Suchergebnisse

This article discusses Alfred Cobban's liberal beliefs. It also reveals for the first time that he was a Fabian socialist. Cobban was Professor of French History at University College, London, from 1953 to his death in 1968. Cobban was outstanding both for his scholarship, his numerous publications on modern French history and his supervision of an impressive number of doctoral students, particularly women, who went on both to publish and to become professors in universities in Britain and in Canada. Cobban's outstanding books on Rousseau, on the Enlightenment, in particular on the French Revolution, and also well-known studies of contemporary politics, display his liberalism, his belief in individual freedom, democracy and change through gradual reform. Cobban joined the Fabian socialists when he was an undergraduate. Fabians were hostile to change through revolution, had no time for Marxism and argued that a socialist society would emerge through parliamentary reform. Such views correspond to Cobban's ideas on 1789, in which he was in profound disagreement with leading French revolutionary historians such as Professor Ernest Labrousse. French liberal historians including Professor François Furet and Professor Leroy-Ladurie shared Cobban's views that 1789 was primarily a political revolution.

Saint-Simonians were a group of young engineers and doctors who proposed original solutions to the social and banking crises of the early nineteenth century. Through an examination of the lives, ideals and activities of these men and women, the book analyses the influence of the Saint-Simonians on nineteenth-century French society

The Saint-Simonians were a group of young engineers and doctors who proposed original solutions to the social and banking crises of the early nineteenth century. They were unique in the 1820s in attracting women, including workers, into their movement, and attempting to change the world through love, including the sexual 'liberation' of women. Some metamorphosed from idealistic reformers to create the first socialist groups in France, while others spearheaded bank reform, railway building and urban transformation in the 1850s. They took the lead in the colonisation of Algeria, in popular journalism, business, and in organising international exhibitions. They planned the most notable engineering project of the time, the Suez Canal, and a project that took over a century more to be completed, the Channel tunnel. Through an examination of the lives, ideals and activities of these men and women, Pilbeam analyses the influence of the Saint-Simonians on nineteenth-century French society.

Cover -- Copyright -- Contents -- Preface -- 1. Plural socialism -- 2. The social question -- 3. Revolutionary inspirations -- 4. Religion and the early socialists -- 5. Socialists and education: to repulse the barbarians -- 6. The "new woman -- 7. Association: dream worlds -- 8. Worker associations before 1848 -- 9. Association: socialist hopes in the Second Republic -- 10. Association: the conservative reaction in the Second Republic -- 11. Conclusion -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index.