Alexander Mikaberidze - Napoleon, War, Progress, and Global Order

Napoleon is not necessarily the child of revolution. Now, he's a product of the revolutionary circumstances, but he does not necessarily represent revolution as such. To me, he's the last of the enlightened despots. Napoleon did not support the radicalism of revolution, and we, we see that throughout his life. The sheer nature of the war is that, that it makes things possible that in peacetime would be unthinkable. Without the war, the revolution would not have radicalized as rapidly or to the extent that it did.

I wonder what you think of this. If Napoleon was alive today, he'd be-

(laughs)

... a startup founder, you know, as you mentioned. Uh, wh- wh- what do you think about this? Would Napoleon, uh, I don't know, become the CEO of a company like Tesla today? All right. Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Professor Alexander Mikaberidze, who is a professor of history and the Ruth Herring Noel Endowed Chair at Louisiana State University, and he's the author of the mo- Napoleonic Wars: A Global History. Um, this is, this is an absolutely fascinating book. Uh, it was unlike any other history book I've read in the sense that it was just, uh, global in its scope, and you're covering such an interesting period in history. Um, so first of all, can you give, uh, my audience a little bit of background on yourself and on the Napoleonic Wars?

Yes. Um, thank you so much for having me. It, it's, it's a delight to be here. Um, I'm originally from, uh, the country of Georgia, and I usually tell, um, people that, no, it's not the state of Georgia, right. It's the country of Georgia in Eastern Europe, a small, uh, state sandwiched between, uh, Russia and Turkey with a rather complex and, uh, diverse and turbulent history. Uh, but it is, mm, most small nations, it is oftentimes kinda lost in, in, on the pages of history. And of course, uh, when I embarked on, on this career to become a professional historian, uh, I've always wanted to see, you know, where my, my people kind of fit in the larger scheme of things. Uh, and I was oftentimes frustrated, uh, especially y- working on the revolutionary Napoleonic era, that the huge transformations that this period witnessed in caucuses were not properly addressed. And so the immediate cause and kind of spark to write this book was desire to kind of wrong, to correct the wrong. But it also kinda, uh, then grew from there, um, to, to get a better understanding of the field because Napoleonic era is one of the most written historical periods. Um, there are thousands and thousands of volumes. In fact, um, Napoleon is probably the most written about historical figure, period. Um, the last estimate was that at least 300,000, maybe 400,000 volumes ha- have been written just about him. Uh, so there has to be a really good reason to (laughs) write another book about, (laughs) uh, this topic. And my, um, gradually my realization was that almost everything that has been written about this period is written from the French and British points of view and focused on the great transformations taking place inside Europe. And that is perfectly worthwhile enterprise, but I thought that it offers a very s- narrow snapshot of the period because Napoleonic, revolutionary and Napoleonic mom- uh, uh, uh, uh, period is the moment when we see the modernity setting in not just in Europe, but gradually extending to various parts of the world. It, it changes the trajectory, uh, uh, that many of these r- world regions followed, um, and, and I thought a- a fresher study ne- was needed to, to flesh that out.