<P> The events of 1848 were the product of mounting social and political tensions after the Congress of Vienna of 1815 . During the "pre-March" period, the already conservative Austrian Empire moved further away from ideas of the Age of Enlightenment, restricted freedom of the press, limited many university activities, and banned fraternities . </P> <P> Conflicts between debtors and creditors in agricultural production as well as over land use rights in parts of Hungary (as in France) led to conflicts that occasionally erupted into violence . Conflict over organized religion was pervasive in pre-1848 Europe . Tension came both from within Catholicism and between members of different confessions . These conflicts were often mixed with conflict with the state . Important for the revolutionaries were state conflicts including the armed forces and collection of taxes . As 1848 approached, the revolutions the Empire crushed to maintain longstanding conservative minister Klemens Wenzel von Metternich's Concert of Europe left the empire nearly bankrupt and in continual need of soldiers . Draft commissions led to brawls between soldiers and civilians . All of this further agitated the peasantry, who resented their remaining feudal obligations . </P> <P> Despite lack of freedom of the press and association, there was a flourishing liberal German culture among students and those educated either in Josephine schools or German universities . They published pamphlets and newspapers discussing education and language; the need for basic liberal reforms was assumed . These middle class liberals largely understood and accepted that forced labor is not efficient, and that the Empire should adopt a wage labor system . The question was how to institute such reforms . </P> <P> Notable liberal clubs of the time in Vienna included the Legal - Political Reading Club (established 1842) and Concordia Society (1840). They, like the Lower Austrian Manufacturers' Association (1840) were part of a culture that criticized Metternich's government from the city's coffeehouses, salons, and even stages, but prior to 1848 their demands had not even extended to constitutionalism or freedom of assembly, let alone republicanism . They had merely advocated relaxed censorship, freedom of religion, economic freedoms, and, above all, a more competent administration . They were opposed to outright popular sovereignty and the universal franchise . </P>

Why do you think the revolution of 1848 failed in austria