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After the reign of terror in France, the leaders of the Revolutionary leaders concentrated on restoring order in the society. Notably, the governments that were led by most of these leaders failed to succeed in restoring this order in the French community. However, Napoleon succeeded in restoring this order irrespective of the fact that his predecessors had earlier on failed to do so. One of the factors that contributed to his success lies in the fact that he developed a Civil Code which regulated social relations and property rights (Chambers, Hanawalt & Rabb, 2003, p.607). Most important is the fact that this code was able to restore the sovereignty of the father as the head of the household which was seen as a way of restoring and maintaining social stability (p.609). With this in mind, Napoleon managed to create a New France. However, he betrayed the ideologies of the French Revolution in the sense that he continued with the vices that had formed the genesis of this revolution such as oppression.
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Congress of Vienna and Restoration of Political Order
By 1815, there were definite power centers in Europe. In reference to Chambers, Hanawalt & Rabb (2003), these centers of power lied in Austria, Great Britania, Russia and Prussia (p.626). In addition, France was later on included as one of the centers of power. Notably, the buffers centers also existed in Europe at this particular time. One of the buffer centers was the Austrian Netherlands which was later absorbed into the independent Kingdom of Netherlands (p.627).
The emergence of different political, economic and social powers in Europe at this particular time played a key role in the shaping of the European politics. In line with this, there are different power centers in Europe that had advantages over others. For instance, France had advantages over others in the sense that it possessed a strong military that enabled them to fight and conquer other nations easily. On the other hand, Russia was disadvantaged by the fact that it had poor development progress that weakened it (Chambers, Hanawalt & Rabb, 2003, p.630). More important is the fact that politics of order was a critical response to the French revolution and the Age of Napoleon in the sense that they were able to restrain the reign of France and the furtherance of its policies across Europe (p.629). However, they acted as recipe for emergence of other powers in Europe that resulted in a lot of instability.
The Effects of Industrialization
Industrialization of the other hand had a lot of effects on European society in the 19th century. To begin with, there was a boom in the European population resulting in lack of the necessary social needs since the environment in which this society was set in was not ready to host a large population beyond a certain limit (Chambers, Hanawalt & Rabb, 2003, p.645). Therefore, most people began living in poor conditions. On the other hand, there were tremendous changes on the overall society as social classes became the norm of the day. With this in mind, discrimination began to be seen in the society especially based on social standing in the society. More so, the issue of working in order to meet the social needs in the family created an aspect of working among women and children, with children being forced to work at a very early age (p.644). Similarly, divorce cases rose since family members worked far away from each other.
Napoleon’s Autobiography
In the last days of Napoleon, he justified himself as one of the key persons in the French revolution. In his justification, Napoleon argues that he had cleansed the French revolution, restored authority to kings and ennobled the common people (Chambers, Hanawalt & Rabb, 2003, p.621). With this in mind, he also argued that to achieve it was important to use dictatorship since this was the only way forward and thus restrain excess freedom in France. As a result of this, Napoleon manages to portray himself as an authoritarian leader who could not tolerate any form social disorder that had caused his predecessors to fail in leading France.