When the French Tried to be British

Download or read book When the French Tried to be British written by J.A.W. Gunn and published by McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. This book was released on 2009-05-01 with total page 637 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In When the French Tried to Be British, J.A.W. Gunn studies the French effort during 1814 to 1848 to adopt the set of common understandings that lent a comparative stability to British government. The institutions of a loyal opposition and disciplined political parties seemed to be implicit in the parliamentary model, but their acceptance foundered on French reluctance to accord legitimacy to political opponents. A sophisticated minority - including such major figures as Chateaubriand, Constant, Mme de Staël, and Guizot - recognized the need for something approaching the British political culture, but the wounds opened by the Revolution could not readily be healed. A more or less complete acceptance of the civil disagreement that was the spirit of the British model had to await the Fifth Republic.