The Most Effective Absolute Rulers During the late 1400s and 1500s, many rulers took great measures to centralize political power and place it in their own hands. This lead to the occurrence of absolute monarchies, some of which I thought were overall very effective. In absolute monarchies, theoretically the monarch is all-powerful, with no legal limitations to his or her authority. Absolutism in Europe was characteristically justified by the doctrine of divine right, according to which the monarch reigns all-powerfully by the will of God. The intention of absolute monarchs is to utilize his or her power in an effective, better-organized way, despite its weaknesses or negative consequences; and from my perspective, I would have to say …show more content…

He did this through good laws, fair taxes, improving society, and overall promoting human happiness. He was taught that change had to come from the monarchs, and not from the people, but instead for the people. His enlightened rule of Prussia combined the need for an effective monarch with the need for economic, educational, and social reform. His victory over Austria, France, and Russia is considered to be one of the greatest military triumphs in European history.
From my perspective, Peter the Great was not only a great effective absolute monarch of Russia but also another one of its greatest reformers. Thanks to Russia's former czars, Russia already possessed a tradition of strong central authority. However, it was culturally, militarily, commercially, and economically compared with the West. During the late 1600s and early 1700s, Peter the Great not only centralized political power but forced rapid westernization, or, in other words, reformed the government and culture of Russia based on Western-style modernization. He also changed Russia's geography and political perspectives and their orientation. Earlier, Russia had been isolated from Europe and concentrated on the events occurring in Asia. However, after combating and winning a long, hard war with Sweden, Peter gained a seaport for Russia to promote superior education and growth. When Peter was declared czar at age ten, he never could have guessed that one day, historians and others would refer to him