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Germany is declared to be the Great Power par excellence, and therefore the natural and predestined master of Europe and the world.
The Pangermanists appeal to history, claiming that evolution leads to the organisation of great non-national, mixed states; there have even been writers who declare mixed states to be a higher type than purely national states. The German Social Democrats here agree with the Pangermanists on the ground that greater territories are needed to accomplish the economic and social reforms of Marxian Socialism. In general, the public political opinion of Europe favours great states. The watchword is imperialism. Smaller states and nations are spoken of with pity or a sort of contempt. The German view of a state as a power was formulated by Treitschke, when he said that there is something ridiculous in the idea of a small state.
Let us see what history tells us. Now and then, great nationally mixed states have been organised. The last attempt was made by Napoleon; before him was the mediæval Empire, the Franks, Rome, Byzantium, etc., as we go backward. All these empires perished, and out of them arose smaller states. The mediæval Empire was a peculiar alliance of various states and the church, and in general, the composition of these great empires varied greatly. On the whole, great multinational empires are an institution of the past, of a time when material force was being cherished and the principle of nationality had not been recognised, because democracy had not been recognised. Great multinational empires and autocracy are almost synonymous.
History teaches that some new great states arose by the union of smaller states of the same nationality—Germany, Italy: the growth of these states is something very different from the subjugation of various nations by one nation.
History also teaches that in modern times alongside of the few greater states arising through national unification, there arose many more small states; since the end of the 18th century we witnessed the birth of Belgium, Serbia, Greece, Bulgaria, Norway, Albania; (Switzerland was re-organised). Non-national Great Powers are decaying; Turkey has fallen; just now the greatly mixed Russia is already dismembered, giving rise to smaller and small states; and non-national Austria-Hungary is following her example.
History teaches that evolution very decidedly favours the rise of smaller national states. Out of 27 states in Europe, only Russia, Germany, Austria-Hungary, England, France, and Italy may be accepted as large states; the others, therefore a great majority, are smaller, either of moderate size like Spain or small (Denmark, Montenegro, etc.). The assertion of the Pangermanists and Marxists is quite patently not justified.
Quite erroneous is the identification of imperialism with capitalism as the Marxists make it: the great empires arose before modern capitalism, and imperialistic and aggressive designs cannot be traced merely to financial and economic motives.[1]
17. The modern state, having far more complicated aims than the older state, needs a great deal of money, to express it briefly; the citizen is obliged, in addition to his home and private needs, to give up a considerable
- ↑ As far as the conception of imperialism is concerned, I desire to call attention at least to the following: Imperium can be conceived in the Roman sense or in the mediæval sense: the Roman Empire is the creation of expansive militarism; the mediæval imperium was in theory, and at first in fact also, built on a spiritual foundation—the Empire was theocratic, the state and church were one. Later the political empire (the Emperor) grew stronger than the papacy, and in modern times, the various states actually took for their own all mediæval absolutism; the dynasties still hold on to the theocratic foundation. Austria, after making intensive use of the mediæval Empire for its dynasty, gave the Empire up, Prussia renewed it; Russia held on to the idea of the Byzantine Empire. In practice, all these Empires followed the old Roman example—material domination was to them both the means and the end. The mediæval Empire had some justification during a certain time; the modern empire is an anachronism.Often the term imperialism is used, when some kind of peaceful federation of various states is thought of, cf. the chapter on state nationalism.
