Peace of Westphalia

(Redirected from Treaty of Westphalia)

Categories: Thirty Years' War | Eighty Years' War | Peace treaties | Swedish peace treaties | French peace treaties

Image:The Ratification of the Treaty of Münster (Gerard Terborch 1648).jpg
The Ratification of the Treaty of Münster
by Gerard Terborch (1648)
Image:Helst, Peace of Münster.jpg
Banquet of the Amsterdam Civic Guard in Celebration of the Peace of Münster
by Bartholomeus van der Helst, 1648

The Peace of Westphalia, also known also as the Treaties of Münster and Osnabrück, refers to the series of treaties that ended the Thirty Years' War and officially recognized the United Provinces and Swiss Confederation. The Spanish treaty which ended the Eighty Years' War was signed on January 30, 1648. The treaty signed October 24, 1648 was between the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III, the other German princes, France, and Sweden. The Treaty of the Pyrenees, signed in 1659, ending the war between France and Spain is also often considered part of the treaty.

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Locations

The peace negotiations were held after initial talks held in the cities of Münster and Osnabrück, which lie about 50 km apart in the present day states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Lower Saxony. These cities were favoured by Sweden whereas Hamburg and Cologne were proposed by the French. Two locations were needed as the Protestant and Catholic leaders refused to meet each other. The city of Münster was used by the Catholics, while Osnabrück was used by the Protestants.

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Results

The results of the treaty were wide ranging. Among other things, the Netherlands gained independence from Spain, ending the Eighty Years' War, and Sweden gained Pomerania, Wismar, Bremen and Verden. The power of the Holy Roman Emperor was broken, and the rulers of the German states were again able to determine the religion of their lands. The treaty also gave Calvinists legal recognition. Three new great powers arose from this peace: Sweden, the United Provinces and France. Sweden's time as a Great Power was to be short lived, however.

The majority of the treaty's terms can be attributed to the work of Cardinal Mazarin, who was the de facto leader of France at the time. France came out of the war in a far better position than any other Power and was able to dictate much of the treaty.

Another important result of the treaty was that it laid rest to the idea of the Holy Roman Empire having secular dominion over the entire Christian world. The nation-state would be the highest level of government, subservient to no others.

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Tenets

The major tenets of the Peace of Westphalia were:

  • The Peace of Prague was incorporated into the Peace of Westphalia (which incorporated the Peace of Augsburg, though its landholdings which were reestablished by the Peace of Prague were again reestablished from 1627 to 1624, which aided the Protestants. The Calvinists were thus recognized internationally, and the Edict of Restitution was again rescinded. The first Diet of Speyer was accepted internationally).
  • There were also territorial adjustments:
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Significance

It is often said that the Peace of Westphalia initiated modern diplomacy, as it marked the beginning of the modern system of nation-states (or "Westphalian states"). Subsequent European wars were not about issues of religion, but rather revolved around issues of state. This allowed Catholic and Protestant Powers to ally, leading to a number of major realignments.

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Modern views

In 1998 on a Symposium on the Political Relevance of the 1648 Peace of Westphalia, then-NATO Secretary General Javier Solana said that "humanity and democracy [were] two principles essentially irrelevant to the original Westphalian order" and levied a criticism that "the Westphalian system had its limits. For one, the principle of sovereignty it relied on also produced the basis for rivalry, not community of states; exclusion, not integration." [1]

In 2001, German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer referred to the Peace of Westphalia in his Humboldt Speech, which argued that the system of European politics set up by Westphalia was obsolete: "The core of the concept of Europe after 1945 was and still is a rejection of the European balance-of-power principle and the hegemonic ambitions of individual states that had emerged following the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, a rejection which took the form of closer meshing of vital interests and the transfer of nation-state sovereign rights to supranational European institutions." [2]

In the aftermath of the 11 March 2004 Madrid attacks, the terrorist network al-Qaida declared that "the international system built-up by the West since the Treaty of Westphalia will collapse; and a new international system will rise under the leadership of a mighty Islamic state". [3]

Also, it is often claimed that globalization is bringing an evolution of the international system past the sovereign Westphalian state.

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Trivia

Adolf Hitler let his grievances be known in his book Mein Kampf about how the Treaty of Westphalia cemented Germany's internal divisions for over 200 years, hampering its unitary development.

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See also

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External links

de:Westfälischer Friede es:Paz de Westfalia eo:Vestfalia Paco fr:Traités de Westphalie it:Pace di Westfalia he:שלום וסטפליה nl:Vrede van Münster ja:ヴェストファーレン条約 no:Freden i Westfalen pl:Pokój westfalski 1648 pt:Paz de Vestfália sv:Westfaliska freden zh:威斯特伐利亚和约