Demos Rising (Hardcover)

Stephen W. Sawyer

ISBN 10: 0226837572 / ISBN 13: 9780226837574

Published by The University of Chicago Press, 2025

About this Item

Hardcover. A political history exploring the concept of demos in the French government during the period of 1800 to 1850. In his previous book, Demos Assembled, historian Stephen W. Sawyer offered a transatlantic account of the birth and transformation of the modern democratic state. In Demos Rising, he presents readers of political history with a prequel whose ambitious claim is that a genuine demos became possible in France only with the development of government regulation and administration. Focusing on democracy as a form of administration rather than as a form of sovereignty allows Sawyer to explore urban planning, work and private enterprise, health administration, and much more as cornerstones of a self-governing society of equals. Examining the period between 1800 and 1850, Sawyer studies a set of thinkers who debated at length over the material problems of everyday life, sparking calls for political action and social reform in the face of conflict wreaked by deforestation, urbanization, health crises, labor relations, industrial capitalism, religious tensions, and imperial expansion. The solutions to these problems, Sawyer argues, were soughtand sometimes foundnot through elections, as one might assume, but rather through the "care for all" promised by modern administrative power, regulatory intervention, and social welfare programs. By studying this profound transformation in governance, the book wagers, we can better understand the origin and meaning of democracyeven when events in our own time have thrown the concept into doubt. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.

Seller Inventory # 9780226837574

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Demos Rising (Hardcover)
• Publisher: The University of Chicago Press
• Publication Date: 2025
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0226837572
• ISBN 13: 9780226837574
• Binding: Hardcover
• Condition: new

About this title

Synopsis

A political history exploring the concept of demos in the French government during the period of 1800 to 1850.
 
In his previous book, Demos Assembled, historian Stephen W. Sawyer offered a transatlantic account of the birth and transformation of the modern democratic state. In Demos Rising, he presents readers of political history with a prequel whose ambitious claim is that a genuine demos became possible in France only with the development of government regulation and administration. Focusing on democracy as a form of administration rather than as a form of sovereignty allows Sawyer to explore urban planning, work and private enterprise, health administration, and much more as cornerstones of a self-governing society of equals.
 
Examining the period between 1800 and 1850, Sawyer studies a set of thinkers who debated at length over the material problems of everyday life, sparking calls for political action and social reform in the face of conflict wreaked by deforestation, urbanization, health crises, labor relations, industrial capitalism, religious tensions, and imperial expansion. The solutions to these problems, Sawyer argues, were sought—and sometimes found—not through elections, as one might assume, but rather through the “care for all” promised by modern administrative power, regulatory intervention, and social welfare programs. By studying this profound transformation in governance, the book wagers, we can better understand the origin and meaning of democracy—even when events in our own time have thrown the concept into doubt.

About the Author

Stephen W. Sawyer is Ballantine-Leavitt Professor of History, cofounder of the History, Law, and Society Program, and director of the Center for Critical Democracy Studies at the American University of Paris. He is editor of the Tocqueville Review and associate editor of the Annales. History and Social Sciences.