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History >1918 - From the Dawn of History to a Border Province |
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The system of Austrian absolutism was severely threatened by the ideas emerging from the French Revolution, which spread to Austria, albeit cautiously. Emperor Franz II, grandson of Maria Theresa and nephew of the executed French queen, Marie Antoinette, joined the coalition against revolutionary France. As a result, Austria suffered severe defeats in the campaigns led by Napoleon Bonaparte.
After Napoleon had crowned himself Emperor of France in 1804, Emperor Franz responded by installing the Empire of Austria. The establishment of the Confederation of the Rhine under the auspices of France led to the disintegration of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806. Accordingly, Franz II renounced the imperial crown. In his subsequent campaigns Napoleon inflicted devastating defeats upon Austria and even conquered Vienna twice. However, Archduke Carl's victory over the powerful Corsican at the Battle of Aspern demonstrated that Napoleon was not invincible. The Congress of Vienna, which was presided over by Austrian State Chancellor Prince Clemens Wenzel Lothar Metternich, the "Coachman of Europe", restored the old order in Europe in 1815.
In the spring of 1848, the ideas of the middle-class revolution originating in France also spread to Austria. The liberals demanded a constitution and freedom of the press. Metternich's hated police-based system was swept away. However, in October of that same year the uprising was suppressed, with the conservatives gaining on all fronts. The young emperor Franz Joseph I established a neo-absolutist system. His dubious policy of neutrality in the Crimean War (1854-1856) led Austria into a dangerous isolation. It was thus left to face Sardinia, which was allied to France and supported the Italian independence movement, alone. Following its defeats at the Battles of Magenta and Solferino in 1859, Austria was forced to give up Lombardy and, at the same time, to yield to internal pressure for a parliamentary institution by issuing the October Diploma and the February Edict.
Political developments in the Austrian part of the monarchy ("Cisleithania") were marked by the emergence of the mass parties (Social Democratic Party and Christian Social Party) and the demand for basic civil rights. The first general elections by direct suffrage to the Imperial Council (Reichsrat) were held in 1907.
The long period of peace which prevailed until the First World War was safeguarded by a complicated system of European alliances, with Austria-Hungary joining up with the German Empire and Italy to form a Triple Alliance. However, growing nationalism within the multiracial state caused severe tension. The justified demands of the working classes for better pay and conditions fit for human beings also clamored for solution.
The assassination on 28 June 1914 in Sarajevo of the heir to the Austrian throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, was only the provocation for the outbreak of the First World War. In four years of futile slaughter the European powers opposed one another, until the entry into the conflict of the United States of America finally brought it to an end. After the defeat of the Central Powers (Austria-Hungary, the German Empire and allied Turkey), the European order crumbled. The dual monarchy disintegrated into national states. The remnants were to form the new Republic of Austria.
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