AP World History: Modern

## Learning Outcomes

- Explain how Enlightenment thought helped nationalism grow
- Identify the link between **popular sovereignty**, the **French Revolution (1789)**, and national politics
- Distinguish between **national identity**, **nationalism**, and the **nation-state**
- Recall key examples including Greece, Italy, Germany, and Latin America
- Explain why the **Congress of Vienna (1814–1815)** tried to contain nationalism
- Compare nationalism as a unifying force with nationalism as a force that weakened empires
- Use this topic in causation, comparison, and LEQ/DBQ arguments

## AP World History: Modern Syllabus

For the AP World History: Modern, you are expected to understand the rise of nationalism in the period **c. 1750–1900**, with a focus on the following syllabus points:

- Know that nationalism grew out of changing ideas about political legitimacy, especially **popular sovereignty**
- Understand that the **French Revolution (1789)** helped shift loyalty from monarch to nation
- Identify the role of the **Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789)** in locating sovereignty in the nation
- Explain how **Napoleon** spread revolutionary ideas and also provoked nationalist backlash
- Understand the **Congress of Vienna (1814–1815)** as a conservative reaction against nationalism and revolution
- Identify examples of nationalism in independence and unification movements, including **Greek independence (began 1821)**, **Italian unification (1861, completed 1870)**, and **German unification (1871)**
- Explain how nationalism weakened **multiethnic empires** such as the Ottoman and Austrian Empires
- Recognise the limits of nationalism in places such as Latin America, where independence often benefited **creole elites** more than all social groups

## Test Your Knowledge

_Attempt these questions before reading this article. If you find some difficult or cannot remember the answers, look more closely at that area during your revision._

1. How did Enlightenment ideas help create nationalism without being identical to nationalism?
2. Why is the **French Revolution** such an important turning point in the rise of nationalism?
3. Name two cases where nationalism unified states and two where it weakened empires.
4. What did the **Congress of Vienna** try to restore after Napoleon?
5. Why did nationalism in Latin America not always produce full equality?

## Introduction

## Introduction

Nationalism became one of the strongest political forces of the nineteenth century. For AP World, you need to see it as part of a chain of developments: **Enlightenment ideas** challenged divine-right monarchy, the **French Revolution** turned those ideas into mass politics, and then nationalism spread through Europe and the Americas, later reaching parts of Asia, the Middle East, and colonial societies.

This topic matters because it appears in many AP thinking skills. It is a **causation** topic because you must explain why nationalism rose. It is also a **comparison** topic because nationalism did not work the same way everywhere. In some places it built new states. In others it broke apart old empires.

> **Key Term: nationalism**
> The belief that a people sharing a common identity should be politically united and loyal to a nation, often seeking self-rule.

### Enlightenment ideas and the foundations of nationalism

The Enlightenment did not create modern nationalism by itself, but it provided the political ideas that made nationalism possible. Earlier European politics had usually centred on loyalty to a monarch, dynasty, or empire. Enlightenment thinkers began to challenge that system by asking a new question: where does legitimate political power come from?

John Locke argued that government rested on the consent of the governed. Rousseau pushed the idea further by stressing the **general will** of the people. These arguments weakened belief in divine-right monarchy. If power comes from the people, then the people—not the king—become the basis of the state.

> **Key Term: popular sovereignty**
> The principle that political authority comes from the people rather than from a monarch or hereditary ruler.

This idea mattered because it encouraged people to imagine themselves as members of a political community. That community could be called a nation. The more people believed they had rights and a collective voice, the easier it became for them to transfer loyalty from ruler to nation.

> **Key Term: social contract**
> The Enlightenment idea that government exists through an agreement between rulers and the people, and must protect the people’s rights.

At this stage, it is important not to confuse different ideas. Enlightenment thought included **liberalism**, natural rights, and constitutional ideas. Nationalism overlapped with these but was not the same thing. A nationalist might want self-rule without supporting full democracy. A conservative ruler might even use nationalism for state power.

> **Test Tip:** In SAQs and LEQs, avoid saying “the Enlightenment caused nationalism” with no explanation. A stronger answer shows the steps: Enlightenment ideas about rights and sovereignty weakened monarchy, then revolutions turned those ideas into national politics.

### The French Revolution as the turning point

The **French Revolution of 1789** is the key bridge between political theory and mass nationalism. It turned abstract Enlightenment ideas into action. Instead of subjects obeying a king, revolutionaries increasingly described the people as citizens of a nation.

The clearest evidence is the **Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789)**. It argued that sovereignty rested in the nation, not in the monarch. This was a major change in political legitimacy.

> **Key Term: nation-state**
> A state whose political boundaries are meant to correspond to a nation with a shared identity.

Revolutionary France also built a new style of politics. Mass mobilisation, citizenship, national symbols, and military service all tied ordinary people more closely to the state. The nation now demanded loyalty, taxes, and military service—but in return it claimed to represent the people.

This helps explain why nationalism became such a powerful force. It was not just a feeling. It became tied to citizenship, rights, and participation in public life.

Napoleon spread these changes farther. As French armies moved across Europe, they exported legal reform and challenged old feudal privileges. Yet Napoleonic rule also had the opposite effect: many conquered peoples resisted French control by developing stronger identities of their own. So Napoleon spread nationalism in two ways:

- by carrying revolutionary ideas abroad
- by provoking anti-French resistance

This is especially useful in AP essays because it shows complexity. French expansion encouraged both imitation and backlash.

> **Key Term: national consciousness**
> A shared awareness among people that they belong to the same nation, often before a nation-state fully exists.

### Nationalism in independence and unification movements

By the early nineteenth century, nationalism was moving beyond revolutionary France. It appeared in struggles for independence, in attempts to unite divided peoples, and in movements against multiethnic empires.

One major example is the **Greek War of Independence**, which began in **1821**. Greeks under Ottoman rule drew on a shared language, Orthodox Christianity, and historical identity. Their nationalism helped weaken the Ottoman Empire, and Greek independence was recognised in the **1830s**.

Nationalism also shaped the **Latin American wars of independence**. Leaders such as **Simón Bolívar** and **José de San Martín** used Enlightenment language and local identity to justify separation from Spain. But AP students should be careful here: these movements were often led by **creole elites**, and independence did not automatically bring equality for Indigenous peoples, enslaved people, women, or lower classes.

The **Haitian Revolution (1791–1804)** also matters. It showed that a colonised and enslaved population could claim sovereignty and form an independent state. Haiti’s independence in **1804** challenged both empire and racial hierarchy. It broadened the meaning of who could belong to a nation.

In Europe, nationalism often focused on unification. Italy had long been divided into separate states. Nationalists argued that Italians should live in one united nation. Three figures are especially important:

- **Giuseppe Mazzini** — ideological nationalist, linked nationalism to popular political purpose
- **Camillo di Cavour** — diplomat and strategist from Piedmont-Sardinia
- **Giuseppe Garibaldi** — military leader who helped bring southern Italy into the movement

The **Kingdom of Italy** was proclaimed in **1861**, and unification was completed in **1870** when Rome was incorporated.

German unification followed a different path. Many German nationalists had hoped for a more liberal nation, especially during the **revolutions of 1848**, but those uprisings largely failed in the short term. Later, **Otto von Bismarck** used nationalism in a more conservative way. Through **Realpolitik** and wars in **1864**, **1866**, and **1870–1871**, Prussia unified the German states. The **German Empire** was proclaimed in **1871**.

> **Test Tip:** A common AP mistake is to say “1848 failed, so it did not matter.” Better analysis says that the revolutions failed immediately but still showed how strong nationalist and liberal pressures had become, helping later unification.

### Nationalism versus empire: why conservatives feared it

After Napoleon’s defeat, European rulers met at the **Congress of Vienna (1814–1815)**. Their aim was to restore stability, monarchy, and balance of power. Nationalism and liberalism frightened them because both could challenge dynastic rule.

> **Key Term: conservative reaction**
> The effort by rulers after the French Revolution and Napoleon to restore monarchy, order, and older political authority.

A leading figure here was **Metternich** of Austria. He understood that nationalism threatened large empires made up of many peoples. The **Austrian Empire** and **Ottoman Empire** ruled over Germans, Hungarians, Czechs, Serbs, Greeks, and many others. If each nationality demanded its own state, empire would weaken or collapse.

This is why nationalism had two very different effects:

- **unifying effect** — in Italy and Germany, it brought together divided peoples
- **fragmenting effect** — in Austria and the Ottoman Empire, it encouraged subject groups to seek autonomy or independence

The **revolutions of 1848** made this danger even clearer. Across Europe, nationalist and liberal uprisings challenged old rulers. Many were suppressed, but they revealed how unstable the old order had become.

In the Ottoman world, nationalist pressure appeared in the Balkans. Greeks, Serbs, Bulgarians, and others increasingly saw themselves as separate nations, not simply imperial subjects. Ottoman reformers later tried **Ottomanism**, a shared imperial identity for all subjects, but this did not fully overcome ethnic and religious division.

### Limits and contradictions of nationalism

Nationalism was powerful, but it was not automatically democratic or equal. That is one of the most important evaluation points for AP essays.

In France, nationalism used the language of citizenship, but many people still lacked full political inclusion. In Latin America, independence often benefited creoles more than everyone else. In Germany, nationalism supported unification but under conservative Prussian leadership, not under a liberal democratic model.

Nationalism could also become exclusionary. Some forms stressed shared citizenship; others stressed language, ancestry, religion, or ethnicity. In practice, this could push people outside the nation or justify hostility toward minorities.

This matters because nationalism later helped support imperialism as well as liberation. In colonies, it often meant **self-determination**. In powerful industrial states, it could mean competition, expansion, and belief in national superiority.

> **Key Term: self-determination**
> The idea that a people should choose its own political status and govern itself.

For AP World, this is a strong evaluative judgement: nationalism changed political life by replacing dynastic legitimacy with the language of nation and people, but it did not guarantee freedom or equality for all.

### How to use this in an AP essay

For an LEQ or DBQ, the strongest structure is usually a clear causal chain. A good thesis might argue that Enlightenment ideas did not create nationalism alone, but they supplied ideas of popular sovereignty and rights, while the French Revolution and Napoleonic era turned those ideas into mass movements that later drove independence and unification.

For **causation**, use:

- Enlightenment ideas
- French Revolution
- Napoleonic spread and backlash
- decline or weakness of empires
- local shared identities such as language, religion, and history

For **comparison**, use:

- Italy and Germany as unifying nationalism
- Austria and Ottoman lands as fragmenting nationalism
- Latin America as anti-colonial nationalism with elite limits

For **continuity and change**, stress:

- change from divine-right monarchy to legitimacy based on people and nation
- continuity of inequality, elite control, and exclusion in many new states

A strong paragraph usually names a specific case, gives a date, and explains why that evidence supports the argument.

> **Test Tip:** In DBQs or LEQs, do not just list “Italy, Germany, Greece, Bolívar.” Always tie each example to the argument: unification, independence, challenge to empire, or limits of equality.

## Key Point Checklist

_This article has covered the following key knowledge points:_

- Nationalism grew strongly in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
- Enlightenment ideas helped nationalism rise by promoting **popular sovereignty** and the **social contract**
- The **French Revolution (1789)** was the key turning point linking these ideas to mass politics
- The **Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789)** located sovereignty in the nation
- Napoleon spread nationalism by exporting revolutionary reforms and provoking anti-French resistance
- The **Congress of Vienna (1814–1815)** tried to restore monarchy and contain nationalism
- Nationalism supported independence movements in places such as **Greece** and **Latin America**
- Nationalism unified divided peoples in **Italy (1861, completed 1870)** and **Germany (1871)**
- Nationalism weakened **multiethnic empires** such as the Austrian and Ottoman Empires
- The **revolutions of 1848** often failed immediately but strengthened later nationalist developments
- Nationalism did not always mean democracy or equality for all people
- In AP essays, nationalism should be explained as both a unifying and a fragmenting force

## Key Terms and Concepts

- nationalism
- popular sovereignty
- social contract
- nation-state
- national consciousness
- conservative reaction
- self-determination


The Enlightenment - Rise of nationalism