Why had Prussia, rather than Austria, emerged as the dominant German power by 1871?

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Why had Prussia, rather than Austria, emerged as the dominant German power by 1871?

                                By Diederik ten Brink

At the beginning of the 19th century, the Austrian Empire was the strongest of  German speaking countries, both military and economically (Gordeeva).  The Austrian Empire was seen as the most influential country in central Europe, politics in German speaking countries were dominated by the Austrian Empire (Young). 70 years later, the entire picture had changed, Prussia had become the dominant German power. So, why had Prussia rather than Austria, emerged as the dominant German power by 1871. By 1871, Prussia had become the dominant German power, due to its economic and military power.

Prussia enjoyed a lot of economic development during the 18th century thanks to several factors, one of these was the Zollverein. The Zollverein was an agreement between German states (lead by Prussia) to simplify customs. It was similar to the European Union now, it made it easier to trade between countries. This made it more attractive to trade with German states, as traders now no longer had to go through 10 customs to get from Hamburg to the southern German states. Austria was not included in the Zollverein, as it had a heavily protected economy (“historyhelp”). The Zollverein made it more attractive to trade with German states, which enabled the German states to develop very fast, while Austria didn’t.

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Prussia’s education system helped the economic growth. It had made education public, causing a lot of more people to have access to education. Instead of scientist only coming from high classes, there could now also come scientists from lower class people. Not only were the schools made public, the way of teaching also changed. Although the main purpose still was to make people intellect, it was also to make children more obedient and less revolting. There were also some other changes, like splitting of material into subjects. The Prussian way of teaching proved good, as geniuses like Albert Einstein came ...

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