Abstract
Reviewed by: Jeremy Black, University of Exeter, UK
This is a fascinating work for those interested in the nineteenth century, in the development of political thought, in international relations, military history, and a number of other sub-disciplines. The variety of fields touched helps explain one of Crossland’s major themes, namely that humanitarianism was not one strand but rather a number, with different causes, courses and consequences. There were overlaps, but also contrasts, and his skill rests in discerning, probing and explaining them. As Crossland, Senior Lecturer in International History at Liverpool John Moores University, notes, the campaign to control warfare was a response to its dynamic character and to its greater apparent lethality. The latter was not in practice the case, but was certainly the impression formed. Indeed, an important aspect of the dynamism in the situation was presented not by weapons technology, but by that of news reporting. The combination of foreign correspondents, photography and news transmission by telegraph was significant. So also with the greater emphasis on the individual in the nineteenth century, seen, for example, in the award of honours, such as the Victoria Cross, to ordinary soldiers, and in their names being individually recorded on war memorials. These factors were possibly as, or more, pertinent than the humanitarians so ably discussed by Crossland. Indeed, they helped explain why the latter gained traction. It would also be useful to have Crossland’s fascinating discussion of what he terms a generation of peace-seekers more closely linked to the diplomacy of the period prior to the valuable discussion he offers of the background to the Hague peace conferences. As he notes, the expansion of the 1899 regulations, notably at Geneva in 1906, indicated that the campaign to control war was far from being at its end. A postscript asks readers to assess the outbreak and conduct of the First World War, and that is indeed appropriate. In part, the period represents what had long been the case, not least in medieval Christendom – the difficulties of reconciling ideological norms with political and military cases, but with the added tropes of a Romantic sensibility, a democratic culture, and a move toward post-Christian norms and practices in international relations. Crossland offers an important introduction to the subject.