Imperial cooperation at the margins of Europe: the European Commission of the Danube, 1856–65

Abstract

This article deals with the work of the European Commission of the Danube (ECD) during the first two decades of its activity in the aftermath of the Crimean War. It focuses on the early stage formation of international organizations in the mid-nineteenth century when river commissions were the first organizations that issued supranational regulations and had their own bureaucracies. In this context, I argue that the ECD became a testing ground for new types of inter-imperial cooperation. First, the ECD became a site where hydraulic expertise from all over Europe was gathered and analysed. As a consequence, this exchange among the representatives of different empires and of different sub-fields of expertise generated new technical knowledge and made the ECD a space for cross-imperial knowledge production. Second, in 1865, the ECD adopted a Public Act that codified navigation rules in the Danube Delta. These regulations were among the first upholding a supranational settlement. Furthermore, the document exemplifies how such a supranational agreement was implemented through a joint imperial intervention against the authority of the Ottoman Empire, the only territorial power.

Keyword:

• International organizations
• river commissions
• Danube
• Crimean War
• supranational agreements
• imperial cooperation

Acknowledgement

I would like to thank Friederike Kind-Kovács and the two anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions. I am also grateful to Rachel Trode for providing much needed language editing.

Notes

1. Bitter, Gesamelte Schriften, 193.

2. Ibid., 179.

3. The ECD had seven members, one each from the Habsburg Monarchy, France, Prussia, Russia, Great Britain, the Kingdom of Sardinia and the Ottoman Empire.

4. Ardeleanu, International Trade and Diplomacy at the Lower Danube, 209–16.

5. Sauer, “Österreich und die Sulina Frage, 1829–1854 Zweiter Teil,” 130–2.

6. Traité de Paris du 30 mars 1856 (articles 15–19), 88–90.

7. Spaulding, “Anarchy, Hegemony, Cooperation: International Control of the Rhine River;” Verhandlungen der Elbe-Stromschau-Commission der betreffenden Uferstaaten über die Schiffbarkeit der Elbe und deren Verbesserung (Hamburg: Langhoff, 1850); Wurm, Fünf Briefe über die Freiheit der Flußschiffahrt und über die Donau-Akte vom 7. November 1857, 20.

8. Die Donauschiffahrts-Frage in ihrer Entwicklung von dem Wiener Congresse bis zum Abschluß der Donauschiffahrts-Acte vom 7. November 1857, 24–6.

9. Iordachi, “Global Networks, Regional Hegemony, and Seaport Modernization at the Lower Danube,” 167–9; Gişa, “Stages of the Institutional Establishment of Danube Cooperation,” 130–40; Pichler, Die Donaukommission und die Donaustaaten.

10. Hajnal, The Danube; Hajnal, Le Droit du Danube International.

11. Ardeleanu, “The European Commission of the Danube and the Results of its Technical and Administrative Activity on the Safety of Navigation, 1856–1914,” 73–94.

12. Thiemeyer, “Die Integration der Donau-Schifffahrt als Problem der europäischen Zeitgeschichte,” 303–18.

13. Iriye, Global Community, 5–7.

14. Sluga, “Editorial: The Transnational History of International Institutions,” 220. See also: Amrith and Sluga, “New Histories of the United Nations,” 251–74; Rothschild, “The Archives of Universal History,” 375–401.

15. A few exceptions are: Lindner, “New Forms of Knowledge Exchange Between Imperial Powers,” 57–78; Rodogno, Against Massacre: Humanitarian Interventions in the Ottoman Empire, 1815–1914; Spaulding, “Institutional Antecedents of European Integration.”

16. The term ‘supranational’ signifies a certain quality of ‘international’ and refers to the principle of ‘shared sovereignty’ among states, meaning that these states have transferred part of their legislative, executive and juridical sovereignty to a common institution. See also: Goldmann, Transforming the European Nation-State, 87; Spaulding, “Institutional Antecedents of European Integration,” 11.

17. Kott, “International Organizations. A Field of Research for a Global History,” 446–8; Herren, eds., Networking the International System, 1–14.

18. Iriye, Global Community, 6.

19. In this paper, I use ‘international’ and ‘inter-imperial’ interchangeably to name a space or an institution where more than one state was involved. While ‘international’ is the conventional term for describing such a phenomenon, ‘inter-imperial’ is more precise in this instance because it emphasizes that the states I am referring to were empires.

20. Kaiser, Schot and Jajeśniak-Quast, Writing the Rules for Europe. Experts, Cartels and International Organizations, 9; Thiemeyer and Tölle, “Supranationalität im 19. Jahrhundert? Die Beispiele der Zentralkommission für die Rheinschifffahrt und des Octroivertrages 1804–1832,” 195.

21. Kohlrausch and Steffen, “The Limits and Merits of Internationalism,” 716–17.

22. Spaulding, “Institutional Antecedents of European Integration;” Thiemeyer and Tölle, “Supranationalität im 19. Jahrhundert? Die Beispiele der Zentralkommission für die Rheinschifffahrt und des Octroivertrages 1804–1832,” 177–96.

23. Aksan, Ottoman Wars, 1700–1870, 343–6.

24. Paulmann, “The Straits of Europe,” 26–8; Huber, Channelling Mobilities, 26–30.

25. Rodogno, Against Massacre, 9.

26. Frary and Kozelsky, “Introduction. The Eastern Question Reconsidered,” 4.

27. Šedivý, “From Hostility to Cooperation? Austria, Russia and the Danubian Principalities, 1829–40,” 646–8.

28. Abschrift der Instruction für den österreichischen Abgeordneten zur europäischen Donauschiffahrtskommission, AT-OeStA/HHStA MdÄ AR F34-S.R.-50.

29. Winfried Baumgart, eds., Akten zur Geschichte des Krimkriegs. Preußische Akten zur Geschichte des Krimkriegs, Serie II, Band 3, 622.

30. Ardeleanu, International Trade and Diplomacy, 53–6; Iordachi, “Regional Hegemony,” 165–6.

31. Coons, Steamships, Statesmen, and Bureaucrats, 108–15; Frank, “Continental and Maritime Empires in an Age of Global Commerce,” 780–1.

32. Oncescu, România în politica orientală a Franţei, 1866–1878, 25–6.

33. Rapport de la Commission technique internationale convoquée à Paris pour l'examen des questions relatives à l'amélioration des bouches du Danube, Paris: Imprimerie Impériale, 1858, 25.

34. Bodin, Documente privitoare la legaturile economice dintre principatele romane si regatul Sardiniei.

35. Ardeleanu, International Tarde and Diplomacy, 210.

36. Goldfrank, The Origins of the Crimean War, 36.

37. Lynn, “British Policy, Trade, and Informal Empire in the Mid-Nineteenth Century,” 102–13.

38. Stokes, Autobiography, 1825–1902, 102–3.

39. Schulz, Normen und Praxis. Das Europäische Konzert der Großmächte als Sicherheitsrat, 1815–1860, 429.

40. Baumgart, Englische Akten zur Geschichte des Krimkriegs, 597.

41. At first the Danube Delta returned under Moldavian control, but in 1857 was placed under direct Ottoman rule as a way to insure more stable power relations in the region. Baumgart, Österreichische Akten zur Geschichte des Krimkriegs, 517.

42. Stokes, Autobiography, 62.

43. Ibid., 63–4.

44. Spratt, Reports on the Comparative Conditions of the Different Mouths and branches of the Danube by Captain Spratt, 26–7.

45. Commission Européenne du Danube (CED), Protocole No. LXVI (11.12.1857).

46. Nobiling, “Mémoire No. V. Die Schiffbarmachung der rechtseitigen Stromarmes der Donau (der St. Georg Canal) mit seiner Ausmündung ins schwarze Meer betreffend,” 21.

47. Report of C. A. Hartley, “Esq., C. E. Engineer-in-Chief to the Commission, on the Improvement of the Navigation of the Lower Danube,” 41–4.

48. Bitter to the Königliche Civil-Kabinet, GStA, I. HA Rep. 89, Nr. 13294 Donauschiffahrts-Kommission in Galatz (24.02.1858).

49. Stokes, Autobiography, 1825–1902, 67.

50. Ibid.

51. CED, Annex II au Protocole No. LXII.

52. CED, Annex III au Protocole No. LXII.

53. CED, Protocole No. LXVI (8.04.1858).

54. Burgoyne to Malmesbury, 23.02.1858, GStA, III. HA MdA, II Nr. 5717.

55. Ibid.

56. Ibid.

57. Malmsbury to the Prussian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 14.03.1858, Geheimes Staatsarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz (GStA), III. HA MdA, II Nr. 5717.

58. Note from the Ministry for Trade to Boul-Schauenstein, Österreichisches Staatsarchiv, Haus-, Hof-, und Staatsarchiv (AT-OeStA/HHStA) MdÄ AR F34-S.R.-51, 24 March 1858.

59. Baron Hübner to Buol Schauenstein, AT-OeStA/HHStA MdÄ AR F34-S.R.-51, 18 April 1858.

60. Rapport de la Commission technique internationale convoquée à Paris pour l'examen des questions relatives à l'amélioration des bouches du Danube, 88–91.

61. Ibid., 88–9.

62. Malmesbury to Stokes, 14.11.1858, GStA, III. HA MdA, II Nr. 5719.

63. Stokes, Autobiography, 74.

64. Ibid., 75.

65. Ibid., 77.

66. Hartley, A Biography of Sir Charles Hartley, 144–6.

67. Stokes, Autobiography, 82.

68. ECD, Protocole No. CLIV, 1-9.

69. Blackbourn, The Conquest of Nature, 95; Pritchard, Confluence, 9–11.

70. Blackbourn, The Conquest of Nature, 92.

71. Haas, “Introduction: Epistemic Communities and International Policy Coordination,” 1–35.

72. Rodogno et al., “Introduction,” 6–7.

73. Kott, “International Organizations,” 447.

74. Kott, “Une communauté épistémique du social?,” 41.

75. Ibid., 27–8.

76. Schulz, Normen und Praxis, 354–7.

77. Acte du Congrès de Vienne du 9 juin 1815, avec ses annexes, 305–6.

78. Traité de Paris du 30 mars 1856, 88–9.

79. Clarendon to Seymour (copy), AT-OeStA/HHStA MdÄ AR F34-S.R.-50, 29 April 1857.

80. Ibid.

81. Toggenburg to Buol, AT-OeStA/HHStA MdÄ AR F34-S.R.-50, 20 Mai 1857.

82. CED, Protocole No. XXII (8 April 1857).

83. CED, Protocole No. CXL, Projet d’un Acte public relative à la navigation des embouchures du Danube (25 July 1860).

84. CED, Protocole No. CXL, 26 (02.12.1861), 26.

85. CED, Protocole No. CXL, 26 (02.12.1861), 27.

86. CED, Protocole No. CXL, 26 (02.12.1861), 29.

87. Public Act of the European Commission of the Danube, relative to the Navigation of the Mouth of the Danube, signed in Galatz, November 2, 1865, 93–4.

88. Stokes, Autobiography, 89; Public Act of the European Commission of the Danube, 100–2.

89. Stokes, Autobiography, 84.

90. Engelhardt, “Les embouchures du Danube et la commission instituée par le congrès de Paris,” 115.

91. Chiffoleau, “Entre initiation au jeu international, pouvoir colonial et mémoire nationale,” 55–74; Huber, “The Unification of the Globe by Disease?,” 453–76.

92. Huber, “The Unification of the Globe by Disease?,” 463.

93. Chiffoleau, “Entre initiation au jeu international, pouvoir colonial et mémoire nationale,” 65.

94. Huber, “The Unification of the Globe by Disease?,” 454.

95. Valeska Huber speaks of ‘semi-permeable membranes that could be open for some interactions and closed for others’. Huber, “The Unification of the Globe by Disease?,” 471.

96. CED, Protocole No. CXL (21 November 1861).

97. Since 1856 when the Russian Empire ceased to be a riparian state at the Lower Danube, its economic involvement in the area decreased. However, a statistic of the ECD showed that in 1960 57 Russian sail ships passed the bar at Sulina; in 1865 there were 110 ships. “État Général et Comparatif des de Chaque Nationalité sorti du Danube durant les années 1861–1868,” CED, Protocole NO. CCXXXII, Annexe No. 1 (1868). For the situation before 1856 see: Tomuleţ, Basarabia în sistemul economic și politic al Imperiului Rus, 1812–1868, 431–60.

98. “Franz Karl Becke,” 62; GStA, IHA Rep 89, 13294, 21.

99. Engelhardt, Histoire du droit fluvial conventionnel précédée d'une étude sur le régime de la navigation intérieure aux temps de Rome et au Moyen Age.

100. Stokes, Autobiography, 101–25.