In the historiography of the Habsburg monarchy, the era of neoabsolutism, 1849–59, has generally been defined as either a period of reaction or one of missed opportunity when domestic policy was subordinated to the dynasty's great power interests. Historians commenting on this era have made important contributions, mostly in the area of foreign policy, state finance, economic developments, and constitutional theory, and have focused on what could or should have happened had the government chosen various reform agendas. None, however, have investigated the substantial developments then taking place in the alteration of state-society relations in the area of public opinion formation. Their interpretations have therefore missed and consequently masked the neoabsolutist state's pioneering efforts to create a wholly new relationship with the monarchy's disparate lands and peoples founded upon the rule of law under the Stadion Constitution, 4 March 1849, and then the Sylvester Patent, 31 December 1851.
