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School of History

HST7319 – In the Shadow of the French Revolution: Political Thought 1789-1890

Module code: HST7319

Credits: 15
Semester: SEM 1

Module Convenor: Professor Gareth Stedman Jones

This course examines the impact of the French Revolution upon the shape of nineteenth-century political thought. The course demonstrates its central role in the inception of socialism and positivism in the definition of modern Conservatism and in the inhibiting part it played in the development of nineteenth-century liberalism, republicanism and democracy. It goes on to examine how these elements of thought were modified by the emergence of the 'social question' (individualization and the workers movements) and by the experience of the 1848 Revolution. Finally, it examines the growing preoccupation with questions of secularism, social democracy and empire in the 1850's and after. Among the thinkers examined are Condorcet, Constant, De Maistre, Saint-Simon and Proudhon: Mill and Carlyle; Hegel, Marx, Lorenz von Stein and Lasalle.

Assessment: Essay (4,000 words) [100%]
Level: 7

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