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The Struggle for Mastery in Europe: 1848-1918 (Oxford History of Modern Europe)

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What A. J. P. Taylor's The Struggle for Mastery in Europe suffers from in being nearly fifty years old, it more than makes up for in style. It is a riveting book that is smattered with wit and an author's thorough knowledge of his subject. Alternate titles might have been The Struggle to Prevent the Mastery of Europe, or the Decline and Fall of the Balance of Power.

Taylor's unyielding faith in diplomacy reflects a Cold War notion that any political problem can be solved by maintaining a diplomatic balance. He deftly navigates the Byzantine web of diplomatic intrigue to show how negotiations, not war, ultimately resolves crises. His whig interpretations are at times blatant. Conservative Russia and Prussia are often "humiliated" and "old fashioned" while liberal France fell victim to its own "ingenuity" or suffered "shattered prestige."

Not all events are treated equal. The 1867 Anschloss or the 1894 Dreyfus Affair receive practically no attention, while obscure diplomatic conventions receive detailed analysis. Great leaders like Napoleon III or Bismarck receive Taylor's praise while British statesmen of lesser stature receive criticism. Taylor is also anti-imperial, stating that colonies are a sign of weakness (though he later seems to suggest the opposite). His treatment of the coming of World War One is perhaps his greatest weakness, or perhaps this is where the book is most dated. He seems to be somewhat surprised that war erupted in the face of diplomatic failure. He fails to see that many at the time lost faith in diplomacy and allowed the war to happen.

In the end, though, this is a fine work. Taylor interjects personal philosophies throughout the book. "Men learn from their mistakes how to make new ones (p. 111);" "Once men imagine a danger they soon turn it into a reality (p. 450); and "A historian should never deal in speculations about what did not happen" (p. 513) are but a few examples. (This last is a personal favorite as it flies in the face of alternative history.) Clever recto page headings and use of dates keep the reader aware of what is happening, and Taylor is a master of the semi colon. All in all this remains a very informative work.

A. J. P. Taylor's The Struggle for Mastery in Europe is the book to start reading about those 70 crucial years in Europe's history.
The book begins with the Revolutions of 1845, that's why it would be a good thing to have some knowledge regarding the Napoleonic Wars and its outcome (Treaty of Metternich). Taylor analyses the out coming system of the Balance of Power that governed European diplomacy until War World I. According to This system, the five great powers (England, Prussia, Austria, Russia and the defeated France) would balance each others force, avoiding the out come of war.
The system worked pretty well until the fall of Bismarck. That is because Bismarck, as his successor once said, knew how to "play with three balls at the same time". He could keep Russia and Austria tied to Germany at the same time. Thus, France was checked. Nevertheless, when Germany didn't renewed its treaty with Russia the obvious move was Russia's alliance with France.
It could be said that by 1885 the outcome of a Great War was a matter just of time. The system of alliances so well designed by Metternich and so well understood and curried out by Bismarck was at the same time the cause of War World I. Without a great politician as Bismarck nobody could make Metternich's system work.
All through his book, Taylor explains what I have just summarized in a really better way. I highly recommend the lecture of this great book.

I think what made me start loving Alan Taylor is the passage from "Struggle" about Louis Napoleon's government being "run by gangsters". After a lifetime of school histories unwilling to venture a judgement, scrupulous in their aridness, this was a revelation.

Taylor suffered ostracism for his outspoken views, especially from Oxford, where his trampling of sacred cows prevented him from gaining a professorship. On the other hand, his rival, Hugh Trevor-Roper, played the Tory historian and prospered. (It was, of course, Trevor-Roper who staked his reputation as an historian on the authenticity of the fraudulent Hitler diaries of 1983, hopefully giving Taylor the last laugh. But being an establishment historian, Sir Hugh was immunized from serious career consequences.)

If you want to understand the century past, you must begin in the century previous, in about 1848. When Taylor deposits you in 1918, you will be on secure footing while reading his, "Origins of the Second World War" or Ian Brendon's "Dark Valley: A Panorama of the 1930s," leading you in turn to WWII, which brings the nineteenth century to a close in 1945. It is said that Alan Taylor liked paradox. I wonder how he liked this one.

A. J. P. Taylor's book is the sine qua non for university students of European history. This is the real deal: Taylor was a genuine historian who never went further than his facts--and his facts are incredibly well researched, well documented, and bountiful. This is true historiography: the way history ought to be done! Plus, Taylor writes very well, in a lively and entertaining fashion. He has good language, wit, and trenchant observations.

It must be noted that this is a history of diplomacy--with some political and military of necessity treated. What does this mean? Well, it means that the characters of Taylor's book are mostly forgotten professional diplomats, and therefore most of their names won't be familiar to those unschooled in modern European history--Bismarck and Disraeli excepted. But this esoterica only increases the value of Taylor's work; for it reveals these forgotten characters to us once again: a gem of historical literature.

This is A.J.P. Taylor's masterpiece of history. Taylor is an exquisite writer, with a unique style that cannot resist the irony and contradictions inherent in the very fabric of European diplomacy. This sprawling tale of folly and pretension is informed by Taylor's exhaustive reading of the official foreign affairs correspondence of the respective nations involved, as well as his own mastery of modern European history. His prose is consistently edged with wit on the verge of sarcasm, always keen to the absurd roots of tragedy. For Taylor there are no sacred cows: every class, every institution, every political party, even cynicism itself fumbles in the dark, toiling under the weight of its illusions and contradictions. One does not emerge from this book with an enhanced respect for statesmen, generals or revolutionaries. This is one of the few history books I plan on reading at least twice.

Taylor successfully tackles a sprawling, detailed subject -- seventy years of byzantine European diplomacy that set the stage for the First World War and, not so indirectly, the Second. He doesn't hold the reader's hand, and assumes you are familiar with many of the events and people he discusses. I wasn't, so I referred often to Britannica, Encarta, and Wikipedia as I read. By doing so, I learned a lot from this book.

A.J.P. Taylor (1906-1990) wrote THE STRUGGLE FOR MASTERY IN EUROPE: 1848-1918 in 1960. This book makes the diplomatic connections and clearly explains the causes and effects of European diplomacy history at a time when the Europeans experienced political revolutions industrial revolutions, etc. Taylor connected the economic changes and diplomatic tensions in a readable style that is unmatched.

Taylor began this book with the 1848 revolutions and the attempts at national unity in Central Europe (Germany, the Slavic peoples, etc.) Taylor clearly showed the tensions that frustrated Italian national unity. What the crowned heads and diplomats feared was that nationalism and unity would come from "below" rather than from the "conservative" European political leaders who feared the masses yet had to take the masses into account re poltical and diplomatic decisions. Taylor showed how Napolean III (1852-1870) was able to take advantage of the June Days (1848) in France only to blunder in diplomatic endeavors. As Taylor noted, Napolean III was too much of a dreamer and was to cautious of an adventurer.

Taylor carefully treated the diplomatic tenions in the late 1840s-1850s. The Russians feared Masgyar or Hungarian unity as well as that of the Polish. Czar Nicholus II (1825-1855)and his advisers feared was that the Russians would be more of an Asian political entity than a European power. What the Russian political leaders did not fully realize was that the Russian political and military systems were too weak for the Russians to realize their diplomatic ambitions. Czar Nicholus II took the Russians into the Crimean War (1854-1855)ostensibly over Russian Orthodox and French Catholic access to the Holy Places which were in Turkish controlled Palestine. As Taylor noted, Napolean III was looking for glory in confronting the Russians, but Napolean III needed British help, an ally, to confront the Russians. Czar Nicholus II had a better claim re the Holy Places than Napolean III did simply because the Czar was the official protector of the Russian Orthodox Church, and Napolean III had no such claim to the Catholic Church. The British simply saw a chance to further hinder Russian ambitions re the Turkish Straits and Russian direct access to the Mediterrean Sea. As noted in this book, the Crimean War demonstrated weaknesses of the belligerents and most glaring the weakness of the Russians who never learned.

Taylor next dealt with Italian unification. The Italian leaders, especially Count Cavour (1810-1861)knew the Italians could not dislodge the Hapsburgs from Northern Italy without an ally. Napolean III attempted to resurrect French greatness by allying the French with the Italians. Even in victory, Napolean III blundered, The Italians "kept their end of the bargain" only to be disappointed that Napolean III refused the let the Italians have Venetia and Rome.

Taylor's treatment of German unification was well done. William I (1862-1888) and Otto von Bismarck (1815-1899) were able to manipulate the Danes into a war vs. the Prussians (the Northern Germans) and the Hapsburghs who easily defeated the Danes in 1863. As Taylor noted, Bismarck undermined the Hapsburgs and Prussian forces defeated them in the Seven Weeks War (1866). The French and Napolean III managed to isolate themselves without accounting for their diplomatic and military weakness. Bismarck tricked the French into starting the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871)which was a disaster for the French and completed German unification. Readers should note that the French and British were preoccupied with the U.S. Civil War and French designs in Mexico ended in 1870. Taylor should have emphasized these events.

As readers may know, after the Franco-Prussian War Bismarck knew that peace could be kept as long as the Russians were placated in Eastern Europe and the French were isolated. Bismarck's "system" was threatened when the Balkan people rebelled against the Turks in 1875-1876. The Europaens urged the Turks to make reforms to defuse a potential disaster, but the Turks responded by committing The Bulgarian Massacres which outraged the Europeans and led to the Russo-Turkish War. Bismarck knew the potential danger of the Germans being drawn into a war he did not want. To paraphrase Bismarck, the Balkans were not worth one Pomeranian solider. When the Turks were defeated and the Bulgarians got a seaport on the Mediterranain Sea, the British and Hapsburgs opposed the settlement. The British would not tolerate the Russians having access to seaport by proxy via the Bulgarians. Bismarck quickly moved to renegotiate the Treaty of San Stafano to avoid war.

Many Europeans thought the time of perpetual peace and prosperity had occured after 1878. Bismarck knew better and knew that the Germans could maintain peace by skilled diplomacy. Taylor gave a solid detailed account of Bismarck's secret alliances with the Hapsburgs, Italians, and Russians. Bismarck pledeged German DEFENSIVE alliances and neutrality to the point that no one could act without the Germans. Readers should note that European and U.S. imperialism deflected European energy. Bismarck, as Taylor noted, was a diplomatic genius.

When Willim II (1888-1918)came to power, Bismarck was dimissed, and his system gradually collapseed. As Taylor noted Bismarck's successors were not nearly as astute as Bismarck. This obviously led to W.W. I, which led to German defeat. Taylor made an interesting comment that the Germans involvement in W.W. I was not due to bad policy. It was due to no policy, and the less able German diplomats and leaders were unaware of the dynamics of European diplomacy. What may have made total war possible was the fact that crowned heads and skilled diplomats did not push for war as much as the masses pushed for war.

The Russians who appeared never to learn anything about their own weakness were in part to blame. They were easily defeated in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905)which sent shock waves througout Russia and Europe. The Russians should have realized just how bad their system was and how weak they were. They never learned this until defeat in W.W. I.

Taylor concluded this book with the fact that while the Germans were defeated in Western Europe, the Germans won W.W. I vs the Russians and extracted the Treaty of Brest-Listov in 1918. Taylor noted that W.W. I ended any European Balance of Power simply because the Americans were the "new players on the block."

Taylor wrote a comprehensive book. Readers who examine this book will have a better understanding of how diplomacy is conducted and recognize folly and blunders. This book undermines popular textbook versions of diplomatic history which rarely if ever "come to grips" with diplomatic history. A.J.P. Taylor's other books that deserve mention are THE ORGINS OF WORLD WAR II, THE HAPSBURG EMPIRE, etc. Anyone interested in careful scholarship and good written expression will benefit from these books.

This is A.J.P. Taylor's masterpiece of history. Taylor is an exquisite writer, with a unique style that cannot resist the irony and contradictions inherent in the actual fabric of European diplomacy. This sprawling tale of folly and pretension is informed by Taylor's exhaustive reading of the official foreign affairs correspondence of the respective nations involved, as well as his own mastery of modern European history. His prose is consistently edged with wit on the verge of sarcasm, always keen to the absurd roots of tragedy. For Taylor there are no sacred cows: every class, every institution, every political party, even cynicism itself, fumbles in the dark, toiling under the weight of its illusions and contradictions. One does not emerge from this book with an enhanced respect for statesmen, generals or revolutionaries. This is one of the few history books I plan on reading at least twice.

Ouch , what a journey through the times , how many hours and resources wasted on study of other books for nothing , while in this work even ignoramus as me can see our static place at the historic pond of European man. Now somes who are invited , they celebrate Fall of the Berlin Wall- and just look on description of Napoleon III and ?.. is he not present days Sarkozy with his courtesans Hilary and Angela caricature of our forgoten past?. Just look on that geometry of environment. Saturated by ill liberated semiskilled ones and office totalitarian paper force, what to do with them? What coalition of willings to make of them ? Just look on those ambassadors of past Gorbachov as Metternich refugee of his own success, Walesa our forgoten Garibaldi. Wau, and new faces are queuing into talent contest. But the shores of the pond are the same, just wait to see who is without sin and throw first peable. Russia , Germany , France , nobles from the Poland ,crazies from Hungary, profesors from Bobemia, and bankers from IMF. One does start understand sentiment , why Churchil said .."if we would have to choose between united Europe and open sea , we would take that other option.." Great read and good references . Must for any secondary school leaver.. Use it in questionare at job application recruitment.

A.J.P Taylor's history is told through the prism of diplomatic affairs and great power jockeying for position. This is only one aspect of history, but in fact this book is an excellent guide to 19th century Europe overall, or its second half, and it has enough about economic and political developments to be readable as a general work. It is also extremely entertaining, both in a gossipy kind of way and because Taylor isn't afraid of going through the strategic intricacies of each situation. Don't be discouraged by the length; this is extremely readable. And it becomes wistful in the end, as your English summer slowly goes.

I once recommended this as a `top 3' to someone who knew very little history, but Taylor's well-known work appeals both to the novice and the knowledgeable amateur.