What would happen to the Spanish and Portuguese empires if Napoleon never took power?

If my impressions of Latin American history are correct, the wars for independence started as anti-Bonapartist revolts on behalf of Ferdinand VII when Joseph Bonaparte was placed on the Spanish throne. What would happen in a world where Napoleon never became the conqueror that he was in ours?

Also, conservative monarchists were a considerable force even during the independence movement, such as the time when Mexico tried to get a Spanish prince to be their ruler, but had to settle for Iturbide when the Bourbons declined. I think Peru was a major loyalist holdout as well.

Would Ferdinand VII's intransigence doom his empire in some other way, or would it survive indefinitely? How would the relationship between Brazil and Portugal turn out if the Braganzas didn't have to flee?
 
The first independentist movements started with the influence of the ARW and the French Revolution (v.g. Francisco de Miranda in Venezuela and Incofidência Mineira in Brazil). The Americas were already powder keg of ideas and the development of European politics would determine which path they'd follow.
 
The first independentist movements started with the influence of the ARW and the French Revolution (v.g. Francisco de Miranda in Venezuela and Incofidência Mineira in Brazil). The Americas were already powder keg of ideas and the development of European politics would determine which path they'd follow.

Yes, but before Napoleon invasions destroyed royal power in Iberia the revolts had been stomped in South America by the Peruvian Viceroy Abascal and in Mexico it was only a low level boiling rebellion.

Without the napoleonic invasions Spain would have kept their colonies in line for the next 50 years until the situation exploded again like the Cuban rebellion in the late 19th century. Brazil and Portugal would take even longer since the slaveholder barons in the colony were really conservative and wanted to keep the status quo as long as possible.
 
Yes, but before Napoleon invasions destroyed royal power in Iberia the revolts had been stomped in South America by the Peruvian Viceroy Abascal and in Mexico it was only a low level boiling rebellion.

Without the napoleonic invasions Spain would have kept their colonies in line for the next 50 years until the situation exploded again like the Cuban rebellion in the late 19th century.

I wonder. When they went, they all went. I think presuming fifty years of peace is a bit much.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
There was a very significant divide between

[QUOTE=Lampiao;12379722]The first independentist movements started with the influence of the ARW and the French Revolution (v.g. Francisco de Miranda in Venezuela and Incofidência Mineira in Brazil). The Americas were already powder keg of ideas and the development of European politics would determine which path they'd follow.[/QUOTE]l

There was a very significant divide between "Europeans" and "Americans" (meaning those born in the Western Hemisphere) over political power, merchantilism, policies regarding relations between the various polities in the Americas, and it was - as you say - a revolutionary era. The peninsulare and criollo divide was real.

Absent power-sharing and some level of democratization, the Spanish and Portuguese empires would only get more unstable...

Best,
 
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Yes, but before Napoleon invasions destroyed royal power in Iberia the revolts had been stomped in South America by the Peruvian Viceroy Abascal and in Mexico it was only a low level boiling rebellion.

Without the napoleonic invasions Spain would have kept their colonies in line for the next 50 years until the situation exploded again like the Cuban rebellion in the late 19th century. Brazil and Portugal would take even longer since the slaveholder barons in the colony were really conservative and wanted to keep the status quo as long as possible.

Brazil remained a Constitutional Monarchy and it didn't stop the eruption of countless rebellions everywhere. From slaveholders to artisans, everyone fought the emperor. Also, Portuguese America was a pretty centralized country depite its size (In the year of the independence, it had a a population compared to Portugal and most of it lived close to the ocean). Spanish America was far more complex geographically, demographically, economically, culturally, etc. As soon as the nativist rebellions intensify the Empire would easily fall apart. As it did OTL.
 
There was a very significant divide between "Europeans" and "Americans" (meaning those born in the Western Hemisphere) over political power, merchant ilium, policies regarding relations between the various polities in the Americas, and it was - as you say - a revolutionary era. The peninsulare and criollo divide was real.

Absent power-sharing and some level of democratization, the Spanish and Portuguese empires would only get more unstable...

Best,

This divide wasn't necessarily true in Brazil. It was rather artificial. The so-called Portuguese Party during the reign of Pedro I mostly assembled the exporting commercial elite who mainted their economic ties to Lisbon instead of London. Other than that, during the entire 19th century, an important part of the Brazilian aristocracy, bureaucracy and even the middle-class was Portuguese-born or had one Portuguese parent. The influx of Portuguese to Brazil after independence never stopped and the antagonization of these two groups is rather artificial and politically-oriented, at least in Brazil.
 
The 'flapping of butterflies' only in Spain, Portugal and Iberian America would be enormous. The event raised by the OP is so important, should not discuss their possible or probable consequences deterministically.

Beginning with an event which surprisingly, is usually quite understated...
The decision taken by the Portuguese monarch refuge in Brazil of the invasion of Portugal by Napoleon, and from there to govern the Portuguese Empire, was instrumental for the formation of state infrastructure, which then enable the creation of future empire, of which the modern nation-state Brazilian, is its heir; in addition to the start of the state centralization with the corresponding military power to suppress the centrifugal tendencies.




With regard to Spain, it would not come to pass the power vacuum, OTL, nor the Council of Regency. Which arise in reaction to the movement juntista, on behalf of the legitimate monarch, first in Spain and taking advantage of the antecedent, emerge the various American juntas overthrow the constituted colonial authorities. Starting the autonomy / independence movement in America.
There were attempts more or less important both internal and external with British support planned and carried out by members of a small minority influenced by the ideas of encyclopedic French and American examples and French revolutionary rebellion.
It is also clear that among the elite Criolla educated, were the autonomists feelings and that in at least part of it, there was some self-identification proto nationalist as evidenced by the debates about the name to give the people on both sides of the Atlantic during the discussion of the constitution of Cadiz, (the representative of New Spain, he rejected the denomination of Spanish Americans, for the inhabitants of America).

But as evidenced by these same debates a shared feelings of patriotism and a sense of community were present in those same elites even after juntista movement started in Hispanic America.

That said, in a scenario where the legitimacy of the authority and prestige of the monarchy are unquestioned and this retained the means to impose its both political and military authority, it is doubtful that members of the autonomist movement make it to take power as they succeeded in OTL, and from there launch military offensive against loyalist and / or peripheral areas.

Not to forget the strong conservatism of the ruling classes Creole and Peninsular of colonial societies and their fear of social revolution, which remained present even after independence was achieved.

Therefore it is unlikely a quick breakdown of the colonial system Spanish, as the likely sources of both internal as foreign rupturist challenges, as had been shown so far, both lacked sufficient military force as a sufficiently broad base of domestic support as to achieve their independence goals.

Finally, given the tendency of the Spanish monarchy to continue applying its absolutist policies and focused on Europe as well as ongoing and unstoppable expansion of the influence of Liberalism among the local elites, it is likely that requests for reform and changes in the colonial system fundamentally increase in intensity and increase their popular support in all Hispanic America, to those claims.
It is also likely to increase the importance of both material and human resources of Hispanic America to the Spanish crown while the local feelings evolve into autonomists feelings.

That the above situation is possible that a negotiated or if no solution is achieved achieved a violent rupture is likely, at least in the peripheral regions and / or a state of constant instability occurs in a continuous cycle rebellion-repression-revolt, etc.

But this possible evolution of historical processes present in OTL, and accelerated by the invasion of Napoleon, not happen, that evolution would take decades to reach the critical point of OTL.
 
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