Peter McPhee has written the first full scholarly study of rural politics in France during the Second Republic (1848-1852). The Revolution of 1848 and the subsequent regime changed the face of mass politics in France; unprecedented numbers of French men and women participated in legal and illegal forms of political activity during a period of protracted crisis ultimately resolved by a military coup d'etat. In exploring the neglected history of rural France in this period, the book draws on hundreds of regional studies to examine the large-scale political mobilizations of right and left in the countryside, and offers a new synthesis and interpretation of these years. Dr McPhee shows that rural politics were both more complex and more threatening to urban elites than has been generally recognized, and provides a lucid and scholarly analysis of a turbulent period in modern French history and its long-term social and political consequences.

In the forty years after the Revolution of 1789, the peasants and former seigneurs of the isolated and arid region of the Corbieres, Languedoc, fought a protracted battle over the consequences of revolutionary change. Central to this conflict was control of the rough hillsides or garrigues used as sheep pastures, which the poorer peasantry seized and cleared. This social conflict culminated in the murder of two nobles by a band of villagers in the aftermath of the Revolution of 1830. Professor McPhee's book highlights two significant new perspectives on the Revolution of 1789. First, the actions of poorer peasants in massive land-clearance occasioned an impassioned debate about the environmental consequences of uncontrolled tree-felling. Secondly, much of the cleared land was used for vineyards, suggesting the importance of far-reaching changes initiated by the poorest sections of the community.

Standing outside the revisionist and postmodernist tide, noted professors explore the changing intellectual and cultural discourses of the late 18th century in the latest volume of this compelling series. The essays analyze a wide range of subjects, including the rise of the bourgeoisie, the arguments over the French state's progressive function, the reality of social conflict, and the revolutionary goals and rights of the peasant class.

In this reliable and succinct introduction to the French Revolution, Peter McPhee tackles the questions which are central to an understanding of this crucial period of French history. Why was there a revolution in France in 1789? Was France fundamentally changed as a result of it? And what effects did it have on everyday life? As well as providing an accessible interpretation of the events and consequences of the Revolution, it also provides an up-to-date guide to the main historiographical debates.

This volume provides a lively and authoritative synthesis of recent work on the social history of France and is now thoroughly updated to cover the 'long nineteenth century' from 1789-1914. Peter McPhee offers both a readable narrative and a distinctive, coherent argument about this remarkable century and explores key themes such as: - peasant interaction with the environment - the changing experience of work and leisure - the nature of crime and protest - changing demographic patterns and family structures - the religious practices of workers and peasants - the ideology and internal repercussions of colonisation. At the core of this social history is the exercise and experience of 'social relations of power' - not only because in these years there were four periods of protracted upheaval, but also because the history of the workplace, of relations between women and men, adults and children, is all about human interaction. Stimulating and enjoyable to read, this indispensable introduction to nineteenth-century France will help readers to make sense of the often bewildering story of these years, while giving them a better understanding of what it meant to be an inhabitant of France during that turbulent time.