World War I

World War I erupted when a Serbian nationalist seeking to free his ethnic group from Austrian rule
assassinated Archduke Ferdinand, heir to the Hapsburg throne of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire, at
Sarajevo in June 1914.

This assassination sparked a series of great power actions and reactions in the five weeks that followed,
shattering world peace. The war involved most of the European states and drew in allies in North
America, Asia, and the Near East to become one of the most destructive wars in history.

By the time the first major European war of the twentieth century had ended, nearly 10 million people
had died, three empires had crumbled, new states had been born, seven decades of communist rule in
Russia had begun, and the world geopolitical map had been redrawn in ways that paved the way for the
rise of Adolf Hitler in Nazi Germany.

The Causes of World War I

How can such a catastrophic war be explained? Multiple answers are possible.

Most popular are structural realist explanations, which hold that World War I was inadvertent, not the
result of any master plan. Neorealists believe that it was a war bred by circumstances beyond the control
of those involved, one that people neither wanted nor expected.

Framed at the global level of analysis, structuralism postulates that the changing distribution of power
within the anarchical global system is the primary factor that determines state behavior. Structuralism:
The neorealist proposition that states’ behavior is shaped primarily by changes in the properties of the
global system, such as shifts in the balance of power, instead of by individual heads of states or by
changes in states’ internal characteristics.

This structural explanation concentrates attention on the nineteenth century, when Britain dominated
world politics. Britain was an island country isolated from continental affairs by temperament, tradition,
and geography.

Britain’s sea power gave it command of the world’s shipping lanes and control over a vast empire
stretching from the Mediterranean to Southeast Asia. This dominance helped to deter aggression.
Germany, however, presented a challenge to British power.

After becoming a unified country in 1871, Germany prospered and used its growing wealth to create a
formidable army and navy.

This strength resulted in greater ambition and resentment of British preeminence. As the predominant
military and industrial power on the European continent, Germany sought to compete for
international position and status

As Kaiser Wilhelm II proclaimed in 1898, Germany had “great tasks outside the narrow boundaries of
old Europe.”
Germany was not the only new emergent power at the turn of the century. Russia was also expanding
and becoming a threat to Germany. The decline of the Austrian- Hungarian Empire, Germany’s only ally,
heightened Germany’s fear of Russia, which can be seen in Germany’s strong reaction to the
assassination of Archduke Ferdinand.

Fearing that a long war might result in an unfavorable shift in the balance of power, Germany sought a
short localized war with a more favorable outcome. Germany thus supported Austria-Hungary’s
unrestrained assault on Serbia.

July 28,1914 Austria Hungry Declares War on Serbia

Although the logic behind Germany’s calculation was clear—a victorious war would bolster Austria-
Hungary and hamper Russian influence—it turned out to be a serious miscalculation.

France and Russia joined forces to defend Serbia and were soon joined by Britain in an effort to oppose
Germany and defend Belgian neutrality.

In April 1917, the war became truly global in scope when the United States, reacting to German
submarine warfare, entered the conflict.

global level of analysis

At the global level of analysis, the dynamics of shifts in the balance of power as a causal factor: the
historic tendency for opposed coalitions to form so that the distribution of military power is “balanced”
to prevent any single power or bloc from seriously threatening others.

And that is what happened in the decade prior to Archduke Ferdinand’s assassination. European military
alignments had become polarized, pitting the Triple Alliance of Germany, Austria-Hungary, and the
Ottoman Empire against the Triple Entente of Britain, France, and Russia. According to this structural
interpretation, after Russia mobilized its armies in response to Austria’s attack on Serbia, cross-cutting
alliance commitments pulled one European great power after another into the war.

state level of analysis

As an alternative interpretation of the origins of World War I at the state level of analysis, many
historians view the growth of nationalism, especially in southeastern Europe, as having created a climate
of opinion that made war likely.

Nationalism: A mind-set glorifying a particular state and the nationality group living in it, which sees the
state’s interest as a supreme value.

Long-suppressed ethnic prejudices soon emerged, even among leaders. Russian foreign minister Sergei
Sazonov, for example, claimed to “despise” Austria, and Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany proclaimed “I hate
the Slavs”. With each side belittling the national character and ethnic attributes of the other, diplomatic
alternatives to war become untenable.
 individual level of analysis
At the individual level of analysis, decision making theories offer a third interpretation of the causes of
World War I.

From the perspective of rational choice theory— which emphasizes that leaders make decisions based
on careful evaluation of the relative usefulness of alternative options for realizing the best interests of
themselves and their states—the war’s outbreak was a result of the German elites’ preference for a war
with France and Russia in order to consolidate Germany’s position on the continent, confirm its status as
a world power, and divert domestic attention from its internal troubles.

The causes of World War I remain in dispute. Structural explanations emphasize the global distribution
of power, domestic interpretations look at causal factors within states, and decision-making explanations
direct attention to the calculations and goals of particular leaders. All partially help us to understand the
sequences that produced the world’s first truly global war.

The Consequences of World War I

World War I changed the face of Europe. In its wake, three multiethnic empires— the Austrian
Hungarian, Russian, and Ottoman (Turkish)— collapsed, and the independent states of Poland,
Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia emerged in their place.

In addition, the countries of Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania were born.

The war also contributed to the independence of the Republic of Ireland from Britain in 1920

And, Finally, the overthrow of the Russian czar in 1917 by the Bolsheviks.

The emergence of communism under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin produced a change in government
and ideology that would have geopolitical consequences for another seventy years.

Despite its costs, the coalition consisting of Britain, France, Russia, and (later) the United States and Italy
defeated the threat of domination posed by the Central powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey, and
their allies). Moreover, the war set the stage for a determined effort to build a new global system that
could prevent another war

A consequence of World War I was a pronounced distaste for war and theories of realism that justified
great power competition, armaments, secret alliances, and balance-of-power politics.

The staggering human and material costs of the previous four years led many of the delegates to the
1919 peace conference convened at Versailles, outside Paris, to reevaluate their convictions about
statecraft.

The time was ripe for a new approach to building world order. Disillusioned with realism, many turned to
liberalism for guidance on how to manage the global future.

The decade following World War I was the high point of liberal idealism. Woodrow Wilson’s ideas about
world order, as expressed in his January 1917 “Fourteen Points” speech, were anchored in a belief that
by reordering the global system according to liberal principles, the “Great War” (as World War I was then
called) would be “the war to end all wars.”

Wilson’s chief proposal was to construct a League of Nations that allegedly would guarantee the
independence and territorial integrity of all states. His other recommendations included strengthening
international law, settling territorial claims on the basis of self-determination, and promoting
democracy, disarmament, and free trade.

As negotiations at the conference proceeded, hard-boiled power politics prevailed. Ultimately, the
delegates were only willing to support those elements in the Fourteen Points that served their national
interests.

After considerable wrangling, Wilson’s League of Nations was written into the peace treaty with
Germany as the first of 440 articles. The rest of the treaty was punitive, aimed at stripping the country of
its great power status. Similar treaties were later forced on Austria-Hungary and Germany’s other
wartime allies.

The Treaty of Versailles grew out of a desire for retribution. In brief, Germany’s military was drastically
cut; it was forbidden to possess heavy artillery, military aircraft, or submarines, and its forces were
banned from the Rhineland.

Germany also lost territory in the west to France and Belgium, in the south to the new state of
Czechoslovakia, and in the east to the new states of Poland and Lithuania. Overseas, Germany lost all of
its colonies.

Finally, in the most humiliating clause of the treaty, Germany was assigned responsibility for the war and
charged with paying heavy financial reparations for the damages.

On learning of the treaty’s harsh provisions, the exiled German kaiser is said to have declared “the war
to end wars has resulted in a peace to end peace.”