Illegitimate Violence in the French and Austrian Militaries during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars (1789–1815)

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Tanja Bührer
• Subject Area: Modern and Contemporary History ; Early Modern History
• Term: since 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 407133841

This sub-project compares the French and Austrian armies during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars (French Wars) that – with short interruptions – raged for twenty-three years throughout almost the whole of Europe and large parts of the world. These wars marked a changing character of warfare that can be roughly characterized as Volkskrieg (‘People’s War’) and which was adopted in other parts of Europe in response to the new challenges of the French wars of conquest. This sub-project aims to analyse to what extent the ‘nation in arms’ and its vigorous ideology had an impact on understandings of legitimate and illegitimate violence and on practices of warfare, specifically regarding an erasure of the basic distinction between soldiers and civilians.A comparison between the French and Austrian armies and their specific cultures of violence promises to be particularly valuable because these two great powers were the most prominent political-military antagonists on the European continent involved in a series of wars throughout the whole period under consideration. Also, the French and the Austrian armies were the very antithesis of one another during this age of political revolutions, military reforms and the emerging nationalism and liberalism. Both armies were part of an empire, but whereas Austria was a landlocked multi-ethnic empire, France became increasingly a centralized ‘nation state with (overseas) imperial extensions’ (Matthias Middell). Overall, this sub-project aims to illuminate transformations in practices and understandings of illegitimate violence from the early modern to the modern times – which is a pivotal period of transition within the overall project – by contrasting the most progressive and the most conservative military protagonists.

• DFG Programme: Research Units
• Subproject of: FOR 2898: Military Cultures of Violence - Illegitimate Military Violence from the Early Modern Period to the Second World War
• International Connection: Austria