Nationalism, Socialism, and Liberalism

Before we start talking about the three big political schools of thought that the time, there are two important guys that need to be recognized...

ROBSPIERRE V METTERNICH 

So once we broke it down during that assignment, we realized that they had very different ideals, but went about those ideals in similar ways 

This led Yarn to compare them to Stalin and Hitler, who both used the same kind of tactics to gain power 




Now, for the main topic of discussion: Nationalism, Socialism, and Liberalism 

Nationalism - based on identity and culture of a country, thought that they weren't the problem, but other countries were. Usually viewed their country as the absolute best and wanted to further improve society by boxing other countries out. (Example= "make america great again!" or "America first!" 
Con- the perfect communities often imagined by nationalists were just too unrealistic 



Socialism- based on economics, wanted the government to regulate private property, class consciousness was central, benefitted more of the working class people, wanted equality in economics (land ownership) 



Liberalism- did not want government intervention in economics (laissez fair), wanted representative government, but only certain classes would be represented (huh, sounds kind of unfair), wanted more government reforms and policies

IMPORTANT: LIBERALISM OF THIS TIME IS NOT WHAT IT IS TODAY 

So, think this: 

(Adam Smith, but you already knew that right?)

Instead of this: 

(ugh, so much love in one pic)

Now for the final question... 

Why was nationalism and socialism sharper tools than liberalism?

Liberalism just wasn't giving people the results they wanted, so when socialism came in with its new ideal of class consciousness, a lot of people hopped on board. Socialism appealed to a lot more people than liberalism did because socialism was geared towards the working class and poor, while liberalism only wanted representation for the wealthy landowners. It also created less competition in the job market, which is always a great thing for the unemployed. Nationalism worked better than liberalism because it was able to effect many different countries and reach across the continent.