From 1815 to 1830, a conscious program by conservative statesmen, including Metternich and Castlereagh, was put into place to contain revolution and revolutionary forces by restoring the old orders, particularly the previously-ruling aristocracies.
Britain, Prussia, Russia and Austria renewed their commitment to prevent any restoration of Bonapartist power and agreed to meet regularly in conferences to discuss their common interests.
That ultimately did not disrupt the meeting but as a punishment to the French for allowing Napoleon back in power, they were forced to pay an indemnity, accept an army of occupation for five years and have France's borders returned to those of 1790.
Metternich and most of the other participants at the Congress of Vienna were representatives of an ideology known as conservatism, which generally dates back to 1790, when its best-known figure, Edmund Burke, wrote Reflections on the Revolution in France.
Joseph de Maistre was a very influential spokesperson for a counterrevolutionary and authoritarian conservatism and believed in hereditary monarchies because they would bring "order to society," a commodity in short supply in his eyes after the chaos of the French Revolution.
While the Revolutions had limited success in Portugal (where a constitutional monarchy was instated) and Greece (which became independent from the Ottoman Empire), they were largely crushed in other European countries, resulting in a victory for the Conservative Order.