Napoleon's wars were only a preliminary step in his larger plan to establish a rational state which would increase the pace of society's modernization. "Napoleon's Integration of Europe studies the implications of this project for the relationship between France and the rest of Europe. Through a systematic comparison of the experiences of French domination in the majority of European states, Stuart Woolf examines the problems encountered by French bureaucrats in ruling a progressively expanding empire, and explores, through the eyes of the populations subjected to French rule, the nature of collaboration and resistance.
"Napoleon's Integration of Europe not only chronicles the history of France, but also the histories of Italy, Germany, Belgium, Holland, Switzerland, Poland, and Spain, at a crucial moment in the development of each. The first comparative study of Europe in the Napoleonic era, it provides an in-depth look at an early exercise in imperialism--in fact, the first attempt to create a single Europe.
Autorentext
Stuart J. Woolf (University of Essex) (Author)
Zusammenfassung
Histories of the Napoleonic period are almost exclusively biographies of the man, or political-military accounts of his wars. But such wars were only the first stage in a far more ambitious programme; the establishment of a rational state which would force the pace of modernising society. Through an examination of the experiences of French domination, Napoleon's Integration of Europe explores the implications of such a project for France and its relationship with the rest of Europe. It examines the problems of ruling a progressively expanding empire, as seen through the eyes of a trained corps of bureaucrates who were convinced that their scientific methods would enable them to understand and govern the mechanisms of society. However it also looks at the populations subjected to French rule, at the nature of their resistance and adaptation to the principles of the Napoleonic project. This book is the first overall comparative study of Europe in the Napoleonic years. It is a study not only of an early exercise in imperialism, but of the conflict that is aroused between the rationalising tendencies of the modern state and the spatial and cultural heterogeneity of individual societies. As well as a history of France, it is also a history of Italy, Germany, Belgium, Holland, Switzerland, Poland and Spain at a crucial moment in the history of each nation state.
Inhalt
1 The Revolutionary-Napoleonic ideals of conquest 2 The tools of conquest 3 The practices of conquest: administrative integration 4 The practices of conquest: exploitation 5 Responses to conquest 6 Epilogue: the heritage