Political History of the 20th Century (1914–1995)
Good Fit
- Students of political history and international relations
- Readers who want to read the diplomatic history of the 20th century in a chronological system
- Anyone who wants to know the style of Turkish university history textbooks
Not a Fit
- Those who want story-like, lively history
- Readers expecting an academic view renewed with current research
- Anyone looking for a short summary: the book is over 750 pages
In the introduction to the first part Armaoğlu writes that the structure of today's international relations goes back to the war of 1914–18 and its consequences, and that this in turn goes back to the currents of thought that overturned Europe in 1789–1815. He divides 1815–1914 into two parts: 1815–71 (liberalism, nationalism and socialism born of the French Revolution) and 1871–1914 (the change in Europe's balance of power as national unions were achieved). He says Africa and the Far East, the United States and Japan, and also the situation of the Ottoman Empire will be considered.
The «Liberalism» section writes that the Renaissance and the Reformation brought freedom of thought in art and religion but did not change man's political life, the sovereign's absolute and unlimited authority continuing. With the revolution of 1789 the basic rights and freedoms a person holds by virtue of «the dignity of being human» emerge as a factor limiting the sovereign's authority. The author gives the basis of the «Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen» of 26 August 1789: being born free and equal in rights, liberty, property, security and resistance to oppression, the sovereignty of the nation.
Armaoğlu writes that the most important element of liberalism is constitutionalism: without rights and freedoms being written in a constitution and the powers of the sovereign being defined there is no guarantee. He notes that the revolutionary wars of 1792–1815 turned into French hegemony under Napoleon but also made it easier for the idea of freedom to spread across Europe. The American Declaration of Independence of 4 July 1776, he shows, at first drew the attention of only a few European intellectuals.
It is then written that after the Congress of Vienna in 1815 absolute rulers restored the old order, which contradicted the changing thought of societies and led to three waves of uprisings in 1818–22, 1830 and 1848. Uprisings occur in Germany, Italy and Spain in 1818–22, in France and Belgium in 1830 (the most advanced liberal constitution of the time) and again across Europe in 1848–49; by the middle of the 19th century constitutional rule «ceases to be a serious problem for European countries».
- The text is in textbook form: headings, numbering, dates and French sources in the footnotes
- Each topic is explained in the order «origin — nature — effect»
- The language is heavy and formal but clear
- Numerous references rest on academic sources (Metternich, Debidour, Renouvin)
The economic and social history of 19th-century Britain — reviewed on our site
A book on Russian and Soviet history in plain language — reviewed on our site
At the end of the part read, Armaoğlu writes that in the uprisings of 1848–49 the nationalist movement prevailed while liberalism won an important victory, that in France the Republic turned into an empire four years later, and that by the mid-19th century liberalism and constitutional rule «ceased to be a serious problem» for European countries. The next part turns to nationalism.
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