Richard Whatmore Books

A bloody episode that epitomised the political dilemmas of the eighteenth century In 1798, members of the United Irishmen were massacred by the British amid the crumbling walls of a half-built town near Waterford in Ireland. Many of the Irish were republicans inspired by the French Revolution, and the site of their demise was known as Genevan Barracks. The Barracks were the remnants of an experimental community called New Geneva, a settlement of Calvinist republican rebels who fled the continent in 1782. The British believed that the rectitude and industriousness of these imported revolutionaries would have a positive effect on the Irish populace. The experiment was abandoned, however, after the Calvinists demanded greater independence and more state money for their project. Terrorists, Anarchists, and Republicans tells the story of a utopian city inspired by a spirit of liberty and republican values being turned into a place where republicans who had fought for liberty were extinguished by the might of empire. Richard Whatmore brings to life a violent age in which powerful states like Britain and France intervened in the affairs of smaller, weaker countries, justifying their actions on the grounds that they were stopping anarchists and terrorists from destroying society, religion and government. The Genevans and the Irish rebels, in turn, saw themselves as advocates of republican virtue, willing to sacrifice themselves for liberty, rights and the public good. Terrorists, Anarchists, and Republicans shows how the massacre at Genevan Barracks marked an end to the old Europe of diverse political forms, and the ascendancy of powerful states seeking empire and markets—in many respects the end of enlightenment itself.

What is intellectual history? Those who practice intellectual history have described themselves as eavesdroppers upon the conversations of the past, explorers of alien ideological worlds, and translators between historic societies and our own, while their critics have often derided them as narrow- mindedly studying the ideas of dead white men.

A brilliant work of intellectual interpretation by our foremost historian of Enlightenment ideas, this radical re-evaluation shows why, for many at its center, the Enlightenment was a profound failure. By the early eighteenth century, there was widespread hope that Enlightenment ideals could be paired with toleration, commerce, and an end to the fanatic wars of religion ravaging Europe. Central to this was the battle for liberty in free states, with aspirations that absolute monarchies like France and free states like Britain could coexist, respecting civil liberties. However, this vision collapsed as states pursued wealth and empire through war, leading to rampant xenophobia and a perversion of liberty into fanaticism. The narrative traces the evolving perspectives of economists, philosophers, politicians, and polemicists, including figures like David Hume, Adam Smith, Edmund Burke, and Mary Wollstonecraft. They aimed to replace superstition with reason but instead faced terror, revolution, corruption, and rampant colonialism. By revisiting these tumultuous events and ideas, the author offers a lucid exploration of disillusion and intellectual transformation, challenging our assumptions about the past while providing insights into how our world might be structured today, particularly as the issues raised at the end of the Enlightenment persist.

Richard Whatmore examines the diverse, interconnected relationships between political history, theory, and action. Considering the work of Michel Foucalt, John Pocock, Quentin Skinner and other key theorists, this book highlights the connections between past and present political systems, and the ongoing relevance of the field today.