Napoleonic France: A State of Terror?
In episode 150, Beatrice de Graaf joins me to discuss how Napoleon's police state operated, how unique it really was, and why terror lay at the heart of state control during this period.
Twitter: @zwhitehistory | @beatricedegraaf
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So Zack produced 150 episodes already, a quite staggering number and huge effort. Do I see Boney's regime as a state of terror? I see his state more like a police state where he perfected how to controll the press and public life and syping onto his own people even closest subordinates - percecting surveillance - and I cannot see any other state in europe where the control of their own people was devoted such huge enery and massive personal interest as in the case of Boney. His system served well as a blue print for police and terror states to come and yes all other powers were ready to copy and introduce such a system of heinous surveillance and eager to introduce for their own countries.
so what other terms would you suggest, terror, terreur, was a well established expression in the 18th century as de Graaf points out and had like Partizans then a different kind of meaning and understanding, I agree with you that Boney perfected the system to such an extend, that other States were ready to take it as an example for their own development of secret police, the press and so on. Beatrice de Graafs certainly benefits from their multi linguistic skills and their broad scope of knowledge of then and of today.