Napoleon

Napoleon was a leader of France, both politically and militarily. He greatly affected Europe and how it was run, because he was running it; Napoleon was in control of most of Europe during his rule. He began in France, his original country, gaining power and later conquering nearby countries. He often redesigned how government ran in each nation and transformed the access and rights of  the people. His ideas lead to huge changes for each country he controlled and his accomplishments are easily seen by the world even today.

Napoleon Crossing the Alps, romantic version by Jacques-Louis David in 1805 

At the time Napoleon came to power class greatly influenced a person's freedoms, power, and education. However, he worked to change that, developing a system of meritocracy so people could get what they deserved by valuing each person's skills instead of rewarding them for their class. He also set up the bank of France, determined the country's budget, promoted industry, and created public works programs which built roads and canals for all of France. In other countries he set up education systems such as the institute of Egypt and removed trade barriers while supporting industry. The people of Europe had more rights to education and property than ever before. Yet Madame de Stael described his rule as having "profound contempt for all the intellectual riches of human nature: virtue, dignity, religion, enthusiasm" Which is strange because you'd think widespread access to education was intellectually rich. But it would make sense for her to think this way since she was part of the nobility and related to an advisor of King Louis XVI before Napoleon took over. She probably did not like that he eradicated titles of nobility and nullified the privileges previously held by the church.

Napoleon was widely disliked as well as praised. The former rulers of the countries he took over were not happy with his different ideals and their loss of power. Also, many members of nobility, aristocracy, the wealthy in general, did not like how he was taking away what they considered natural superiority. His control came through military strategy and war has never resulted in friendships so those who lost something in a battle would not be his fans. As well as people who were unwillingly forced to belong to France when they were loyal to their homeland. I don't agree with the way he took over but the improvements he made to social, economic, and political systems were important for the progression of human rights in Europe and the rest of the world.