective official name prior to 1915, and hence official sources referred to the "Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council". (The Imperial Council (Reichsrat) functioned as Cisleithania's parliament.) Similarly, the Transleithanian ("Hungarian") half also consisted of more than simply Hungary, and bore the official designation of the Lands of the Hungarian Crown of St. Stephen" -- a reference to the canonised first Christian king of Hungary.

The "Kingdoms and Lands" of the Cisleithanian half of the Empire

The "Lands" of the Transleithanian half of the Empire

Under joint administration by both halves

Source: Geographischer Atlas zur Vaterlandskunde an den österreichischen Mittelschulen. Vienna 1911. Data according to the Census of December 31st 1910.

Creation of Austria-Hungary — the Compromise of 1867

The Ausgleich ("Compromise"; kiegyezés in Hungarian) of February 1867 which inaugurated the Empire's dualist structure in place of the former unitary Austrian Empire (1804-1867) originated at a time when Austria had declined in strength and in power -- both in the Italian peninsula (as a result of the Austro-Sardinian War of 1859) and in greater Germany (culminating in the Austro-Prussian War of 1866). Other factors in the constitutional changes included continued Hungarian dissatisfaction with rule from Vienna, and increasing national consciousness on the part of other nationalities of the Austrian Empire. Hungarian dissatisfaction grew partially from Austria's suppression, with Russian support, of the Hungarian liberal revolution of 1848 – 1849. However, dissatisfaction with Austrian rule had grown for many years within Hungary, and had many causes.

In an effort to shore up support for the monarchy, Emperor Franz Joseph began negotiations for a compromise with the Magyar nobility to ensure their support. Some members of the government, such as Austrian prime minister Count Belcredi, advised the Emperor to make a more comprehensive constitutional deal with all of the nationalities that would have created a federal structure. Belcredi worried that an accommodation with the Magyar interests would alienate the other nationalities. However, Franz Joseph was unable to ignore the power of the Magyar nobility, and they would not accept anything less than dualism between themselves and the traditional Austrian élites.

In particular, Hungarian leaders demanded and received the Emperor's coronation as King of Hungary as a re-affirmation of Hungary's historic privileges, and the establishment of a separate parliament at Budapest with the powers to enact laws for the historic lands of the Hungarian crown (the lands of St Stephen), though on a basis which would preserve the political dominance of Hungarian minority (more specifically of the country's nobility and educated élite) and the exclusion from effective power of the country's large Romanian and Slavic populations.

Governmental structure

Three distinct elements ruled Austria-Hungary:

1. the Hungarian government
2. the “Austrian” or Cisleithanian government
3. a unified administration under the monarch

Hungary and Austria maintained separate parliaments, each with its own prime minister. Linking/co-ordinating the two fell to a government under a monarch, wielding power absolute in theory but limited in practice. The monarch’s common government had responsibility for the army, for the navy, for foreign policy, and for the customs union.

Within Cisleithania and Hungary certain regions, such as Galicia and Croatia, but not the Slovak lands, enjoyed special status with their own unique governmental structures.

A common Ministerial Council ruled the common government: it comprised the three ministers for the joint responsibilities (joint finance, military, and foreign policy), the two prime ministers, some Archdukes and the monarch. Two delegations of representatives, one each from the Austrian and Hungarian parliaments, met separately and voted on the expenditures of the Common Ministerial Council, giving the two governments influence in the common administration. However, the ministers ultimately answered only to the monarch, and he had the final decision on matters of foreign and military policy.

Overlapping responsibilities between the joint ministries and the ministries of the two halves caused friction and inefficiencies. The armed forces suffered particularly from overlap. Although the unified government determined overall military direction, the Austrian and Hungarian governments each remained in charge of "the quota of recruits, legislation concerning compulsory military service, transfer and provision of the armed forces, and regulation of the civic, non-military affairs of members of the armed forces". Needless to say, each government could have a strong influence over common governmental responsibilities. Each half of the Dual Monarchy proved quite prepared to disrupt common operations to advance its own interests.

Relations over the half-century after 1867 between the two halves of the Empire (in fact the Cisleithan part contained about 57% of the combined realm's population and a rather larger share of its economic resources) featured repeated disputes over shared external tariff arrangements and over the financial contribution of each government to the common treasury. Under the terms of the Ausgleich, an agreement, renegotiated every ten years, determined these matters. Each build-up to the renewal of the agreement saw political turmoil. The disputes between the halves of the empire culminated in the mid-1900s in a prolonged constitutional crisis -- triggered by disagreement over the language of command in Hungarian army units, and deepened by the advent to power in Budapest (April 1906) of a Hungarian nationalist coalition. Provisional renewals of the common arrangements occurred in October 1907 and in November 1917 on the basis of the status quo.

Ethnic relations

Czechs (the majority in the Czech lands, i.e.Bohemia, Moravia and Austrian Silesia), Poles and Ukrainians (in Galicia), Slovenes (in Carniola, Carinthia and southern Styria, mostly today's Slovenia) and Croats, Italians and Slovenes in Istria each sought a greater say in Cisleithan affairs.

At the same time, Magyar dominance faced challenges from the local majorities of Romanians in Transylvania and in the eastern Banat, of Slovaks in today's Slovakia, of Croats and Serbs in the crownlands of Croatia and of Dalmatia (today's Croatia), in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in the provinces known as the Vojvodina (today's northern Serbia). The Romanians and the Serbs also looked to union with their fellow-nationalists in the newly-founded states of Romania (1859 - 1878) and Serbia.

Though Hungary's leaders showed on the whole less willingness than their German Austrian counterparts to share power with their subject minorities, they granted (it is argued) a large measure of autonomy to the kingdom of Croatia in 1868, parallelling to some extent their own accommodation within the Empire the previous year.

"Distribution of Races in Austria-Hungary" from the Historical Atlas by William R. Shepherd, 1911

Language was one of the most contentious questions in Austro-Hungarian politics. All governments faced difficult and divisive hurdles in sorting out the languages of government and of instruction. Minorities wanted to ensure the widest possibility for education in their own language as well as in the "dominant" languages of Hungarian and German. On one notable occasion, that of the so-called "ordinance of April 5, 1897", the Austrian Prime Minister Kasimir Felix Graf Badeni gave Czech equal standing with German in the internal government of Bohemia, leading to a crisis because of nationalist German agitation throughout the Empire. In the end Badeni was dismissed. On another occasion, the Czechs lost the privilege of using their own language in everyday life, including newspapers and in the workplace: Czechs had to use German. This caused general chaos.

From January 1907 all the public and private schools in Slovak part (aprox. 3 mil. people) of Hungary were forced to teach in Hungarian language only, burning Slovak books and newspapers. This led to wide criticism by Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson among others.

It was not rare for the two kingdoms to divide spheres of influence. According to Misha Glenny (The Balkans, 1804-1999), the Austrians responded to Hungarian badgering of Czechs by supporting the Croatian national movement in Zagreb. (Croatia, in spite of nominal autonomy, was in fact an economic and administrative arm of Hungary; this the Croats resented.)

Economy

The Austro-Hungarian economy changed dramatically during the existence of the Dual Monarchy. Technological change accelerated industrialization and urbanization. The capitalist mode of production spread throughout the Empire during its fifty-year existence. The old institutions of feudalism continued to disappear. Economic growth centred around Vienna, the Austrian lands (areas of modern Austria), the Alpine lands, and the Bohemian lands. In the later years of the nineteenth century rapid economic growth spread to the central Hungarian plain and to the Carpathian lands. As a result of this pattern wide disparities of development existed within the Empire. In general the western areas achieved far more development than the east. By the early 20th century most of the Empire had started to experience rapid economic growth. The GNP per capita grew roughly 1.45% per year from 1870 to 1913. That level of growth compared very favourably to that of other European nations such as Britain (1.00%), France (1.06%), and Germany (1.51%). (Source: Good, David. The Economic Rise of the Habsburg Empire). However, the Empire's economy as a whole still lagged considerably behind the economies of other powers, as it had only begun sustained modernization much later. Britain had a GNP per-capita almost three times larger than the Habsburg Empire, while Germany's stood almost twice as high as Austria-Hungary's. Nonetheless, these large discrepancies hide different levels of development within the Empire.

Rail transport expanded rapidly in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Its predecessor state, the Habsburg Empire, had built a substantial core of railways in the west originating from Vienna by 1841. At that point the government realized the military possibilities of rail and began to invest heavily in their construction. Bratislava, Budapest, Prague, Kraków, Graz, Laibach (Ljubljana), and Venice became linked to the main network. By 1854 the Empire had almost 2000 kilometres of track, about 60 to 70% of it in state hands. At that point the government began to sell off large portions of track to private investors to recoup some of its investments and because of the financial strains of the 1848 Revolution and of the Crimean War.

From 1854 to 1879 private interests conducted almost all rail construction. What would become Cisleithania gained 7952 track kilometres, and Hungary built 5839 track kilometres. During this time many new areas joined the railway system and the existing rail networks gained connections and interconnections. This period marked the beginning of widespread rail transportation in Austria-Hungary, and also the integration of transportation systems in the area. Railways allowed the Empire to integrate its economy far more than previously possible, when transportation depended on rivers.

After 1879 the Austro-Hungarian government slowly began to re-nationalize the rail network, largely because of the sluggish pace of development during the worldwide depression of the 1870s. The years between 1879 and 1900 saw more than 25,000 km of railways built in Cisleithania and Hungary. Most of this constituted "filling in" of the existing network, although some areas, primarily in the far east, gained rail connections for the first time during this period. The railroad reduced transportation costs throughout the Empire, opening new markets for products from other lands of the Dual Monarchy.

Foreign policy

The Imperial (Austrian) and Royal (Hungarian) governments differed also to some extent in their attitude toward the Empire's common foreign policy. Politicians in Budapest particularly feared annexations of territory which would add to the kingdom's non-Hungarian populations. But the Empire's alliance with Germany against Russia from October 1879 (see Dual Alliance, 1879) commanded general acceptance, since Russia seemed the principal external military threat to both parts.

Austro-Hungarian forces occupied the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina from August 1878 under the Treaty of Berlin. The Empire annexed this territory in October 1908 as a common holding under the control of the finance ministry rather than attaching it to either territorial government. The annexation set up an anomalous situation which led some in Vienna to contemplate combining Bosnia and Herzegovina with Croatia to form a third component of the Empire, uniting its southern Slav regions under the domination of Croats (who might have proved more sympathetic to Vienna than to Budapest).

World War I

On June 28, 1914, Franz Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria, heir presumptive to his uncle the Emperor Franz Josef (Franz Josef's only son had died under still-mysterious circumstances, and Mexican republicans had executed the Emperor's brother), visited the Bosnian capital Sarajevo where Bosnian Serb militants of the nationalist group Mlada Bosna, supplied by the violent Serbian militant group Black Hand, ambushed his convoy and assassinated him. See: Assassination in Sarajevo

After the Congress of Berlin the Empire's military spending didn't even double, while that of Germany rose fivefold, and British, Russian and French rose threefold. The Empire had previously lost ethnically Italian areas to Piedmont due to nationalist movements sweeping through Italy, and many Austro-Hungarians felt the threat of losing the southern territories inhabited by Slavs to Serbia as imminent. Serbia had recently gained a significant amount of territory in the Second Balkan War of 1913, causing much distress in government circles in Vienna and Budapest. Some members of the government, such as Conrad von Hötzendorf had wanted to confront the resurgent Serbian nation for some years. The leadership of Austria-Hungary, especially Count Leopold von Berchtold, backed by its ally Germany, decided to confront Serbia militarily before it could incite a revolt: using the assassination as an excuse, they presented a list of ten demands [1] expecting Serbia would never accept. When Serbia accepted nine of the ten demands but only partially accepted the remaining one, Austria-Hungary declared war.

These events brought the Empire into conflict with Serbia and over the course of July and August 1914, caused the start of World War I, as Russia mobilized in support of Serbia, setting off a series of counter-mobilizations.

Italy initially remained neutral, although it had an alliance with Austria-Hungary. In 1915 it switched to the side of the Entente powers, hoping to gain territory from Austria-Hungary.

General Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf was the Chief of the Austro-Hungarian General Staff during the war. Under his command, Austro-Hungarian troops initially crushed Serbia, defended the routes into Hungary and repulsed Italian advances in Gorizia. The Russians then began considerable war aid to their slavic Serbian allies. The Austro-Hungarian Army suffered very serious casualties throughout the war. However, they had considerable successes (albeit with German aid and direction) even advancing into enemy territory following the German-led victory in Galicia (May 1915), taking Belgrade despite the heroics of Serbian General Radomir Putnik (October 1915), and again with the Germans at Caporetto on the Italian front (October 1917), sending the Italian First Army reeling in retreat. As World War I dragged on, the Austro-Hungarian war effort had become more and more subordinate to the direction of German planners. Supply shortages, low morale, and the high casualty rate began to seriously affect the operational abilities of the army by the last years of the war.

In June 1918, Conrad attempted a double edged offensive with the bulk of remaining Austro-Hungarian forces. Its failure left the empire vulnerable, and in October 1918 an Italian-led Allied army attacked, gaining victory in the battle of Vittorio Veneto, destroying the last of the Austrian Army and ended the Habsburg Empire.

Dissolution of the Empire

A humorous "obituary" of the Austrian Empire, published in Kraków in late 1918. Click on the image to read a translation.

As it became apparent that the Allied Powers of the United Kingdom, France, Italy and the United States would win World War I, nationalist movements which had previously been calling for a greater degree of autonomy for various areas, started pressing for full independence. With defeat in the war imminent, Czechoslovakia declared independence on 28 October 1918 and on 29 October the southern slav areas declared the State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs. In Austria and Hungary, separate republics were declared at the end of the war in November. The treaty of Saint Germain between the victors of World War I and Austria, and the treaty of Trianon between the victors and Hungary regulated the dissolution of Austria-Hungary. The last Habsburg emperor-king, Karl I (styled Károly IV in Hungary), renounced participation in affairs of state (but did not abdicate) and fled to Switzerland.

A monarchist revival in Hungary after a short-lived communist revolution and the Romanian intervention of 1919 resulted in the restoration of the Hungarian monarchy (March 1920), with the royal powers entrusted to a regent, the naval hero Admiral Miklós Horthy. Ill prepared attempts by Karl to regain the throne in Budapest (March, October 1921) collapsed when the initially wavering Horthy, who had received threats of intervention from the Allied powers and neighboring countries, refused his cooperation. Subsequently the British took custody of Karl and removed him and his family to the Portuguese island of Madeira, where he died the following year.

Austria-Hungary and new states that emerged in 1918 ██ Border of Austria-Hungary in 1914 ██ Borders in 1914 ██ Borders in 1920 ██ Empire of Austria in 1914 ██ Kingdom of Hungary in 1914 ██ Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1914

The following successor states were formed (entirely or in part) from the former Habsburg lands:

• Austria
• Hungary
• Czechoslovakia
• State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs (joined with the Kingdom of Serbia on 1 December 1918 to form the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, later Yugoslavia)
• Poland

Some Austro-Hungarian lands were also ceded to Romania and Italy. Liechtenstein, which had formerly looked to Vienna for protection, formed a customs and defence union with Switzerland, and adopted the Swiss currency instead of the Austrian. In April 1919 Vorarlberg, the westernmost province of Austria, voted by a large majority to join Switzerland; however both the Swiss and the Allies disregarded this result.

Historiography

Historical views of Austria-Hungary have varied throughout the 20th century:

Historians in the early part of the century tended to have emotional and/or personal involvement with the issues surrounding Austria-Hungary. Nationalist historians tended to view the Habsburg polity as despotic and obsolete. Other scholars, usually associated with the old government, became apologists for the traditional leadership and tried to explain their policies.

• Major writers from the early period who remain influential include: Oskar Jászi and Josef Redlich.

Subsequent experience of the region's inter-war "Balkanization", of Nazi occupation, and then of Soviet domination, led to a more sympathetic interpretation of the Empire, based primarily in a large exiled community in the United States. Meanwhile, Marxist historians still tended to judge the Empire in a negative way.

• Major scholars of this period include: C. A Macartney, Robert A. Kann, Charles Ingrau and Arthur J. May.

One controversy among historians remains: whether the Empire faced inevitable collapse as the result of a decades-long decline; or whether it would have survived in some form in the absence of military defeat in World War I.

• Alan Sked has advanced the view that, "to speak of decline and fall with regard to the Monarchy is simply misleading: it fell because it lost a major war." (The Decline and Fall of the Habsburg Empire 1815–1918)

• David F. Good supports Sked's view.

• Others, such as Solomon Wank, remain skeptical.

Territorial legacy

The current countries whose entire territory were located inside Austria-Hungary by the time of the dissolution of the empire are:

• Austria

• Hungary

• Czech Republic

• Croatia

• Slovakia

• Bosnia and Hercegovina

• Slovenia

The current countries whose part of their territory were located inside Austria-Hungary by the time of the dissolution of the empire are:

• Poland (voivodships of Silesia, Lesser Poland and Subcarpathia)

• Ukraine (oblasts of Zakarpattia, Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Ternopil and Chernivtsi)

• Romania (region of Transylvania and the county of Suceava)

• Serbia and Montenegro (autonomous province of Vojvodina in Serbia and the bay of Boka Kotorska in Montenegro)

• Italy (autonomous regions of Trentino-South Tyrol and Friuli-Venezia Giulia)

Flags of Austria-Hungary

• 

  Flag of Austria

• Kuk-doppeladler.jpg

  Coat of Arms of Austria

• Austria-Hungary-flag-1869-1918-naval-1786-1869-war.gif

  War Flag

• Austria-Hungary flag 1869-1918.gif

  Merchant Flag

• 

  Flag of Hungary

• Coat of Arms of Hungary 1867.jpg

  Coat of Arms of Hungary

• 

  Flag of the Habsburg Empire (Before the 1867 Compromise)

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

Flags of Austria-Hungary

• Czech lands: 1867-1918
• Aftermath of World War I
• Austrian nobility
• Habsburg Monarchy
• Former countries in Europe after 1815
• List of extinct states
• Banat Republic
• Baron Ladislaus Hengelmuller, Austro-Hungarian Ambassador to the United States from 1894-1913

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Jászi, Oszkár The Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy, Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 1966.
• Macartney, Carlile Aylmer The Habsburg Empire, 1790-1918, New York, Macmillan 1969.
• Mark Cornwall (ed.) The Last Years of Austria-Hungary in Exeter Studies in History. University of Exeter Press, Exeter. 2002. ISBN 0859895637
• Sked Alan The Decline And Fall of the Habsburg Empire, 1815-1918, London : Longman, 1989.
• Taylor, A.J.P. The Habsburg monarchy, 1809-1918 : a history of the Austrian Empire and Austria-Hungary, London : Penguin Books in assoc. with Hamish Hamilton, 1964, 1948

External links

• "Distribution of Races in Austria-Hungary" from the Historical Atlas by William R. Shepherd, 1911
• Maps of Austria-Hungary
• The Austro-Hungarian Military
• Austria-Hungary - extensive list of heads of state, ministers, and ambassadors

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