Minerva's Message

by Staum, Martin S.

• ISBN13: 9780773514423
• ISBN10: 0773514422
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1997-01-01
• Publisher: McGill Queens Univ

Summary

In theory the CMPS was set up to enshrine the human and social studies that were at the heart of Enlightenment culture. Staum illustrates, however, that the Institute helped transform key ideas of the Enlightenment in order to maintain civil rights while upholding social stability, and that the social and political assumptions on which it was based affected notions of social science. He traces the careers of individual members and the factions within the Institute, arguing that the discord within the CMPS reflects the unravelling of Enlightenment culture. Minerva's Message presents a valuable overview of the intellectual life of the period and brings together new evidence about the social sciences in their nascent period.

Author Biography

Martin S. Staum is professor of history, University of Calgary.

Table of Contents

Tables
Preface
Intellectuals, Revolution, and the Social Sciences	p. 3
Enlightenment Social Science Models	p. 19
The Institute Intellectuals: Change and Continuity	p. 33
Advice to Government and Prize Contests	p. 56
The Public Image of the Institute and the Decline of Encyclopedism	p. 78
Indelible Temperament and Condillac's Uncertain Legacy	p. 95
A Science of Morality	p. 118
Philosophical History and Political Discord	p. 136
Human Geography: Correlating Climate, Culture, and Civilization	p. 154
Rights, Utility, and Political Institutions	p. 172
Towards the Political Economy of Commercial Society	p. 191
Suppression and Resurrection of an Academy	p. 211
Joseph Lakanal's List of Nominees for the Class of Moral and Political Sciences	p. 231
Members and Associates of the Class of Moral and Political Sciences	p. 232
The National Institute after the Reorganization of 1803	p. 236
Members of the Class of Moral and Political Sciences in the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences in 1832	p. 238
Number of Memoirs Read before the Class of Moral and Political Sciences and Published in Its Collection	p. 240
Prize Contests of the Class of Moral and Political Sciences	p. 244
Notes	p. 251
Bibliography	p. 301
Index	p. 333
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