Critical Assessment of 3 Causes of World War 1 Nationalism is being a strong supporter of the rights and interests of one’s country. It was very high in the 19th century and nations which had not obtained independence by 1900 were determined to do so as it gave groups of subject peoples the idea of forming independent nations of their own. In 1815, the Congress of Vienna took place. This was a conference held in Vienna in Austria between ambassadors from the major powers in Europe. This conference left people under the control of local dynasts or other nations and ignored nationalism in favour of preserving the peace, however, revolutions and strong nationalistic movements during the late 19th century dissolved the anti-nationalistic work of the Congress of Vienna and led to the unification of Italy in 1861 and Germany in 1871 after they were left as divided states by the Congress. Nationalism was the most imposing cause of war in the late 19th and early 20th century as it caused a problem ultimately due to the fact that a nation’s goals came into conflict with the goals of other nations. An example of this would be Serbian nationalism. Serbia led a movement to unite the regions of Slavs. This weakened the Austro-Hungarian, Russian and Ottoman empires as Slavs made up most of Austria-Hungary and there was a fear that Slavic nationalism would result in the countries breaking up. The Radical Party brought the idea of nationalism to Serbia. They mixed nationalist and socialist rhetoric in a way that was new to Serbia and had wide appeal even though it had been discredited by Western Europe in 1848. Yet nationalism was a pro... ... middle of paper ... ...o be dragged into the war making it a world war. Nationalism, militarism and alliances were all major causes of world war one and each of the factors led onto the next. Nationalism is probably the most imposing cause of tension leading onto the war and caused a problem ultimately due to the fact that one nation’s goals came into conflict with the goals of other nations. Militarism was encouraged by nationalism and was a deciding factor in the outbreak of war as many countries felt the need to follow Germany’s vigorous militaristic expansionist policies out of pride and intimidation. This fear of Germany led on to alliances being formed which ended up leading more countries into war than there may have been originally. Therefore, all three of the mentioned causes were equally responsible for causing World War One.