The essays in this volume portray the debates concerning freedom of speech in eighteenth-century France and Britain as well as in Austria, Denmark, Russia, and Spain and its American territories. Representing the views of both moderate and radical eighteenth-century thinkers, these essays by eminent scholars discover that twenty-fi rst-century controversies regarding the extent of permissible speech have their origins in the eighteenth century. The economic integration of Europe and its offshoots over the past three centuries into a distinctive cultural product, the West, has given rise to a triumphant Enlightenment narrative of universalism and tolerance that masks these divisions and the disparate national contributions to freedom of speech and other liberal rights.

The essays in this volume portray the debates concerning freedom of speech in eighteenth-century France and Britain as well as in Austria, Denmark, Russia, and Spain and its American territories. Representing the views of both moderate and radical eighteenth-century thinkers, these essays by eminent scholars discover that twenty-fi rst-century controversies regarding the extent of permissible speech have their origins in the eighteenth century. The economic integration of Europe and its offshoots over the past three centuries into a distinctive cultural product, "the West," has given rise to a triumphant Enlightenment narrative of universalism and tolerance that masks these divisions and the disparate national contributions to freedom of speech and other liberal rights.

Austrians today often seem to believe that they have two histories. One is their republican present; the other, the centuries that their forebears spent as part of the multi-ethnic Habsburg Empire. Contemporary Austria is a fixture among Europe's democracies. Yet, it did not achieve this state easily: World War I, the unification with Germany in 1938, and World War II were catastrophes for Austria. In 1995, it became part of the European Union, and its government, culture, and egalitarian economy are far cries from the monarchical and highly stratified society of the old Empire. The A to Z of Austria is a paperback reprint of the Historical Dictionary of Austria. Through its chronology, introductory essay, appendix, bibliography, and hundreds of cross-referenced dictionary entries, greater attention has been given to foreign affairs, economic institutions and policies, social issues, religion, and politics.

From the fourteenth to the eighteenth centuries the armies of the Ottoman empire brought terror, in the name of Islam, to much of the Christian world. Intermittently, but relentlessly, the Sultans' forces raided, then conquered the Danube Valley as far as Budapest and beyond. Their inexorable progress westward eventually brought them into conflict with the dynastic confederation created in central and eastern Europe by the Austrian Habsburgs. Repeatedly faced with virtual annihilation by superior Muslim forces, the ruling powers in Vienna fought to mobilise the minds as well as the military resources of their subjects in order to save both their faith and their soil. The propaganda developed by both government and church, particularly the Roman Catholic variant, created, then reinforced many of the negative stereotypes of Muslims that are still familiar to Europeans today. Gradually, after the middle of the seventeenth century, Habsburg rulers and officials came to see that its political and military survival required solid information about the Muslim foe that prejudiced ideas did not supply. In "Terror and Toleration", Paula Sutter Fichtner traces the story of this change of heart and mind in government and intellectual circles throughout the Habsburg empire. This episode shows, she argues, that it is possible to form and disseminate negative views of an enemy for political and strategic reasons, yet be able to reconfigure those views as circumstance and necessity dictates. A highly original account of a fascinating historical and cultural encounter, this book gives readers a close view of how a Western empire not only survived Islamic aggression, but in the process learned how to consider and even work with Muslims positively and productively.