REVIEWS | 79 The French Second Empire: An Anatomy of Political Power. By Roger Price (New York, Cambridge University Press, 2002) 507 pp. $75.00 This book synthesizes a vast range of primary and secondary sources about the origins, transformation, and collapse of the French Second Empire. Its theme of “regime transition” from the authoritarian empire of the 1850s to the liberal empire of the later 1860s combines a familiar

narrative about constitutional change with a richly contextualized analy- Downloaded from http://direct.mit.edu/jinh/article-pdf/34/1/79/1706947/002219503322645574.pdf by guest on 29 September 2021 sis of Louis Napoleon’s personal authority, the administrative institu- tions and public policies of his regime, socioeconomic and cultural changes, and forms of political opposition. Most of the chapters span the entire period from 1852 to 1870, each from a distinct analytical perspec- tive. Thus, successive chapters in Part II cover Napoleon III’s personal role as emperor; the system of government involving Napoleon’s minis- ters, legislative institutions, and the prefectoral administration; the man- agement of elections; the preservation of public order; the construction of moral order; and economic policies designed to create prosperity. Similarly, Part III consists of chapters about the context for opposition, about legitimism, and about liberalism throughout the period, followed by a chapter about republicans in the aftermath of Louis-Napoleon’s coup d’état and a chapter about the republican revival of the 1860s. These analytical chapters are preceded in Part I by a concise account of Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte’s rise to power during the Second Republic, and followed in Part IV by a superb analysis of the crisis of war and revo- lution in 1870 that ended his regime. The overlapping chronology and interrelated themes addressed in the central parts of the book result in considerable repetition about the reasons for Napoleon III’s constitutional changes, the administration’s loss of control over electoral management, elite disillusionment with Napoleon III’s foreign and domestic policies, and the rise of political op- position. Nonetheless, the many strands of analysis are woven into a co- herent argument about the dynamics of liberalization: It expressed the disaffection of social elites from the personal rule of Napoleon III and involved concessions by the emperor to liberal demands for greater pub- lic liberties and parliamentary power. Liberals were the main architects and beneªciaries of regime transition. The counterpoint of Price’s argument about liberalization concerns the limits of democraticization at the end of the Second Empire. How stable was a liberal empire that continued to be opposed by republicans who were inspired by the democratic ideals of the French Revolution? Unlike historians who have emphasized the strength of the republican movement at the end of the Second Empire, Price highlights divisions between moderate republicans, radicals, and revolutionary socialists, and he interprets the plebiscite of May 1870 as an overwhelming defeat for republican opponents of the regime. Furthermore, Price points out that protests and riots in Paris, where republican candidates had triumphed in the legislative elections of 1869, sparked a backlash among voters in the 80 | TED W. MARGADANT provinces that the government skillfully encouraged. An incipient “party of order” rallied support for the regime from a broad spectrum of opinion, ranging from moderate republicans, liberal Catholics, and lib- eral Bonapartists to Legitimists and authoritarian Bonapartists. Thus, Price concludes that liberalization had stabilized the regime. But what would have happened to this coalition if radical republi- cans had succeeded in extending their political base from Paris and other

cities into the countryside, as their predecessors in the “Democ-Soc” Downloaded from http://direct.mit.edu/jinh/article-pdf/34/1/79/1706947/002219503322645574.pdf by guest on 29 September 2021 movement had done during the Second Republic? Price’s excellent analysis of the social context of politics shows that liberalism was an elit- ist movement. Authoritarian Bonapartists had a mass base in the coun- tryside, especially in southwestern France, and radical republicans were developing a mass base in the cities, especially in Paris. Would liberal Bonapartists have been able to maintain the political inºuence that they achieved in the elections of 1869, or would they have been outºanked by authoritarian Bonapartists on the right and radical republicans on the left? This question is hypothetical because the liberal Empire collapsed in military defeat less than four months after its constitution had been ratiªed by the plebiscite of May 1870. However, Price shows that the outbreak of the war was related to the rivalry between liberal Bonapartists and authoritarian Bonapartists. The pressure of public opin- ion did not compel Napoleon III to declare war on Prussia. The war party had a speciªc locus in authoritarian Bonapartists who had been pressing for a crackdown on the republican left ever since the elections of 1869. A diplomatic dispute with Prussia offered them a chance to em- bark on a war that would rally popular support for an authoritarian em- pire. Price is at his best in dissecting the political intrigues in Paris that brought authoritarian Bonapartists back into power as soon as rumours of military setbacks compromised the liberal ministry of Emile Ollivier. This palace coup also undermined prospects for liberals in the legislative assembly to establish an interim government after the emperor was cap- tured by the Prussians at Sedan. In playing for such high stakes, the au- thoritarian Bonapartists lost everything, but they brought down the liberal Bonapartists with them. The Second Empire collapsed in a Pari- sian uprising that proclaimed a new republic and brought republican deputies from the city into power as a government of national defense. Price’s compelling narrative of these events reveals how quickly liberal Bonapartism vanished. Behind the military defeat in 1870 were deeper tensions between authoritarianism and democraticization in French po- litical culture that the liberalization of the Second Empire failed to re- solve. Ted W. Margadant University of California, Davis