AP European History
AKA "Torture" :)
Task 3 part 1
If there is one thing Italy and I have in common, it is that we do love a beardy dude in red flannel. Hoo boy. Yeah. However, where as I'm willing to throw myself at this guys' feet just because he's hot, Italians were throwing themselves at this guys' feet because he wanted unification for Italy. Yep. Garibaldi, the original lumbersexual. Anyways, he was very popular in Italy and pair that with Cavour and his shady ass tactics like provoking Austria into war just to get in with France, and you got yourself a piping hot Italy pizza pie. Who could resist??
Task 1
In the case of Cavour, there was no real nation to be spoken of at first. However, he picked up nationalistic strategies to create a more unified Italy. For example, he picked a fight with Austria so that the rest of Italy would join together and yell "FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!" . Just kidding. Well, it was only sort of like that. Cavour was quoted as saying that "the improvement of Italy's fate is...to prove that Italy's sons can fight valiantly on battlefields where glory is to be won.” So he thought that if Italians saw that Italians were brave and feisty, that they would all hop on the nationalist bandwagon. Also, he supported nationalistic groups like the Italian National Society. These things aren't all just because he loved the idea of a unified Italy, but because he wanted to have a nice strong European power. Same goes for Napoleon III, who did a bunch of nice guy things for a not-so-nice guy reason. He made old people homes, he remodeled Paris, he did all sorts of nice things, and it was all so he could become emperor. #smh. Many other leaders did this, like Bismarck, who granted universal male suffrage just to get people on his side, and Alexander II of Russia who did this by enabling the Emancipation Proclamation and freeing the serfs.
Task 2
Alexander II enacted many reforms in Russia. He freed serfs, drew up plans for huge railway systems, invested in iron and steel works, and reformed the army and navy. These things are all fine and dandy, but keep in mind that Russia was trying to catch up to the rest of Europe, which was probably like a century ahead, in a few years. These reforms were a step in the right direction, but they still caused a lot of problems. There was a lot of discontent in the cities now, instead of with the rural serfs, and that led to a much faster distribution of radical and revolutionary ideas, which all built up as they got their butts kicked by Japan, the tension leading up to WWI all led them to the revolutions of 1905.
Task 3 Part 2
So when Italy and Germany went and suddenly because two huge countries instead of a bunch of tiny ones, they were all of a sudden big kids in a world of little kids. All the other countries started becoming wary of them because they were all of a sudden a much bigger threat.
Task 4
Socialist parties grew quickly , and without a lot of people knowing because neither Bismarck's Anti-Socialist Laws nor his extensive social security system was checking the growth of the SPD. Like how embarrasing is that honestly lmao This groupwas big with the working classes and became one of the largest groups in the Reichstag. Marx himself was a main player in this. He started that there Socialist International Working Men's Association, also known as the First International, but that was a failure and collapsed. But later a group of people came together to create the Second International. So like!! yay!1! commmunism





