Hello, and happy Thursday. This is Victoria, Narrative Design Lead of Victoria 3, and today I will be covering the first round of paid content contained in National Awakening. I will also be covering some additional free features and improvements that we ran out of space to cover in the last dev diary.
National Awakening is centred around the Austrian Empire and Balkan nations, with supporting content for the Ottoman Empire. Its central theme is the conflict between established dynastic states and aspiring nation-states. The vision of universal monarchy embodied by the Austrian and Ottoman Empires is placed in contrast with the particular ambitions of the Balkan nations. The victory of the latter requires tearing the former to pieces, transforming subjects into citizens divided by blood and language. Owners of National Awakening will be able to experience this conflict from both sides – struggling against the nationalist onslaught as the Austrian Empire, or striving towards the national aspirations of the Balkan states.
National Awakening contains quite a lot of narrative content. If we attempted to cover it all in a single diary, we would both need to compromise on the image count and risk occupying our readers’ entire evenings – a fate which I believe would be quite cruel. As I am not a cruel person [[u]ᶜᶦᵗᵃᵗᶦᵒⁿ ⁿᵉᵉᵈᵉᵈ], we will be splitting our coverage into two diaries. This first one will cover Austria Hungary, and some generic content, whilst the second will cover the Balkan states – Montenegro, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Greece, as well as the supporting content we have added to the Ottoman Empire.
The Age of Metternich
Following the death of Emperor Franz I in 1835, the Austrian Empire was left in a difficult position. The new Emperor, Ferdinand I and V, was considered by both his late father and his advisors to be incapable of effective governance. The will of the late Franz I hence constituted the Secret State Conference, a de jure advisory panel for the new Emperor which would serve as the de facto ruling cabinet of Austria until the Revolutions of 1848. The panel’s members would include the Habsburg Archdukes Ludwig and Franz Karl, Count Franz Anton von Kolowrat-Liebsteinsky, and Prince Klemens von Metternich.
When one thinks of the Austrian Empire, Klemens von Metternich is likely to be one of the first figures that comes to mind. As Foreign Minister of the Austrian Empire, he orchestrated the marriage of Napoleon to an Austrian Archduchess, and chaired the Congress of Vienna. As State Chancellor in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars, he developed a reputation as Europe’s leading conservative statesman, dedicating much of his time to maintaining the post-Napoleonic geopolitical order. Following the death of Emperor Franz I, he is widely regarded to have been the leading power in Austria, leading a despotic government with zero tolerance for any liberal cause.
How true is this narrative? How does one portray a figure like Metternich, who has been alternately slandered and lionised, condemned and exonerated, appraised and reappraised – first by his contemporaries, and then by historians? First, we must understand the real conditions within which he existed. We must understand that Austria was not conservative because of Metternich, and that Vienna – let alone all of Europe – did not bow to his whims. Historical Austrian policy did not correspond one-to-one to Metternich’s personal beliefs, which evolved over time. Within the Secret State Conference, Metternich had a limited portfolio, centred around foreign affairs, and his influence within the Austrian court waxed and waned over time. Following what historian Wolfram Siemann referred to as a “minor coup” by Franz Anton von Kolowrat in December of 1836, Metternich was excluded from briefings and reports on domestic affairs, and matters such as finance and policing would become the exclusive purview of Kolowrat. Past this point, the existence of a “Metternich System” within Austria itself becomes questionable.
Conversely, we must understand that Metternich was not an irrelevancy. The nineteenth century was, perhaps, the period in which the greatest amount of power was concentrated in the fewest number of hands – to ignore the role of individuals in shaping this era would be a drastic overcorrection. Prior to our period, he played an indispensable personal role in European diplomacy and Austrian policymaking, especially as pertains to the diplomatic service. His historical marginalisation at the hands of Kolowrat in 1836 greatly diminished his ability to affect Austrian policy, but he was still capable of actions such as blocking Archduke Karl from assuming supreme command of the Austrian Army throughout the 1840s, and facilitating the annexation of Kraków in 1846. One may safely say that his term on the Secret State Conference was largely spent in dire political straits, but to present him as a powerless courtier would be both a historiographical mistake and a waste of narrative potential.
It is certainly the case that Metternich was conservative, at times reactionary even for his time. He was an opponent of enlightened absolutism as embodied by the policies of Joseph II, favouring the traditional privileges of the estates over autocratic power. He was an opponent of convening a central Parliament, believing that doing so would inflame tensions between the Habsburg Empire’s nationalities. In 1847, he advised King Friedrich Wilhelm of Prussia to refrain from summoning the United Parliament on the same grounds. Despite opposing centralised autocracy, he was an advocate for rationalising the functions of the Imperial government, proposing a system of far-reaching reforms for the Secret State Conference which would end the disorganised system of ad hoc written communication with in-person cooperation between agencies. These reforms would largely never be realised, and the Austrian government would be placed into a long state of semi-paralysis between the December of 1836 and the Revolutions of 1848.
Economically, Metternich diverged from the reactionary mould into which he is often placed. Historically, he favoured industrialisation and closer economic ties between the Zollverein and Austrian Empire, adopting an all-German perspective with regards to economic development. In 1841, he proposed an ambitious programme of free trade, domestic infrastructure development, and the integration of Austrian and North German railway systems. As with his government reform, this would encounter fierce resistance from Kolowrat’s clique, coming down to nothing in the end. Towards the end of his career, one may say that Metternich had joined the tradition of doomed modernising reformers whose proposals came to be too little and too late.
Metternich, in all of his personal intricacies, serves as an iconic device from which we may create a narrative. The Age of Metternich Journal Entry, available for Austria from game start, uses him as a lens to present the historical priorities of the Austrian government throughout the Vormärz period.
This Journal Entry contains ten subgoals, themed around his foreign and domestic ambitions. If one chooses to pursue his agenda, maintaining Austria’s status at the heart of conservative Europe, one will receive rewards of a strength proportional to the number of completed subgoals – and, following up on the theme of conflicted historiography, a different parting thought.
One may also choose to follow the historical outcome – sending him away from Vienna with a revolutionary mob at his heels.
Historically, this was not the end for Metternich. After the Revolution, he fled to England, where he hosted many influential visitors, launched a short-lived newspaper endeavour, and became increasingly fond of the British press and parliamentary system. He spoke positively of both the Tory and Whig parties, viewing them to be organic social groupings naturally arisen from British society, whilst condemning continental European political parties as artificial constructs born of pure ideology. To the late Metternich, Germans were simply not civilised enough to possess a parliamentary system. He would later move to Belgium, and, during the Neo-Absolutist period, back to Vienna, where he would live out the rest of his days in retirement.
Autocracy in the Age of Liberty
The Revolutions of 1848 brought the Austrian Empire to the brink of collapse. Revolutions in the Empire’s Italian provinces brought Austria into a war with a coalition of Italian states at the same time as the Hungarian revolutionary government launched its War of Independence. For a time, Vienna, Milan, Venice, and Budapest were all in the hands of revolutionaries, and the Austrian court was forced to flee to Innsbruck. It took the combined efforts of Austria, Russia, and Prussia to crush each rebellion and restore Imperial authority to each corner of Austria.
In the waning days of the Revolutions, the newly-enthroned Emperor Franz Josef I issued a series of decrees which granted him absolute power, abolished the Diet of Hungary, and partitioned the former Kingdom of Hungary into several military districts. This marked the beginning of “Neo-Absolutism”, a period in which the Emperor and Viennese bureaucracy embarked upon a radical programme of centralisation. The Neo-Absolutists, exemplified by Interior Minister Alexander Bach, sought to abolish the traditional privileges of the crown-lands, instating an authoritarian unitary regime that sought to marginalise nationalist sentiments through economic growth and quality governance.
The Autocracy in the Age of Liberty Journal Entry provides flavour to this Neo-Absolutist period. It is enabled for an autocratic Austria that has both successfully eliminated all of its Crown Land subjects. The Neo-Absolutist project’s emphasis on empowering the bureaucracy and achieving social peace through the power of the state is very much in line with the spirit of the Austrian “Biedermänner”, and so one may choose to pursue this Journal Entry with either a Petit-Bourgeoisie-inclined monarch [such as Franz Josef I], or a powerful Petit-Bourgeoisie government.
To successfully complete this Journal Entry, one must successfully complete four out of its five conditions before Constitutional Pressure gets too intense. Constitutional Pressure abstracts the various conditions which led to the historical fall of the Neo-Absolutist regime – from the passive resistance of the Hungarian political establishment to the military defeats against Prussia and Italy.
The Neo-Absolutist period had a highly Catholic character, with “Clerical Absolutism” and “Neo-Absolutism” being largely synonymous. In 1855, Alexander Bach signed a concordat with the Pope that granted the Catholic Church greatly expanded authority within the Austrian Empire, especially over education. Signing this concordat is one of the possible ways one may move this Journal Entry towards completion.
Other priorities of the regime are disempowering the Crownland diets and completing the abolition of feudal obligations, such as the widely-despised robot.
If one can successfully complete this Journal Entry, they will be rewarded with a unique Distribution of Power law, representing the refined and entrenched Neo-Absolutist system. This serves as a variant of Autocracy that grants even more Authority, and favours Bureaucrats over Aristocrats.
If one fails to entrench this system, one will come to the historical outcome. The government’s creditors will lose patience with the Neo-Absolutist project, and demand that it either issue a Constitution or have its credit cut off. At this point, one may choose to either do as they wish, or suffer a sharp increase in interest rates.
Pictured: Dread it, run from it, the bond market arrives all the same.
The Gründerzeit
The Gründerzeit, or “founding period”, was a time of great speculation and economic growth in the German states. During this time, the development of the German railway system and liberalisation of corporate law led to an explosion in the amount of enterprises founded per year. The frenetic economic tempo of this period would continue until the Panic of 1873, a stock-market crash so severe that the term “Great Depression” was first used to describe it.
The Gründerzeit is a Journal Entry shared across all of the German states, representing the free and wild speculation of this era. Whilst this Journal Entry is active, all German states will contribute to its goal – to increase their collective GDP by 2.5% each quarter. At the beginning of this period, one may choose the degree to which one wishes to commit to the Gründerzeit, taking on various amounts of risk depending on the option one chooses
Whilst the Gründerzeit is ongoing, the German states will be expected to maintain consistent quarterly collective GDP growth of at least 2.5%. Failing to meet this target for any given quarter will decrease the progress bar, representing declining investor confidence – failing four quarters in a row will trigger the panic that historically put an end to this period. If one manages to maintain this constantly inflating bubble for thirty years in a row, one will successfully ride out the Gründerzeit without experiencing the subsequent hangover.
We believe that it is entirely reasonable to expect an economy to maintain thirty years of uninterrupted growth, and have staked our entire life savings on this.
Pictured: Nikolai Kondratiev, eat your heart out!
The Triple Monarchy
The Kingdom of Croatia existed as an autonomous unit within the Hungarian portion of Habsburg monarchy since the sixteenth century. Historically, the Austro-Hungarian Compromise was soon followed by the Croatian-Hungarian Compromise, which confirmed the self-governing status of the Croatian Sabor, and legally merged the lands of Croatia and Slavonia. Croatia existed as an autonomy within Hungary from 1867 to 1918, after which it briefly achieved de jure status as a third, co-equal crown within the collapsing Habsburg monarchy. This situation lasted only for one week, after which the Croatian Sabor voted to terminate the Union and declare independence from Austria as a constituent of the State of Slovenes, Croats, and Serbs.
Croatian independence from Hungary and the establishment of a South Slavic unit within the Empire had long been a demand of Croatian nationalists. The first expression of this demand within our time period was the Illyrian Movement of the 1830s and 40s, a political current amongst the Croatian intelligentsia calling for the establishment of a unified South Slavic state within the Austrian Empire. Its demands included the unification of Croatia, Slavonia, and Dalmatia under a single “Triune Kingdom”, the separation of Croatia from Hungary, and the use of the Croatian language in the Croatian Sabor. Activists of the movement may also be credited with the development and popularisation of the Croatian literary language. The Austro-Hungarian compromise, which set a precedent for separate crowns under the Austrian Emperor, created hopes amongst South Slavs for a Triple Monarchy between Austria, Hungary, and Croatia. This political current would be referred to as “trialism”, and its supporters would include two ill-fated heirs to the Austrian crown – Crown Prince Rudolf and Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
If one chooses to establish the Dual Monarchy through the Matter of Hungary Journal Entry, and Hungary is choosing to be uncooperative, one may choose to create a third crown through the decision to Issue a Trialist Manifesto. The Trialist Manifesto will split Croatia from Hungary, and transform Austria-Hungary into Austria-Hungary-Croatia. Such a measure, however, will require Hungarian approval – and this may prove difficult to acquire.
Once this decision is taken, Hungary will receive an event in which they may choose to veto the Manifesto. If Hungary does so, Austria will be faced with a choice of their own. Under the terms of the Austro-Hungarian compromise, the Austrian Emperor has no legal recourse to enforce such a decision on Hungary. Will they cease their pursuit of the triple crown, or will they make use of an illegal appeal to force?
A military intervention was not out of the question, historically. By the early twentieth centuries, tensions between Austria and Hungary had developed to the point that Franz Ferdinand intended to do precisely this upon taking the throne, breaking the dualist structure of the Empire and forcing the introduction of universal suffrage in Hungary at gunpoint.
If Hungary consents to the Manifesto – or if Austria can successfully enforce a wargoal on it during an Enforce Trialist Manifesto Diplomatic Play – Croatia will be established as a new Personal Union subject of Austria, and the Dual Monarchy will become the Triple Monarchy.
Pictured: There are many problems which can be solved by invading Hungary.
If one establishes a Triple Monarchy, Croatia will typically be much more amicable to imperial interests than Hungary will be. This will be quite useful if one seeks to pursue the next step in reforming the Empire – the United States of Greater Austria.
Pictured: A trialist Empire with a pan-Slavic Croatia.
The Federal Solution
In 1906, Aurel Popovici published The United States of Greater Austria, an ambitious proposal to reorganise the Austro-Hungarian empire into a “Greater Austria” with fifteen federal states. This proposal swiftly attracted attention amongst a circle of radical reformers that surrounded Franz Ferdinand – the heir to the Austrian throne at the time.
It is important to note that Popovici’s proposal was essentially a conservative one, with its objective being the dismemberment of Hungary and maintenance of the Habsburg dynasty. To Popovici, the Hungarian state was dominated by a Kossuthist revolutionary conspiracy which sought to subvert the Austrian Empire and transform the various nationalities of Hungary into a unitary, uniform mass through Magyarisation. Furthermore, he believed that this homogenisation was a natural result of cosmopolitan democracy, and that nationalism was necessary to resist the homogenising impulses of the state. The proposal for the United States of Greater Austria was hence heavily focused upon ethnic autonomy, drawing borders along very precise linguistic lines and designating its federal units by ethnicity.
Whilst other proposals for the federalisation of the Empire existed, such as Lajos Kossuth’s plan for the organisation of a republican “Danubian State” circa 1848, and the territorial federalisation supported by the Austro-Marxists, we have deemed Popovici’s United States of Greater Austria to be the most feasible. This Journal Entry is thus flavoured around a more conservative approach.
If Austria has formed the Dual or Triple Monarchy, it will receive a proposal for federalisation of the monarchy upon researching Pan-Nationalism. Declining the proposal will dismiss the relevant Journal Entry, and enable a decision which will allow one to reconsider it at any time one wishes.
The Federal Solution Journal Entry allows one to build their own United States of Greater Austria. In order to succeed in this Journal Entry, one must both assemble a coalition of nationalities willing to sign on to the project and get one’s applicable Personal Unions, Crown Lands, and Puppets to cooperate.
Once this proposal is accepted, all Austrian Crown Lands and Personal Unions will receive a Journal Entry of their own, allowing for them to choose whether to either combat or assist the formation of the United States of Greater Austria. If one has a powerful Personal Union with high Liberty Desire – such as Hungary – one may need to accede to the particular demands of their dominant cultures, possibly throwing other cultures to the winds in the name of securing their cooperation.
If a subject is especially uncooperative, of course, they may be unwilling to accept even that. In such cases, extraordinary measures may be necessary.
Pictured: This is going to be a problem.
To assemble a collection of nationalities, one must address their grievances with other cultures, and draw the map of the future United States of Greater Austria in a manner that is advantageous to them. It is not possible to get every culture on board – one must be strategic, and try and maximise the number of Integrated cultures whilst Disqualifying as few cultures as possible. An Integrated culture is one that is willing to cooperate with the federalisation project, becoming a primary culture of Austria and counting towards the completion requirement, whilst a Disqualified culture is one that is unwilling to cooperate under any circumstances.
Each button will give one a choice in how to address a given culture’s demands. To Integrate one culture will often Disqualify another – or, at the very least, radicalise a portion of that culture’s population, and worsen relations with subjects of that culture. Furthermore, if one violates promises one has already made, the betrayed culture will immediately become Disqualified – and spawn a much larger amount of radicals.
Once one has assembled a coalition of nationalities, one may sign federalisation into law, locking in one’s current coalition. At this point, one must either get one’s subjects into line, or cut them loose to save the whole.
Completing this Journal Entry will annex all of Austria’s applicable subjects, and change the country’s name to the United States of Greater Austria, with a pleasing marble-grey map colour and an extremely interesting flag. It will also grant the Danubian tradition trait to all cultures with homelands within the union’s territory, granting even those who could not initially be Integrated an acceptance boost.
Pictured: In this case, Hungary proved an insurmountable obstacle to federalisation, and so it was booted out of the Empire. As a result, the Hungarian culture does not get the Danubian tradition trait.
The Ständestaat
In 1891, Pope Leo XIII published Rerum Novarum, an encyclical addressing the condition of the working class. This encyclical detailed the Catholic approach to the social question, outlined the duties of capital and labour to support one another, expressed support for workers’ rights to form trade unions, and criticised both laissez-faire capitalism and socialism. This document served a foundational role in the history of Catholic corporatism, and would provide support for conservative trade unions against their politically radical rivals. In the years following Rerum Novarum, Catholic political parties, such as the Austrian Christian Social Party, would tend to drift in a corporatist direction.
Following the fall of the Austrian Empire and the October Revolution in Russia, figures in the Christian Social Party would become radicalised against its social-democratic opponents, advocating for an end to parliamentary democracy and the replacement of the First Austrian Republic with a corporate state, or “Ständestaat”. The Christian Socials, Landbund, and Heimwehr paramilitary organisations would collaborate to end Austrian democracy in 1933, ushering in a period of corporatist dictatorship commonly referred to as “Austrofascism”.
Historically, the Austrofascist takeover occurred towards the very tail end of our period, under a republican Austria that had lost its Empire. However, one may argue that the rise of Austrofascism did not necessarily require such a cataclysm. The tendencies which would lead to the Austrofascist regime were endemic to the Christian Social Party, and anti-democratic sentiments were hardly unknown in Austria-Hungary. The extension of universal male suffrage in 1907, a measure implemented due to a general strike supported by the Social-Democratic Party, created a great degree of resentment in Austrian conservative circles and the military. The Austrian military pushed for a law which included wide-ranging wartime powers in 1912, allowing for direct control of production by the military. These laws, in combination with an article of the 1867 Constitution permitting for rule by decree and a harshly reactionary military establishment, led to a state of military dictatorship in Austria following the outbreak of the First World War. A transition from a unitary Austrian Empire to an enlarged Ständestaat is thus not entirely implausible.
The Ständestaat Journal Entry is available for a democratic Austria that has neither formed the Dual or Triple Monarchy, nor federalised. Once it is active, one may choose to combat the rising Corporatist threat, or embrace their agenda.
If one chooses to embrace the Corporatist project, and get a sympathetic figure as Head of State, one may immediately transition to a Single-Party State through a button. To represent the Fatherland Front’s strange, nebulous identity, this button will transition whatever political party the Head of State belongs to into the Fatherland Front. This means that one may have a Fatherland Front with a conservative, agrarian, militaristic, fascistic, or Catholic flavour, depending on the party which formed it.
Once one has enacted a set of corporatist laws and repressed the socialists, Austria will be successfully re-organised into the Ständestaat.
We are aware that there is a heated debate amongst historians over whether the Fatherland Front was truly “fascist” or not. “Austrofascism”, itself, is a controversial term. We have designed this content to be agnostic on this question. To draw a sharp line between the realms of “fascism” and “not-fascism” posits a clean, qualitative difference between the two, which is a questionable thesis at best. We believe in taking a descriptive approach – the Fatherland Front must be assessed according to its real character, not what labels may be applied to it from on high.
The Hungarian Revolution
The Hungarian Revolution was one of the most spectacular occurrences of the 1848 Revolutions. Beginning as a “lawful revolution” by reform-inclined Hungarian magnates for a better position within the Austrian Empire, it evolved into a full-scale war for independence, lasting for more than a year and necessitating Russian intervention to defeat.
The Hungarian Revolution Journal Entry for Hungary allows one to pursue the same ends the historical Hungarian revolutionaries did – a liberal, modern Hungarian nation-state, either independent or occupying an autonomous and untouchable position within the Habsburg Empire.
The unique interactions in this Journal Entry allow a Hungary player to rapidly liberalise, at the cost of a major rift with Austria. One will want to time one’s political revolution carefully, at a time when the Austrians are otherwise occupied – such as, for example, the Springtime of the Peoples.
Even if one can push through one’s reforms at an advantageous time, the Austrian Empire is certain to not be in crisis forever. The “Establish the Honvéd Army” interaction allows one to prepare for the inevitable Austrian reprisal by assembling a solid, well-motivated conscript army of one’s own.
The enthusiastic Magyarisation programmes pursued by the Hungarian revolutionaries, however, are certain to spark dissent. Historically, these policies led the many minority populations of Hungary sided with the Austrian imperial forces during Hungary’s independence war. A war that drags on for too long may lead to these minority-dominated territories breaking away and seeking status as autonomous crownlands within the Austrian Empire.
Successfully securing Hungarian independence will allow one to choose a monarch from the various noble houses of Europe, from Romanov to Orleans
National Awakening
The National Awakening Journal Entry represents the efforts of the various Balkan nations to develop their national identities. It is available to all Balkan nations which have researched Nationalism, have a non-Subjecthood citizenship law, and have achieved a certain degree of independence from their overlord. It revolves around both increasing one’s cultural Fervour, and achieving independence.
This Journal Entry creates a National Awakening map marker when it is enabled, and is accompanied by numerous events, all with the theme of developing a country’s national identity.
Once this Journal Entry is completed, a nation may leverage their newfound sense of identity to place claims on what they consider to be their culture’s homelands, setting the stage for conflicts to come.
Additional Free Content
Update 1.10 brings a tremendous amount of free content to the game. Our previous diary addressed this free content, yet did not quite manage to cover everything. This section will include two new free additions to the game – the National Awakening map marker, and the Colonial Slavery law.
National Awakening Markers
Update 1.10 brings a new use of the map to the game – the National Awakening marker. A National Awakening marker highlights the epicentre of a nation’s “National Awakening” – the point at which a nation’s literary culture reaches critical mass, and catalyses a rapid increase in national consciousness. An example of a historical National Awakening would be the Croatian National Revival, in which Croatian nationalist activists released numerous vernacular publications of note using a newly-developed Croatian written language.
A culture may have one National Awakening per game. National Awakenings may occur when a culture reaches 30 Cultural Fervour. A National Awakening will catalyse the formation of a National Movement, increase attraction to cultural movements, and further increase Fervour whilst it is active. As a multinational empire, a subject culture having its National Awakening is something to keep an eye on.
Pictured: Habsburg Nightmare Mode – simultaneous National Awakenings for nearly every nationality in the Empire.
As one may see, we have also changed the Culture and Religion mapmodes to use stripes to highlight sizable minorities.
Colonial Slavery
At game start, many European nations had either banned or chosen to not recognise the institution of slavery on their mainland territories, whilst maintaining the institution in their overseas colonies. The Colonial Slavery law represents this state of affairs, allowing countries to safely cordon the institution of slavery off from the prying eyes of respectable citizens. This law functions as Debt Slavery in unincorporated states and Slavery Banned in incorporated states. Whilst this law is active, discriminated pops with low standard of living in unincorporated states will slowly become enslaved.
The Colonial Slavery law is active at game start for Spain, Portugal, Denmark, the Netherlands, and France.
And that is all. Thank you for reading. Next week, we will continue to cover the paid narrative content contained in National Awakening.