A counter voice: Gustave de Beaumont and the theory of national characters

Abstract

Gustave de Beaumont was clearly a counter voice within the debate about national characters that engaged nineteenth-century French political thought. This was not the first time that Beaumont set himself apart for the originality of his convictions. For instance, on the Irish question, he did not take Ireland's part against England out of allegiance to the Catholicism of the Irish as opposed to the Anglicanism of the English (which was why most of French public opinion was for Ireland); rather, studying the issue led him to see the English presence in Ireland as a policy of oppression and discrimination.