Christopher W. Close's book State Formation and Shared Sovereignty is an important and impressive study of early modern imperial and Dutch leagues that recognizes “the importance of alliances for the development of both political systems” (2). This detailed chronological history from the Swabian League to the Princes’ League properly places imperial alliances as fundamental to imperial history. Close's study is thus a welcome addition to the ongoing scholarly attention to imperial institutions and state formation. The Holy Roman Empire offered fertile ground for a variety of cross-status alliances to arise in times of political, military, and confessional tension. Indeed, far from treating leagues as unfortunate, isolated aberrations exploiting imperial weakness, State Formation and Shared Sovereignty gives them a history of their own, describing how leagues perceived themselves as guarantors to the empire's proper functioning.
Leagues primarily served to guarantee collective security, yet they provided their members with far more. Rulers of territorial states, imperial free cities, and ecclesiastical polities drew on the league's pooled resources to enhance their influence. Maximilian of Bavaria would have never acquired the Palatinate's electoral title without his leadership of the Liga. Leagues were not merely playthings for the dynastic whims of their captains, either. Smaller estates used their control over league financing to make their voices heard. Close argues convincingly that leagues helped sustain the empire's small estates. Far from being vehicles for territorial state development, many leagues dissolved because they failed to meet the needs of their smaller members.
Despite forming due to imperial tensions, leagues had an ambivalent relationship with the empire. They were “vehicles of protest against and support for the Empire's central organs” (8). Leagues acted as safety nets, providing services that imperial organs promised but could not deliver. The Swabian League, “the quintessential cross-status alliance,” enforced the public peace so well that it became the ideal league model (25). Leagues mediated conflicts among members to reduce the burden on imperial courts. After the Peace of Westphalia, leagues formed connections between imperial circles to improve collective action. In fulfilling the empire's responsibilities, leagues helped to preserve it. At the same time, they revealed the empire's weaknesses and undermined its jurisdiction.
Particularly interesting is the discussion of how leagues formed with a specific vision of an ideal empire, albeit one often at odds with what the emperor or other estates preferred. League members knew well the histories of previous leagues and saw in them models for effective imperial reform. Even the Protestant Union and the Catholic Liga understood themselves as necessary to preserve the empire's health on the eve of the Thirty Years’ War. Not all leagues achieved their goals, of course, and the book's chronological organization allows the complete story of failed leagues to be told, as well. Such failures often came down to competing notions over how best to support the empire.
Leagues were important “to state formation at the local, regional, and national levels,” and the majority of the work points to their contributions to the empire (5). The Schmalkaldic League protected nascent Protestant polities, while the first multiconfessional leagues tested policies that influenced the Peace of Augsburg in 1555. Page 331 includes a useful list of just some of the major imperial reforms that leagues influenced. The most notable example of leagues contributing to state formation is, of course, the Union of Utrecht, which essentially created the Dutch Republic. Close's inclusion of the Dutch example reveals the many similarities between it and imperial leagues, including shared sovereignty, pooled resources, and protecting provincial autonomy in confessional matters.
This wonderfully detailed monograph will be of particular use to scholars of German and Dutch history. More information on how leagues contributed to state formation in their individual members, particularly smaller ones, would have made this even stronger. There is quite a bit of repetition of major themes due to the book's chronological organization. Leagues generally shared similar operations, organizations, and internal debates. While that is sometimes frustrating, it is worth it for the long historical view, which adds much to our knowledge of how early modern leagues formed, legitimized themselves, and operated within the imperial context.
