Free Trade and its Enemies in France, 1814–1851

The first full examination of the 'protectionist turn' of French liberalism in the early stages of nineteenth-century globalisation.

David Todd (Author)

9781107036932, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 30 April 2015

296 pages
23.5 x 16 x 2 cm, 0.56 kg

'Using a wide range of archival and printed primary sources in English, French and German, Todd provides the reader with an exhaustive analysis of the economic debates within France and stresses their connection with the globalizing economy of the nineteenth century.' Christopher Guyver, European History Quarterly

In the aftermath of the French Revolution, advocates of protection against foreign competition prevailed in a fierce controversy over international trade. This groundbreaking study is the first to examine this 'protectionist turn' in full. Faced with a reaffirmation of mercantile jealousy under the Bourbon Restoration, Benjamin Constant, Jean-Baptiste Say and regional publicists advocated the adoption of the liberty of commerce in order to consolidate the new liberal order. But after the Revolution of 1830 a new generation of liberal thinkers endeavoured to reconcile the jealousy of trade with the discourse of commercial society and political liberty. New justifications for protection oscillated between an industrialist reinvention of jealousy and an aspiration to self-sufficiency as a means of attenuating the rise of urban pauperism. A strident denunciation of British power and social imbalances served to defuse the internal tensions of the protectionist discourse and facilitated its dissemination across the French political spectrum.

Introduction
1. The reactionary political economy of the Bourbon Restoration
2. Economists, winegrowers and the dissemination of commercial liberalism
3. Completing the revolution: political and commercial liberty after 1830
4. Inventing economic nationalism
5. The contours of the national economy
6. The Englishness of free trade and the consolidation of protectionist dominance
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Economic history [KCZ], History of ideas [JFCX], Early modern history: c 1450/1500 to c 1700 [HBLH], European history [HBJD]