Robert Mevissen | SUNY: Old Westbury (original) (raw)

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Papers by Robert Mevissen

Water History, 2020

Riparian communities in the Habsburg monarchy experienced perennial flooding with tragedy often e... more Riparian communities in the Habsburg monarchy experienced perennial flooding with tragedy often eliciting heroics and generosity. What made these empathetic responses even more admirable was their juxtaposition with the antipathy that nationalist groups expressed in the political realm in the monarchy's final decades. Studying government and public responses to flooding in the nineteenth century demonstrates the critical link between empire and environment which forged transnational communities through floods of adversity , charity and cooperation.

Austrian History Yearbook, 2018

After the First World War, historians helped shape the narrative that national identities were mo... more After the First World War, historians helped shape the narrative that national identities were monolithic, liberal and modern, and they castigated the Habsburg Monarchy as a “prison of nations.” These historical narratives argued that the state’s multinational nature caused illiberal governance, social disunity, economic backwardness, and divisive politics, all leading to the monarchy’s unsurprising collapse in 1918.

More recently, historians have revived the monarchy’s reputation, revealing hitherto unexplored areas of non-national connection and unity; economic dependencies, imperial patriotism, regional identities, multilingual loyalties, and supranational associations. The focus on social and political developments in the monarchy’s last half century has, to an extent, neglected the environmental transformations occurring in the monarchy at the same time, thereby missing the groups, which emerged to shape and debate the scope of these geo-physical changes. The monarchy, imperial bureaucrats and engineers, provincial diets and municipal councils, and companies spent millions of guldens regulating the Danube in Austria and Hungary, to make it suitable for large-scale navigation and to make it safe to live along. In the mid to late nineteenth century, different associations, commercial enterprises, aristocrats, and elected officials mobilized to shape these transformations, advocating for interventions, which would promote their particular interests. The Danube thus became a space where a transnational network of actors engaged with local, provincial and imperial authorities to pursue the construction of ‘Danube Monarchy’ they envisioned. The authorities, for their part, continuously expressed hope to find solutions, which would promote the ‘common good.’ Using newspaper reports, commercial and associational reports and meetings, petitions and governmental memos and minutes, my work reveals how Hungarian and Austrian authorities negotiated at times divergent interests along the river with different groups who identified the Danube as a source for their socio-economic livelihood and well-being.

gnovis Journal, 2014

The Habsburg dynasty ruled over an empire, which from 1815 until its collapse in 1918 encompassed... more The Habsburg dynasty ruled over an empire, which from 1815 until its collapse in 1918 encompassed much of modern-day Austria, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and parts of Romania, Ukraine, Poland, Montenegro and Italy. Modernizing forces throughout the nineteenth century fueled nationalist sentiment, which disrupted the social cohesion in the multiethnic empire. The state fought to counter these trends by reaffirming the positive role and influence it had on people’s lives. Specifically, the Habsburgs supported technological innovations such as river regulation and the rise of steamboats on the Danube, which capitalized on historical associations people had to the river, enhanced the river’s importance to people’s livelihoods, and re-channeled people’s loyalties and connections to both the state and to each other.

Water History, 2020

Riparian communities in the Habsburg monarchy experienced perennial flooding with tragedy often e... more Riparian communities in the Habsburg monarchy experienced perennial flooding with tragedy often eliciting heroics and generosity. What made these empathetic responses even more admirable was their juxtaposition with the antipathy that nationalist groups expressed in the political realm in the monarchy's final decades. Studying government and public responses to flooding in the nineteenth century demonstrates the critical link between empire and environment which forged transnational communities through floods of adversity , charity and cooperation.

Austrian History Yearbook, 2018

After the First World War, historians helped shape the narrative that national identities were mo... more After the First World War, historians helped shape the narrative that national identities were monolithic, liberal and modern, and they castigated the Habsburg Monarchy as a “prison of nations.” These historical narratives argued that the state’s multinational nature caused illiberal governance, social disunity, economic backwardness, and divisive politics, all leading to the monarchy’s unsurprising collapse in 1918.

More recently, historians have revived the monarchy’s reputation, revealing hitherto unexplored areas of non-national connection and unity; economic dependencies, imperial patriotism, regional identities, multilingual loyalties, and supranational associations. The focus on social and political developments in the monarchy’s last half century has, to an extent, neglected the environmental transformations occurring in the monarchy at the same time, thereby missing the groups, which emerged to shape and debate the scope of these geo-physical changes. The monarchy, imperial bureaucrats and engineers, provincial diets and municipal councils, and companies spent millions of guldens regulating the Danube in Austria and Hungary, to make it suitable for large-scale navigation and to make it safe to live along. In the mid to late nineteenth century, different associations, commercial enterprises, aristocrats, and elected officials mobilized to shape these transformations, advocating for interventions, which would promote their particular interests. The Danube thus became a space where a transnational network of actors engaged with local, provincial and imperial authorities to pursue the construction of ‘Danube Monarchy’ they envisioned. The authorities, for their part, continuously expressed hope to find solutions, which would promote the ‘common good.’ Using newspaper reports, commercial and associational reports and meetings, petitions and governmental memos and minutes, my work reveals how Hungarian and Austrian authorities negotiated at times divergent interests along the river with different groups who identified the Danube as a source for their socio-economic livelihood and well-being.

gnovis Journal, 2014

The Habsburg dynasty ruled over an empire, which from 1815 until its collapse in 1918 encompassed... more The Habsburg dynasty ruled over an empire, which from 1815 until its collapse in 1918 encompassed much of modern-day Austria, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and parts of Romania, Ukraine, Poland, Montenegro and Italy. Modernizing forces throughout the nineteenth century fueled nationalist sentiment, which disrupted the social cohesion in the multiethnic empire. The state fought to counter these trends by reaffirming the positive role and influence it had on people’s lives. Specifically, the Habsburgs supported technological innovations such as river regulation and the rise of steamboats on the Danube, which capitalized on historical associations people had to the river, enhanced the river’s importance to people’s livelihoods, and re-channeled people’s loyalties and connections to both the state and to each other.