ABSTRACT
The evident problems facing large parts of the working population required a steering of society – by the state, through a government that truly cared for all its people – in such a way that economic prosperity and, in a wider sense, sociocultural welfare would be adequately guaranteed to each and everybody. The government has to be controlled by the heads of industrial enterprises. In 1805, the French emperor had defeated the Prussians and imposed severe conditions on their country. In 1813, the Prussian king, Friedrich Wilhelm II, decided to join the alliance against Bonaparte. In many European states, political and cultural elites, using such emotionally effective elements as the reference to a shared language and, where possible, a shared religion, the invocation of a common, though often mythical ancestry and of collective historical memories and traditions now succeeded in achieving a more or less deeply-felt sense of nationhood.
