Agents of the People: Democracy and Popular Sovereignty in British and Swedish Parliamentary and Public Debates, 1734-1800BRILL, 2010 - 530 strani This book on the pre-history of democratisation shows how and why more modern attitudes to democracy started to emerge in the late eighteenth century. Focusing on the language of parliamentarians, the author reconstructs and compares debates on the political role and representation of the people in Britain and Sweden. His analysis demonstrates not only the persistence of the classical, pejorative, conception of democracy but also the gradual revaluation of the notion prior to the French Revolution. The author analyses the clash between British and French conceptions of democracy as well as the first definitions of the sovereignty of Parliament as the sovereignty of the people. Furthermore, by placing parliamentary discourse in the context of public debates, he reveals the previously ignored evolutionary role that parliaments played in redefining the most crucial concept in Western political theory. |
Vsebina
Introduction | 1 |
Chapter One British and Swedish Parliamentary Debates in a Comparative Study of Political Vocabularies | 29 |
The Significance of Parliamentary Debates for the History of Political Vocabularies | 31 |
Practical Arrangements and Argumentation | 36 |
Special Features of Parliamentary Rhetoric | 41 |
Ceremonial Speaking and Dialogues between the Powers of the State | 45 |
Methodological Challenges Posed by the Use of Parliamentary Reports and Minutes | 50 |
Chapter Two Variations in British Parliamentary Conceptions of the People 17341771 | 59 |
The Concept of Democracy in the Rhetoric of the Deadlocked Parties | 220 |
The Political Role of the People in the Accession Charter and the Nomination of Senators | 226 |
The Concept of the People at the Time of the Coronation and the Royal Coup of 1772 | 239 |
Chapter Four The ReEvaluation of the Representation of the People and Democracy in Westminster 17721789 | 245 |
The American Crisis Representation and the British People 17721780 | 246 |
Democracy of the Pure Swedish and Mixed British Types Debated in the Early 1780s | 269 |
Prospects for a Parliamentary Reform and the Peoples Ministry 17821783 | 289 |
Further Debates on Parliamentary Reform 17841785 | 306 |
Walpoles Definition of the Limits of Democracy | 67 |
The Standing Army and the Rights of the People in the Late 1730s | 78 |
The Prime Minister Challenged by a Popular Government in 17411742 | 89 |
Views on the Excessive and Insufficient Power of the People in the 1740s | 104 |
Consensual Conceptions of the People as Subjects during the Seven Years War | 119 |
The Increasing Relevance of the People in Political Argumentation 17631769 | 127 |
Redefinitions of the Relationship between the People Parliament and the Crown in the Aftermath of the John Wilkes Case 17701771 | 139 |
Did Popular Sovereignty and Representative Democracy Exist in Sweden before 1772? | 157 |
Interpretations of the Age of Liberty as a Watershed in the Progress of Democracy | 160 |
The Relationship between the Nobility the Nation and the People at the Beginning of the Riksdag of 17691770 | 175 |
The Concept of the People in Printed Literature and the Reactions of the Estates to Publicity in the Autumn of 1769 | 184 |
The Concept of the People in Debates on the Constitution | 190 |
The Noble Estate and the Meaning of Democracy in the Autumn of 1769 | 203 |
Increasing Contestability of the Concept the People during the Riksdag of 17711772 | 209 |
Positive Understandings of Democracy before the French Revolution | 325 |
no Comment from Westminster | 337 |
Chapter Five Reactions to the Revolutionary Concepts of Democracy and Popular Sovereignty in Westminster 17891800 | 343 |
Initial Responses to the Revolution in Britain | 348 |
The Heated Debate on Democracy in 1790 | 352 |
Strengthening Criticism of the French Model of Democracy in 1791 | 364 |
Proper British and Extreme French Democracy Contrasted in 1792 | 375 |
Combating both French and Domestic Conceptions of Democracy in 1793 | 392 |
Reactions to Robespierres Redefinition of Democracy in 1794 | 409 |
The Political Rights of the People in a Time of Crisis | 423 |
Calls for Representative Government and Defences of Democracy in 17961797 | 447 |
the Sovereignty of Parliament Becomes the Sovereignty of the People | 457 |
Conclusion | 471 |
Bibliography | 497 |
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Agents of the People: Democracy and Popular Sovereignty in British and ... Pasi Ihalainen Omejen predogled - 2010 |
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