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Melvyn Bragg

Kathleen Burk

Tim Blanning

John Bew

Simon Tillotson

In Our Time: The Congress of Vienna

The Congress of Vienna

19/10/2017

BBC Radio 4 - In Our Time, The Congress of Vienna

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Congress of Vienna, 1814-15.

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the peace plan for Europe after the Napoleonic Wars, with the redrawing of borders and balancing of the great powers so that none would be dominant.

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the conference convened by the victorious powers of the Napoleonic Wars and the earlier French Revolutionary Wars, which had devastated so much of Europe over the last 25 years. The powers aimed to create a long lasting peace, partly by redrawing the map to restore old boundaries and partly by balancing the powers so that none would risk war again. It has since been seen as a very conservative outcome, reasserting the old monarchical and imperial orders over the growth of liberalism and national independence movements, and yet also largely successful in its goal of preventing war in Europe on such a scale for another 100 years. Delegates to Vienna were entertained at night with lavish balls, and the image above is from a French cartoon showing Russia, Prussia, and Austria dancing to the bidding of Castlereagh, the British delegate.

With 

Kathleen Burk
Professor Emerita of Modern and Contemporary History at University College London

Tim Blanning
Emeritus Professor of Modern European History at the University of Cambridge

and

John Bew
Professor in History and Foreign Policy at the War Studies Department at King's College London




Producer: Simon Tillotson.

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