History and Geopolitics All books
Robert Darnton
Mesmerism and the End of the Enlightenment in France
At the beginning of 1778, Franz-Anton Mesmer arrived in Paris where he set about expounding his rather exotic theory - that the universe was swimming in a fluid which was responsible for occurences such heat, light, electricity and magnetism, but it was this fluid's relevance to medicine which he wished to highlight. In order to restablish health and man's harmony with nature he undertook strange healing sessions which became the origins of an extraordinary craze. Quickly, mesmerism became a disguised political theory. In demonstrating the links of mesmerism to politics, and the scientific notions of the age, Robert Darnton provides in this work a decisive contribution to the study of the diffusion of ideas in French society at the end of the 18th century. Robert Darnton is a professor at the University of Princeton
Norbert Rouland
The French State and Pluralism A Political History of Public Institutions from 476 to 1792
Has France become a multicultural society? Are we heading towards a dislocation of French unity, or a more advanced form of democratic life due to this pluralism? Can we invoke the French tradition which has given us several reference points? These are the serious questions which History must confront, and it is the aim of this history of public institutions to do just that. The author shows that the French State has constructed the Nation through a stronger voluntarist policy than found in most other Western European countries. His clear yet detailed style makes this book accessible to a wide readership, both those wishing to know more about the origins of our current political regime, and also to first year students, to whom this work represents a source of valuable information.
Guiliana Gemelli
Fernand Braudel
Fernand Braudel is considered as one of the major historians of the XXth century. Making his stand against factual history, he was one of the founders of the triumph of new history: the history of human societies rooted in their geographical space and obstinately determined to produce their material civilization there. This biography takes its strength from friendly conversations between Braudel and Giuliana Gemelli, who because she is Italian, had the necessary distance to make a demanding quest.
Claude Lelièvre, Christian Nique
The School of Presidents From Charles de Gaulle to François Mitterrand
What kind of education shaped Charles de Gaulle, Georges Pompidou, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing and François Mitterand? Who were their mentors? What was their opinion of school? What role is played in educational politics by a nationalist "Saint-Cyrien", a conservative "Normalien," a liberal from Polytechnique or ENA, or a socialist from Sciences-Po? How did their different educational experiences affect their actions and their views? A story of four great men who were once just schoolboys like everyone else.
Laurent Douzou
Disobedience History of the Liberation Movement
Not everybody in the world become a Pétainist after the debacle and not all the resistance movements were infiltrated by communists working for the benefit of Moscow. Drawing upon numerous archives, Laurent Dazou explains why several men and women as diverse as a freewheeling navy officer, a normalien philosopher obsessed with maths, a young militant communist from the Latin Quarter and a founding banker from an anti-Semetic league, refused to crack under pressure, joining the ranks of disenchantment, and learning to resist by organizing themselves to fight and to blaze the trail of disobedience. Laurent Douzou is a specialist in the history of the Resistance.
Maurice Duverger
Europe of Men
How is it possible to get many nations, separated by history, culture, political structures, to live together? If the European community functioned well with 6 members, in a mediocre way at 9, and at 12 members with difficulty, beyond, the E.E.C. will be ineffectual and paralyzed. One solution is available: to change the institutions. The author, a former member of the European Parliament, proposes here a new theory of federalism, the only way according to him, to progressively substitute to the power of the technocrats that of the members of Parliament and citizens.
