This page intentionally left blank FRENCH POLITICAL THOUGHT FROM MONTESQUIEU TO TOCQUEVILLE This study makes a major contribution to our understanding of one of the most important and enduring strands of modern political thought. Annelien de Dijn argues that Montesquieu’s aristocratic liberalism – his conviction that the preservation of freedom in a monarchy required the existence of an aristocratic ‘corps intermediaire’´ – had a continued impact on post-revolutionary France. Revisionist historians from Furet to Rosanvallon have emphasized the impact of revolutionary republicanism on post-revolutionary France, with its monist concep- tion of politics and its focus on popular sovereignty. Dr de Dijn, however, highlights the persistence of a pluralist liberalism that was rooted in the Old Regime, and which saw democracy and equality as inherent threats to liberty. She thus provides a new context in which to read the work of Alexis de Tocqueville, who is revealed as the heir not just of Restoration liberals, but also of the Royalists and their hero, Montesquieu. annelien de dijn is a postdoctoral researcher in the History Department of the University of Leuven. She has also been a visit- ing scholar at the Columbia University History Faculty and at the Cambridge University History Faculty. This is her first book. ideas in context 89 French Political Thought from Montesquieu to Tocqueville Liberty in a Levelled Society? ideas in context 89 Edited by Quentin Skinner and James Tully The books in this series will discuss the emergence of intellectual traditions and of related new disciplines. The procedures, aims and vocabularies that were generated will be set in the context of the alternatives available within the contemporary frameworks of ideas and institutions. Through detailed studies of the evolution of such traditions, and their modification by different audiences, it is hoped that a new picture will form of the development of ideas in their concrete contexts. By this means, artificial distinctions between the history of philosophy, of the various sciences, of society and politics, and of literature may be seen to dissolve. The series is published with the support of the Exxon Foundation. A list of books in the series will be found at the end of the volume. FRENCH POLITICAL THOUGHT FROM MONTESQUIEU TO TOCQUEVILLE Liberty in a Levelled Society? ANNELIEN DE DIJN University of Leuven CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo Cambridge University Press The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 8RU, UK Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521877886 © Annelien de Dijn 2008 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provision of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published in print format 2008 ISBN-13 978-0-511-38690-9 eBook (EBL) ISBN-13 978-0-521-87788-6 hardback Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of urls for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. Contents Acknowledgements page viii Introduction 1 1 Political thought in eighteenth-century France: the invention of aristocratic liberalism 11 2 Liberty and inequality: the royalist discourse 40 3 A society of equals: the liberal response 68 4 Liberty in a levelled society: Charles Dunoyer, Benjamin Constant, and Prosper de Barante 89 5 The new aristocracy: a theme in Restoration liberalism 111 6 The danger of democracy: Orleanist´ liberalism and Alexis de Tocqueville 129 7 The French predicament: aristocratic liberalism in the Second Empire 155 Epilogue 185 Bibliography 195 Index 210 vii Acknowledgements This book began life as a doctoral dissertation at the History Department of the University of Leuven. I am most indebted to all members of that department for the congenial atmosphere which has sustained me while doing research, and, perhaps even more importantly, while writing. In particular I wish to thank my supervisor Emiel Lamberts for his unfailing support of my work over the years. Many thanks are also due to my teachers Isser Woloch and David Armitage, and my fellow students at the Columbia History Department, for sparking my interest in the history of ideas and in French history, during my time there as an MA student. I will be for ever indebted to the members of my dissertation committee, as well as to the readers of Cambridge University Press for their many suggestions which have helped to turn this dissertation into a book. Special thanks go out to Quentin Skinner, who was not only kind enough to be part of my dissertation committee, but also encouraged me to submit the manuscript to the series in which it is now published. The New York University Remarque Institute and the Columbia Uni- versity History Department provided me with a hospitable environment while I was reworking the manuscript, and I received invaluable help and encouragement from a number of scholars based in the New York area, in particular Helena Rosenblatt and Samuel Moyn. My gratitude, no less heartfelt although its recipients are impersonal, also goes out to a number of institutions who have funded me over the years. The Fund for Scientific Research – Flanders sponsored my doctoral research, and has continued to support me as a postdoctoral researcher, while the Fulbright Foundation allowed me to spend a year abroad while rewriting the manuscript. viii Introduction Since the 1980s, many important books have been written on the his- tory of nineteenth-century liberal thought. The writings of canonical liberal thinkers, such as Benjamin Constant and Alexis de Tocqueville have engendered new and intellectually stimulating interpretations.1 At the same time, scholars have recovered a number of lesser-known nineteenth- century liberal thinkers, such as Franc¸ois Guizot, or T. H. Green, from oblivion.2 But historical interest has not remained limited to individual liberal thinkers. Over the past few decades, several histories have appeared which analyse the discourse of nineteenth-century liberal movements in their various national contexts. The intellectual landscape of mid-Victorian liberalism, for instance, is now a familiar one.3 We have gained more insight into the ideological preoccupations of both English and Dutch progres- sive liberals of the late nineteenth century.4 Likewise, our knowledge of the French liberal movement in its manifold manifestations has increased 1 E.g. Stephen Holmes, Benjamin Constant and the making of modern liberty (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1984); Biancamaria Fontana, Benjamin Constant and the post-revolutionary mind (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1991); Franc¸oise Melonio,´ Tocqueville et les Franc¸ais (Paris: Aubier, 1993); George Armstrong Kelly, The Humane Comedy: Constant, Tocquevilleand French liberalism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992); Roger Boesche, The strange liberalism of Alexis de Tocqueville (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1987); Sheldon Wolin, Tocqueville between two worlds. The making of a political and theoretical life (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2001). 2 Pierre Rosanvallon, Le moment Guizot (Paris: Gallimard, 1985); Aurelian Craiutu, Liberalism under siege: the political thought of the French doctrinaires (Maryland: Lexington Books, 2003); R. Bellamy, Victorian liberalism: nineteenth-century political thought and practice (London: Routledge, 1990). 3 Eugenio Biagini, ed., Citizenship and community: liberals, radicals and collective identities in the British Isles, 1865–1931 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996); Eugenio Biagini, Liberty, retrenchment and reform. Popular liberalism in the age of Gladstone, 1860–1880 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992). 4 M. Freeden, The new liberalism. An ideology of social reform (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978); Henk te Velde, Gemeenschapszin en plichtsbesef: liberalisme en nationalisme in Nederland, 1870–1918 (’s-Gravenhage: SDU, 1992); Siep Stuurman, Wacht op onze daden: het liberalisme en de vernieuwing van de Nederlandse staat (Amsterdam: Bakker, 1992); Stefan Dudink, Deugdzaam liberalisme: sociaal- liberalisme in Nederland 1870–1901 (Amsterdam: IISG, 1997). 1 2 French Political Thought From Montesquieu to Tocqueville considerably.5 In addition to these national histories, a number of scholars have attempted to capture the nature of nineteenth-century liberalism as a European phenomenon.6 The increased attention for nineteenth-century liberalism in recent his- toriography can be attributed to different factors. Interest in the history of political thought has been stimulated over the past few decades, in partic- ular in the Anglophone world, by the work of scholars such as Quentin Skinner and J. G. A. Pocock. In their methodological writings, and in their own work on early-modern political thought, these authors have shown that it is possible to study political thought as any other field in the history of mankind, thus turning what had long been a philosophical activity into a historical discipline. At the same time, the ‘cultural’ or ‘linguistic’ turn in history has contributed much to encouraging an interest in the world of