Known at first as 'People's War', this idea developed in the 19th century as part of a growing sense of national identity.
In the ideology of revolutionary France, young men were conscripted into the armed forces as part of their duty as citizens, but the remaining population was also expected to make personal sacrifices for the war, blurring the distinction between civilian and soldier. More than a century before, the French Revolution of 1789 had seen the first attempts to harness citizenship and patriotism to a national war effort. The war was also fought at a high point of patriotism and belief in the existing social hierarchy beliefs that the war itself helped destroy, and that the modern world finds very hard to understand. This was the first mass global war of the industrialised age, a demonstration of the prodigious strength, resilience and killing power of modern states. What made World War One so different was the long-term impact of the Industrial Revolution, with its accompanying political and social changes.
