E.J. Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolution: 1789-1848, New York: Mentor, 1962. E.J. Hobsbawm argues that the French Revolution and the British Industrial
Revolution transformed the world in unprecedented ways. This “Dual Revolution,” argues Hobsbawm, established the parameters for European capitalist hegemony. The socio-economic structure of Europe in 1848 looked completely different from that of
1789. Although they followed different trajectories, bourgeois liberalism lay at the heart of both. To begin, Britain was the first country in the world to industrialize, in part because its political system was already geared to the ideals of economic expansion and private profit. Britain’s economy changed in fundamental ways as it gradually moved away from …show more content…
Thus “the period of the dual revolution saw both the triumph and the most elaborate formulation of the middle-class liberal and petty bourgeois radical ideologies, and their disintegration under the impact of the states and societies they had themselves set out to create . . .” (298) The Age of Revolution is an impressive work. It is what one might expect from a
Marxist: a reliance upon a dialectical framework of class-struggle. The book is also rich in details, and works well as a survey of the period. It is, at times, too unwieldy; some of
Hobsbawm’s tangential forays into areas seemingly not germane to the book are alarming
(for example his ill-advised generalizations about Egypt, Asia, North America, Latin
America, Euclidean geometry, etc.). Nevertheless, Hobsbawm’s position is largely persuasive. The global supremacy of Europe in the second half of the nineteenth century is undeniable. The liberal idea that humans have a natural right to pursue profit and accumulate capital without fetters played a central role in nineteenth century world affairs
-- perhaps the most central. Surely the consecration of private property paved the way for the Dual
Revolution transformed the world in unprecedented ways. This “Dual Revolution,” argues Hobsbawm, established the parameters for European capitalist hegemony. The socio-economic structure of Europe in 1848 looked completely different from that of
1789. Although they followed different trajectories, bourgeois liberalism lay at the heart of both. To begin, Britain was the first country in the world to industrialize, in part because its political system was already geared to the ideals of economic expansion and private profit. Britain’s economy changed in fundamental ways as it gradually moved away from …show more content…
Thus “the period of the dual revolution saw both the triumph and the most elaborate formulation of the middle-class liberal and petty bourgeois radical ideologies, and their disintegration under the impact of the states and societies they had themselves set out to create . . .” (298) The Age of Revolution is an impressive work. It is what one might expect from a
Marxist: a reliance upon a dialectical framework of class-struggle. The book is also rich in details, and works well as a survey of the period. It is, at times, too unwieldy; some of
Hobsbawm’s tangential forays into areas seemingly not germane to the book are alarming
(for example his ill-advised generalizations about Egypt, Asia, North America, Latin
America, Euclidean geometry, etc.). Nevertheless, Hobsbawm’s position is largely persuasive. The global supremacy of Europe in the second half of the nineteenth century is undeniable. The liberal idea that humans have a natural right to pursue profit and accumulate capital without fetters played a central role in nineteenth century world affairs
-- perhaps the most central. Surely the consecration of private property paved the way for the Dual