Making sense of this crazy world

I spent last week looking at how the aristocratic elite were doing all they could to prevent any breech on their monopoly of power. Well, much as they tried to keep the door tightly closed. That bew breed of  'urban aristocracy' that Asa Briggs had talked about were banging against the door and they’re not going to go away.

Enough of the French, I say, and their crazy revolutions. Let’s look at how the English did things in the nineteenth century. “Reform in order to conserve” was the English way: give a little when you have to in order to keep what’s most important. You’ll see what I mean, in this episode, and as the next few episodes unfold.

Through the English, American and French revolutions and those of 1848, we have been looking at the history of what we call liberal representative democracy, by which today, all adult men and women, periodically have the opportunity to vote for people to represent us, make laws and govern over us. And, actually, we began this journey back in ancient Athens, with Athenian or direct democracy. Well,...

I said last week that the French weren’t finished with their revolution but when things flared up again, the counter-revolution kicked in. It seemed that everything the workers of Paris had fought for, the democracy that they thought would usher in more social reform, was not going to happen. Instead, things were being taken away from them. And what happened in France, would happen across Europe.

Having spent a couple of weeks looking at the thoughts of Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, interesting and relevant though they are, it’s time to get back to the stuff of revolutions because it's 1848 and the French, God bless ‘em, are far from done.

Having taken a look at the influence Jeremy Bentham has on our world today, I’m moving on to look at someone who had an even greater influence: John Stuart Mill. Why? Because Mill, a man way, way ahead of his time, put liberty front and centre in his political work

I said last week that I’d look at how British liberals picked up the baton from the Enlightenment and developed liberal thinking. And I’m going to begin with Jeremy Bentham, the man who gave us utilitarianism and much more. And don’t worry about utilitarianism, I am not going to get too heavy (I can’t) but it is very important and pretty straightforward really.

Having looked at revolutions in England, America and France, the idea of liberty is what powers through most and it gave rise to a political ideology that we’ll be familiar with today: liberalism. So, this episode takes stock of where we are at in the wake of the French Revolution with liberal ideas.

This is the episode where I try to put the French Revolution in perspective. Just how significant was it?

I left things last week in France with the 18 Brumaire coup which had left France governed by three consuls: Abbé Sieyès, Napoleon and, just for the record, Roger Ducos. I called the last episode “Reaction”.  Well, I’m calling this one “Delayed Reaction” because that’s what it seems like to me. There is not a counter-revolution going on but a reaction to what was seen as the excesses of the revolu...

We left things last week with the death of Robespierre and the end of the Terror. In Paris, people were literally hugging each other in the streets, such was the relief that it was over. Well, in politics as much as in chemistry and physics, actions nearly always result in a reaction, and that’s what happened in France. Things had gone too far, time to rein the runaway horse in.

Last week I ended things with the execution of Louis XVI. This week I move on to look at the ways in which the French Revolution radicalised and resorted to terror.

Last week I mentioned that most of France thought the Revolution was over as the Constituent Assembly settled down to write a constitution for France but I also said a few weeks ago that the genie had been let out of the bottle, well, the bourgeoisie were still struggling to get the lid back on that bottle with the genie safely inside. And they were to fail. To go back to how I ended things last w...

This week we’ll look at how, having pushed the revolution forward only to lose control, the bourgeoisie, men of property lest we forget, tried to haul the reigns in on the runaway horse and regain control.

We should, in so many ways, see the French Revolution as the model for future revolutions. Last week, I talked about “letting the genie out of the bottle” and that’s what happened, and it proved so difficult to put the cork back into the bottle. So, what we’ll look at today is the way in which the bourgeoisie, at least temporarily, lost control of events. Just as so often. those that start things...

This episode looks at the meeting of the Estates-General that, it was hoped, would decide the future of France and it was here that the bourgeoisie seized control of events from both the King and the aristocracy, and demanded a constitution.

It has to be one of the greatest ironies of history that the revolution that would ultimately remove the heads of many an aristocrat was actually started by the aristocracy, and by their selfishness at that. And that's what we'll look at in this episode and you will see its links to issues we face today.

I’m still back in the world of books and clever people. And this week its Jean-Jaques Rousseau, the man who saw democracy as a contract. And a thinker that still has a big influence on our world today.

With the French Revolution, I really have to make another diversion and consider the influence of the philosophes. Not only did they have an influence on the revolution but they have a profound influence on our world today. So, I’m back in the world of books and clever people. And I begin with the work of one Charles Louis de Secondat, baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu.

We’ve looked at the English Revolution in the seventeenth and the American Revolution that rid itself forever of the English monarchy but replaced it with an oligarchy of the wealthy. So now I’m going to turn our attention to the French Revolution, the one that gave us Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité. Well, we’ll see about that.

This episode wraps up our look at the American constitution, so-called American democracy by looking at the ratification process and making a final assessment of just what had been achieved.

This episode will focus squarely on the American Constitution, a constitution that Americans at least, still seem to think is fit for purpose. I say this because there have only been 27 amendments with the first ten making up the Bill of Rights, so really, they were always part of the constitution, and the 21st amendment was repealing the 18th amendment (prohibition) so, in effect, there have only...

I left things last week with the American colonies at war with Britain. But also, at war with themselves. And this is going to continue. And this episode will look at the America that was created out of the Revolution and I’m going to suggest that what was in fact created was an oligarchy.

In this episode, I’m turning my attention squarely on the American Revolution, the revolution against British rule, because it led to an independent American state and to the Constitution that largely still operates today. And I'm going to suggest that for the people of America, it was a decidedly limited revolution.

This week I’m going to look at someone who, along with Karl Marx, was perhaps the most important thinker in shaping our world today. He was a pamphleteer, a journalist, a propagandist, a polemicist, and something of a philosopher. His name is Thomas Paine and he’s important because he had a remarkable influence on both the American and French revolutions.