Paul W. Schroeder


Paul W. Schroeder was an American historian who was professor emeritus at the University of Illinois. He specialized in European international politics from the late 16th to the 20th centuries, Central Europe, and the theory of history. He is known for his contributions to diplomatic history and international relations.

Biography

Schroeder was born in Cleveland, Ohio, the son of Rupert H. Schroeder and Elfrieda Koch. He attended Concordia Seminary, Texas Christian University, and the University of Texas at Austin, where he received his doctorate in 1958. He received the 1956 Beveridge Award for the best manuscript on American history submitted by a beginning historian. He was an associate professor of history at Concordia Senior College from 1958 to 1963 and was later hired at the University of Illinois.
In the 1972 essay "World War I as a Galloping Gertie", against established historical opinion and Article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles, Schroeder laid the blame for [the First World War] on Britain's doorstep. Schroeder characterized the political events leading up to the war as a "Galloping Gertie," a metaphor that described political events as escalating out of control and pulling and pushing all five Great Powers into an unwanted war. Schroeder's research highlighted the fact that Britain was engaged in an “encirclement" policy directed at Austria-Hungary. The British policy was not in keeping with the Congress System, which had developed after the Napoleonic Wars, and was fundamentally anti-German and even more anti-Austrian. The policy created an atmosphere in which Germany was forced into a "preventive war" to maintain Austria as an allied power.
Apart from his scholarship, Schroeder was a regular contributor to the magazine The American Conservative and wrote strong critiques of the foreign policy of the George W. Bush administration, especially regarding the Iraq War, for its destabilizing counterproductive effects. The internationalist realist perspective of his critiques fit well with his favorable appraisals of the 19th-century Concert of Europe approach to international relations that he offered as a model in his scholarship. Perry Anderson called him "arguably the greatest living American historian" and said that his The Transformation of European Politics, 1763–1848 "revolutionised one of the most disgraced of all fields in the discipline,... diplomatic history."

Awards

Fellowships

Offices

Publications

Books

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Articles

  • "Metternich Studies since 1925," Journal of Modern History, 33,, 237-66.
  • "Austrian Policy at the Congresses of Troppau and Laibach," Journal of Central European Affairs, 22#2, 139-52.
  • "Austria as an Obstacle to Italian Unification and Freedom, 1814–1861," Austrian History Newsletter, 1962, 1-32.
  • "American Books on Austria-Hungary," Austrian History Yearbook, II, 1972-196.
  • "The Status of Habsburg Studies in the United States," Austrian History Yearbook III. Pt. 3, 267-295.
  • "Bruck versus Buol: The Dispute over Austrian Eastern Policy, 1853-1855," Journal of Modern History 40#2, 193-217.
  • "Austria and the Danubian Principalities, 1853–1856," Central European History 2#3, 216-36.
  • "A Turning Point in Austrian Policy in the Crimean War: the Conferences of March, 1954," Austrian History Yearbook, IV-V, 159–202.
  • "World War I as Galloping Gertie: A Reply to Joachim Remak," Journal of Modern History 44, No. 2,, 319-344.
  • "The 'Balance of Power' System in Europe, 1815–1871," Naval War College Review, March–April 1975, 18-31.
  • "Romania and the Great Powers before 1914," Revue Roumaine d'Histoire, XIV, 1, 39-53.
  • "Munich and the British Tradition," The Historical Journal, 19, I, pp. 223–243.
  • "Alliances, 1815-1945: Weapons of Power and Tools of Management" in Klaus Knorr, ed., Historical Problems of National Security,, pp. 247–286.
  • "Quantitative Studies in the Balance of Power: An Historian's Reaction," and "A Final Rejoinder," Journal of Conflict Resolution 21#1, 3-22, 57-74.
  • "Austro-German Relations: Divergent Views of the Disjoined Partnership," Central European History 11#3, 302-312.
  • "Gladstone as Bismarck," Canadian Journal of History, XV, pp. 163–195.
  • "Containment Nineteenth Century Style: How Russia was Restrained," South Atlantic Quarterly, 82, 1-18.
  • "The Lost Intermediaries: The Impact of 1870 on the European System," International History Review, VI, 1-27.
  • "Oesterreich und die orientalische Frage, 1848–1883," in Das Zeitalter Kaiser Franz Josephs von der Revolution zur Gruenderzeit, Vol. I, 324-28.
  • "Does Murphy's Law Apply to History?", The Wilson Quarterly, 84-93.
  • "The European International System, 1789–1848: Is There a Problem? an Answer?", colloquium paper presented March 19, 1984 at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C..
  • "The European International System, 1789–1848: Is There a Question? An Answer?", Proceedings of the Consortium on Revolutionary Europe, 1-29.
  • "The 19th-Century International System: Changes in the Structure," World Politics 39#1, 1-26.
  • "Old Wine in Old Bottles: Recent Contributions to British Foreign Policy and European International Politics, 1789-1848," Journal of British Studies 26, 1, 1-25.
  • "Once More, the German Question," International History Review IX, 1, 96-107.
  • "The Collapse of the Second Coalition," Journal of Modern History 59, 2, pg. 244-290.
  • "An Unnatural 'Natural Alliance': Castlereagh, Metternich, and Aberdeen in 1813," International History Review X, No. 4, 522–540.
  • "The Nineteenth Century Balance of Power: Balance of Power or Political Equilibrium?", Review of International Studies, 15, 135–153.
  • "Failed Bargain Crises, Deterrence, and the International System," in Paul C. Stern et al., eds., Perspectives on Deterrence, 67–83.
  • "Germany and the Balance of Power: Past and Present Part I", in Wolf Gruner, ed., Gleichqewicht in Geschichte und Gegenwart, 134–39.
  • "Die Habsburger Monarchie und das europaische System im 19t. Jahrhundert," in A. M. Birke and G. Heydemann, eds. Die Herausforderung des europaischen Staatensystems. 178–82.
  • "Europe and the German Confederation in the 1860s," in Helmut Rumpler, ed., Deutscher Bund und Deutsche Frage 1815-1866, 281–91.
  • The Years 1848 and 1989: The Perils and Profits of Historical Comparisons," in Samuel F. Wells, ed., The Helsinki Process and the Future of Europe, 15-21.
  • "Review Article. Napoleon Bonaparte," International History Review, XII, 324–29.
  • "Napoleon's Foreign Policy: A Criminal Enterprise," Journal of Military History 54, No. 2, 147–61.
  • "Die Rolle der Vereinigten Staaten bei der Entfesselung des Zweiten Weltkrieges," in Klaus Hildebrand et al., eds., 1939: An der Schwelle zum Weltkrieg, 215–19.
  • "" ACDIS Occasional Paper, March 1991. 14 pp.
  • "" ACDIS Occasional Paper, April, 1991. 12 pp.
  • "The Transformation of Political Thinking, 1787-1848," in: Jack Snyder and Robert Jervis, eds., Coping with Complexity in the International System, 47-70.
  • "'System' and Systemic Thinking in International History," Journal of International History Review xv, 1, 116-34.
  • "Economic Integration and the European International System in the Era of World War I," American Historical Review 94, 4, 1130–37.
  • "" ACDIS Occasional Paper, May, 1994.
  • "Historical Reality vs Neo-Realist Theory," International Security 19, 1, pp. 108–48.
  • "History vs. Neo-realism: A Second Look," International Security, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp. 182–195
  • "Britain, Russia, and the German Question, 1815-1848: Emerging Rivalry or Benign Neglect?," in Germany and Russia in British Policy towards Europe since 1815, ed. AdolfM. Birke and Hermann Wentker, 15-30.
  • "Balance of Power and Political Equilibrium: A Response," International History Review, 16,4, 745-54.
  • "History and International Relations Theory: Not Use or Abuse, but Fit or Misfit," International Security, Vol. 22, No. 1, pp. 64–74
  • "The Missing Dimension in the Manichaean Trap: A Comment," in The ManichaeanTrap. American Perceptions of the German Empire, 1871-1945, ed. Detlef Junker, 37-47.
  • "The Historical Record on Peacekeeping: Grounds for Hope or Pessimism?" in Regional Conflicts and Conflict Resolution, ed. Roger E. Kanet, 149-66.
  • "Review Article: Can Diplomatic History Guide Foreign Policy?," in International History Review, 28, 2, 358-70.
  • "Austria and Prussia, 1813-1848: Pause in the Rivalry or Shift: in the Paradigm?," in Reich Oder Nation? Mitteleuropa 1780-1815, ed. Heinz Duchhardt and Andreas Kunz,87-104.
  • "The Vienna System and Its Stability: The Problem of Stabilizing a State System In Transformation," in Das Europaische Staatensystem 1m Wandel, ed. Peter Kruger, 107-22.
  • "Making a Necessity of Virtue: The Smaller State as Intermediary Body," Austrian History Yearbook, 29, pt. 1,1-18.
  • "Work with Emerging Forces in the International System," in Just Peacemaking: Ten Practices for Abolishing War, ed. Glen Stassen, 133-45.
  • "," in Thompson, William R., Great Power Rivalries
  • "International Politics, Peace, and War, 1815-1914," in The Short Oxford History of Europe: The Nineteenth Century, ed. T. C. W. Blanning,158-209.
  • "The Cold War and Its Ending in 'Long-Duration' International History," in Peace, Prosperity and Politics, ed. John Mueller, 257-82.
  • "A. J. P. Taylor's International System," International History Review, 28, 1,3-27.
  • "The Luck of the House of Habsburg: Military Defeat and Political Survival," Austrian History Yearbook, 32,215-24.
  • "Explaining Peace More than War," in Nation und Europa. Studien zum Internationalen Staatensystem 1m 19. und 20. Jahrhundert, ed. Gabriele Clemens, 271-84.
  • "," The National Interest,22-36.
  • "International History: Why Historians Do It Differently than Political Scientists," in Bridges and Boundaries: Historians, Political Scientists, and the Study of International Relations, ed. Colin Elman and Miriam Fendius Elman, 403-16.
  • "Epilogue: Transformation or Evolution-Linear or Catastrophic?," in «The Transformation of European Politics, 1763-1848»: Episode or Model In Modern History?, ed. Peter KrUger and Paul W. Schroeder, 323-32.
  • "Iraq: The Case Against Preemptive War," The American Conservative,8-20.
  • "," The National Interest, 125-32.
  • "Why Realism Does Not Work Well for International History," in Realism and the Balancing of Power. A New Debate, ed. John A. Vasquez and Colin Elman,114-27.
  • "The Transformation of European Politics. Some Reflections", in: Wolfram Pyta and Philipp Menger, eds., Das europäische Mächtekonzert. Friedens- und Sicherheitspolitik vomo Wiener Kongreß 1815 bis zum Krimkrieg 1853, 25–41
  • , American Interest, 2016