Page - 49 - in Universities in Imperial Austria, 1848–1918 - A Social History of a Multilingual Space

49 cHApter 2 The Neoabsolutist Search for a Unified Space An einen Unterrichtsminister. Einen Selbstmord hab’ ich euch anzusagen. Der Cultusminister hat den Unterrichtsminister todtgeschlagen. —frAnZ grillpArZer, Around 18551 [What is’t, Mephisto?] Why such hurry? Why at the cross cast down thine eyes? —georg-eMMAnuel HAAS, criticiZing tHe relAxAtion of conSerVAtiVe cAtHolic educAtion under tHun-HoHenStein in 18532 After the turmoil of the revolutionary year of 1848, in mid-1849 the con- servative Catholic reactionary Leo Thun-Hohenstein, with his like-minded entourage in the nomen est omen Ministry of Religion and Education, ini- tiated the final steps in the major educational reforms and ensured their implementation.3 In this chapter I offer an interpretation of his policy and the ideas behind it. I argue that universities did not change considerably under Thun-Hohenstein (1849–60); they remained an instrument of state policy and were only secondarily scientific institutions. Nevertheless, the changes implemented between 1848 and 1860 were pivotal for the Habsburg universities, bearing fruit, however, only after the liberalization of higher education in the 1860s. Moreover, as I demonstrate in later chapters, orga- nizational regulations established in 1849, including scholarly appointments in the 1850s, largely defined Habsburg science and scholarship well into the late nineteenth century and even the early twentieth century.