War. Parallel to the Congress of Vienna itself was a process known as the
‘Congress System’, in which the leading powers tried to organize themselves to
control European international politics by a series of diplomatic meetings
rather like modern summit meetings. Only five meetings were held before the
system finally collapsed in 1825. It failed partly because of conflicts about how
far the powers would go in interfering within the domestic politics of countries
threatened by revolution, but even more because Britain was determined to
distance itself from Europe and enter a period of deliberateisolationism.
However just the Vienna settlement was, or was not, it achieved a longer peace
in Europe, punctuated only by Prussia’s wars with Austria in 1866 and France
in 1870–71, than had previously obtained in European history. The aspirations
of peoples and territories which were ignored in the border settlements at
Vienna, however, were major problems at the next great peace conference,
resulting in the treaties of Versailles and others in 1919–20, and some lasting
implications were still perceptible in Eastern Europe in the 1990s.
Consensual
Consensual simply means ‘in agreement’, but it refers essentially to a process of
agreement reached by an effort to find deep underlying compatibility between
different viewpoints, rather than pragmatic and possibly temporary coinci-
dence of separate ends. In claiming that there is a consensus in a society or
group about something there are really two points being asserted. Firstly, the
agreement is not merely a practical decision by groups or individuals who do
not really agree at all, but who see a tactical necessity to vote in the same way.
Rather the issues have been debated, the sources of initial disagreement
explored, and a solution that everyone can accept, indeed believe in, has been
reached. Secondly, it is being suggested that this agreement is both deep-rooted
and long-term; the issues will not become controversial again, at least for a
reasonable period. This is, obviously, an optimistic, even idealistic, definition,
but it adequately explains the hopes expressed by those who seek consensus in
situations of political conflict. An example in the United Kingdom is the
political consensus on the value of the National Health Service (NHS), where
there is overwhelming support for the free provision of basic services to the
entire population. However, this sort of definition has shortcomings, because
consensus is not merely a matter of head counting. There are issues where an
overwhelming majority agree with a policy, but where the minority opposition
is so intense and deep-rooted that it would be absurd to claim that a consensus
existed. In the UK two examples would be the use of capital punishment and
the retention of nuclear weapons. In both cases there are strong, and long-
term, majorities on one side of the argument, but absolutely no consensus
across the nation as a whole. In the case of the NHS outright abolition would
Consensual