L'émotion : un dommage pour l'idée républicaine. Autour de l'éloquence de Léon Gambetta

Abstract

What part can emotions play in politics ? This is the question that arises from the use which Leon Gambetta made of his eloquence, in the meetings held from the 1860's to the 1880's. Indeed, the assemblies where that popular orator intervened are described as an opportunity for an intense exchange of emotions, upon which the formidable efficiency of the orator's eloquence was built. Two rival discourses emerged around this question of the connection between Gambetta's speech and emotion. His detractors alleged that the omnipresence of emotion during meetings ruled out any possibility of considering Gambetta as a potential, responsible political leader, and that it constituted a threat, since through plebiscite he might gain too much power, or even a dictatorship. For those Republicans who favoured Gambetta, building a discourse that made his proceedings legitimate was a more delicate matter, because civic wisdom places a high value on self-control: those who comment on the meetings try to show that emotion and reason are not always opposed.