King's College London

TY - JOUR

T1 - TRANSNATIONAL PROJECTS OF EMPIRE IN FRANCE, C.1815-C.1870

AU - Todd, David

PY - 2015/8

Y1 - 2015/8

N2 - Rather than renouncing empire after the fall of Napoleon, this essay argues, French liberal thinkers expressed a sustained preference for a strategy based on transnational connections, or what imperial historians describe as informal imperialism. The eulogy of European Christian civilization exemplified by François Guizot's lecture at the Sorbonne in 1828 served not only to legitimize French global ambitions, but also to facilitate cooperation with other European imperial powers, especially Britain, and indigenous collaborators. Liberal enthusiasm for the spread of Western civilization also inspired the emergence of a French version of free-trade imperialism, of which the economist Michel Chevalier proved a consistent advocate. Only when such aspirations were frustrated did liberals reluctantly endorse colonial conquest, on an exceptional basis in Algeria after 1840 and on a global scale after 1870. The allegedly abrupt liberal conversion to empire in the nineteenth century may instead be construed as a tactical shift from informal to formal dominance.

AB - Rather than renouncing empire after the fall of Napoleon, this essay argues, French liberal thinkers expressed a sustained preference for a strategy based on transnational connections, or what imperial historians describe as informal imperialism. The eulogy of European Christian civilization exemplified by François Guizot's lecture at the Sorbonne in 1828 served not only to legitimize French global ambitions, but also to facilitate cooperation with other European imperial powers, especially Britain, and indigenous collaborators. Liberal enthusiasm for the spread of Western civilization also inspired the emergence of a French version of free-trade imperialism, of which the economist Michel Chevalier proved a consistent advocate. Only when such aspirations were frustrated did liberals reluctantly endorse colonial conquest, on an exceptional basis in Algeria after 1840 and on a global scale after 1870. The allegedly abrupt liberal conversion to empire in the nineteenth century may instead be construed as a tactical shift from informal to formal dominance.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84935041348&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1017/S147924431400047X

DO - 10.1017/S147924431400047X

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:84935041348

VL - 12

SP - 265

EP - 293

JO - Modern Intellectual History

JF - Modern Intellectual History

SN - 1479-2443

IS - 2

ER -