The Cemetery of the March Revolution in Berlin. A key site in the history of European democracy

El presente artículo aborda el Cementerio de la Revolución de Marzo desde su fundación en la Revolución Europea de 1848-49 hasta la actualidad. Durante la revolución de 1918-19, el cementerio fue ampliado y, a lo largo del tiempo, se ha ido transformando repetidamente según los diferentes sistemas políticos. Desde el principio, el Cementerio de la Revolución de Marzo ha sido un lugar que ha cumplido dos propósitos: ser espacio del luto personal de los familiares de los fallecidos y escenario de manifestaciones masivas y actos políticos conmemorativos para promover los derechos civiles y humanos. Los lugares de recuerdo de la historia de la democracia europea, como el Cementerio de la Revolución de Marzo, contribuyen a reforzar nuestras raíces culturales y políticas comunes y a establecer una cultura europea del recuerdo. This essay presents the cemetery of the March Fallen from its foundation in the European Revolution of 1848-49 to the present. During the revolution of 1918-19 the cemetery was expanded and over time it was repeatedly transformed in the different political systems. Right from the start, the Cemetery of the March Revolution has always been a place for two purposes: the personal grief of relatives of the dead, and mass demonstrations and political commemorative events to promote civil and human rights. Sites of remembrance for the history of European democracy such as the cemetery of the March Revolution help strengthen our shared cultural and political roots and help to establish a European culture of remembrance.

THE SERBIAN VOJVODINA AND MONTENEGRO: 1848–1849

The revolution of 1848–1849 had a significant effect on the Serbs in the Habsburg Monarchy, who established their own self-governing entity, the Serbian Vojvodina, within the monarchy. These events also attracted the attention of Serbs living outside the monarchy’s borders, especially those in Montenegro and, in particular, the Metropolitan of Cetinje, Petar II Petrović Njegoš. He wanted to assist his compatriots in the monarchy, and considered this action to be only the first step, albeit a very important one, in the ultimate fight for the liberation and unification of all Serbs within two independent countries: Serbia and Montenegro.

The “Re-Tuning” of János Arany's Life and Work in the Popular Education of the 1950s

In 1948, in the year it came to power, the Hungarian Communist Party began building its legitimacy, using the occasion of the centenary, by appropriating the legacy of the Revolution of 1848. The need for a revolutionary transformation of culture heralded the advent of the scientific materialist worldview. The popular education system, created as a channel of the cultural revolution, conveyed the findings of the various branches of science and arts, combined with the rhetoric of political propaganda, to the “working people.” Revolutionism, which the Marxist view of history elevated to prominence, soon gained ground in the interpretation of Hungarian literary history via the compilation of “progressive literary traditions.” Public educators' literary presentations in villages and cities, as well as articles and cheap publications produced in large quantities all served to promote this central principle. The author examines the representation and interpretation of János Arany's life and work in various textual and visual popular education products. Certain junctures and directions in Arany's life, used as guidelines of the presentations, were highlighted in the image of Arany mediated by filmstrips and newspaper articles to make him one of the “poets of freedom.” Publications intended for the cultural and political education of “working people” set out the way in which to relate to the poet and the framework for interpreting his writings. Through the Arany poems that popular educators employed in scientific education, the author points out the way in which textual and visual representations became carriers of added content in a given context and a possible means of the “rural class struggle.”

Temporalitatea internă a romanului românesc (1933-1947)

From the point of view of its internal temporality, the Romanian novel between 1933 and 1947 demonstrates an overwhelming preference for negotiating the present. After 1933 the world had already gone through a World War and a world economic crisis – so that the metabolism of the present in post-1933 Romanian novels can also be explained as a post-traumatic shock, an attempt to process the traumatic information of recent history. But the Romanian novel, in its earlier ages, had been synchronous with historical events of relatively comparable magnitude: the European Revolution of 1848, the Crimean War, the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78, translated in Romania as the War of Independence, the Romanian economic crisis from 1899-1901, the peasant uprising of 1907, with its bloody repression, the Balkan wars, the Great Union of 1918, etc. And yet, this succession of historical events did not have the effect of establishing the historical present as a preferential time of the Romanian novel. Only the Romanian novelist between 1933 and 1947 clearly prefers “recognition” in the present history, in the immediate actuality; the narrative no longer means for him the construction of a patrimonial memory, but almost exclusively a construction of the historical present. Between 1933 and 1947, the Romanian novel is synchronized with its own present.

Villette, Female Political Agency, and the French Revolution of 1848

This essay reads Charlotte Brontë’s Villette (1853) as a response to questions about women’s public agency that were raised by the French Revolution of 1848, in which women played prominent roles. The actress Rachel, the inspiration for Villette’s Vashti, became the most notorious female activist of the Revolution when she performed La Marseillaise in support France’s Second Republic. As I demonstrate, Brontë engages directly with Victorian journalistic accounts of these performances. Here, and in other episodes focused on women leaders, such as ‘Madame Beck’ and ‘The Cleopatra’, Brontë seeks to expose the linguistic and iconographic conventions around female political power that diminish women’s agency in the process of representing it. Brontë’s awareness of the pervasiveness and intractability of these conventions explains the novel’s final scepticism about women’s ability to exercise political power. Although Villette’s protagonist, Lucy Snowe, indulges in fantasies of political power, she satisfies these fantasies not in the public realm but in a politicized private realm, where she re-enacts Napoleonic-era political conflicts with her imperious lover, M Paul. My aim in analysing Brontë’s engagement with 1848 is to understand Villette’s politicization of romance. For Brontë, I argue, women’s exclusion from the political is tantamount to their exclusion from history, and Lucy’s strategic political re-enactments function as both critique of and compensation for this exclusion.

“The old burden” of subjectivity in criticism of L. Feuerbach and Junghegelianer

The article is devoted to the consideration of key aspects of the socio-political meaning and direction of the philosophical and theological doctrine of the Junghegelianer. The nomination of philosophy as the “mother of sciences”, combining the old metaphysics and new dialectic, to the center of the social “agenda” is explained both by internal reasons (split in the Hegel “school”, competition from positivism, renaissance of theological thought), and the impact of external factors. The problem of understanding “subjectivity” in the philosophical critique of the 1840s, which turned out to be a stumbling block for many panellists, is explored; the categorical content of the concept has not been clarified. The task is to identify the basic characteristics of such widely interpreted “subjectivity” and clarify the positions of the parties. Replacing the speculative practices of the “old” Kantian school with intellectual (going from Schelling) “procedures” of philosophizing formed a completely new philosophical paradigm of a different era. The revolution of 1848 updated many philosophical ideas, filling them with social content. The conclusions state the contradiction and a certain eclecticism of the philosophical designs of the Junghegelianer.

The Beginnings of Bible Mission of the British and Foreign Bible Society in Early Nineteenth Century Hungary

The paper examines the very beginnings of Bible Mission in Hungary within the Habsburg Empire in the first part of the nineteenth century. It divides the first thirty years into two major epochs: the one before Gottlieb August Wimmer, Lutheran pastor of Felsőlövő (Oberschützen) and agent of the British and Foreign Bible Society (BFBS) and the one characterized by his work until the revolution of 1848. In the paper, I summarize the main obstacles of Bible Mission both political and religious as well as the main achievements and formations of policies and practices that still define Bible Mission of the Bible Societies in all around the world. The work of BFBS in Hungary in this period was also intertwined with the formative period of the Budapest Scottish Mission, a topic that I also touch in the paper.

Leadership in Social Movements: Evidence from the “Forty-Eighters” in the Civil War

This paper studies the role of leaders in the social movement against slavery that culminated in the US Civil War. Our analysis is organized around a natural experiment: leaders of the failed German revolution of 1848–1849 were expelled to the United States and became antislavery campaigners who helped mobilize Union Army volunteers. Towns where Forty-Eighters settled show two-thirds higher Union Army enlistments. Their influence worked through local newspapers and social clubs. Going beyond enlistment decisions, Forty-Eighters reduced their companies’ desertion rate during the war. In the long run, Forty-Eighter towns were more likely to form a local chapter of the NAACP. (JEL D74, J15, J45, J61, N31, N41)

Verfassung und Verwaltung. Landesfürst und Stände, Politiker und Beamte

Constitution and Administration. The Territorial Prince and Estates, Politicians and Officials. This chapter focuses on the bipolar political life in Lower Austria in the course of the long 19th century. Beginning with the constitutional realities before the revolution of 1848, it examines the constitutional developments after 1848 and 1861, and also offers a brief description of the various administrative organizational structures and their efforts and achievements. Prior to 1848, the aulic offices sought to minimize the political role of the estates and thus the participation of sections of the populace. Yet according to the constitutional settlement of 1861, some elements of the population hitherto not involved in politics were given the opportunity for self-determined activities. The “autonomous” administration of the land became a substantial part of public administration, being quite successful in supplying all kinds of services. Owing to a blurred assignment of remits between the “autonomous” administration of the land and that run by the central state government, this “dual-track” public administration diminished the effectiveness of its activities and became a nuisance for the public at large

Jüdisches Leben zwischen Toleranz, Integration und Antisemitismus

Jewish Life between Tolerance, Integration, and Anti-Semitism. In the 18th century, Jews were strictly forbidden to settle in Lower Austria, with the exception of Vienna. Only the Toleranzpatent of 1782 made this possible, again under certain conditions. Free movement in the wake of the revolution of 1848 led to the immigration of Jews, mainly from Bohemia, Moravia and Hungary. By 1908, they had founded 15 Kultusgemeinden (Jewish communities), with the associated religious infrastructure, throughout the country. The constitution of 1867 finally made them citizens with the same rights as the majority society. However, anti-Semitism fundamentally questioned their successful integration and physical existence in Lower Austria. Jews, however, did not accept these attacks without resistance, but defended themselves with the means available under the rule of law. During the First World War, they contributed to the ultimately futile war efforts of the Monarchy. They welcomed peace in 1918, but had to look to the future with concern, faced with an anti-Semitism that was more aggressive than ever.