The political journalism of Charles Comte and Charles Dunoyer (1814–1815): an attempt to define representative government

Abstract

ABSTRACT The Restoration (1814–1830) was a golden age for liberal philosophy in France, especially in the field of politics. The political thought of Benjamin Constant and François Guizot, two of the most well-known theorists of the representative regime, is today regarded as particularly useful for understanding the meaning of many of the institutions which post-revolutionary democracies inherited. However, this paper reveals the existence of another great theory of the representative regime in circulation during the French Restoration: that popularized in the pages of Le Censeur (1814–1815), a major liberal newspaper of the time. Its editors, Charles Comte (1782–1837) and Charles Dunoyer (1786–1862), are today known for their important contribution to the rise of liberal political economy in France. Their earliest journalistic writings contrast with the rest of their work and predate their discovery of the Treatise on Political Economy by Jean-Baptiste Say. During the first Bourbon Restoration (1814), Comte and Dunoyer were concerned almost exclusively with political philosophy. Before adopting the doctrine of ‘industrialism’, they attempted to make a synthesis of the political thought of Rousseau and Montesquieu, in order to give a liberal form to the idea of popular sovereignty compatible with monarchical government.