Napoleon Comes to Power: Democracy and Dictatorship in Revolutionary France, 1795-1804

Late-20th-century research has suggested that the Bonapartist dictatorship was by no means a foregone conclusion, the inevitable outcome of a corrupt and discredited revolutionary regime. Historians now seek to gain a greater awareness of the difficulties faced by the Directory (as the constitutional system was called after 1795) in steering a middle course between Royalism and Jacobinism and also a greater recognition of its achievements. It is now a widely-held view that by the time Napolean crowned himself Emperor in 1804, the Revolution was effectively over. This study examines the balance that was struck between democracy and authority, between hierarchy and equality, in short between the old order and the new in early-19th-century France. This hybrid of revolution and tradition lasted only for a further decade in France, but, asserts Malcolm Crook, it exerted a profound influence over 19th-century political culture. The text seeks to give careful attention to the Napoleonic episode on a more deeper level than the personal and military heroics that have tended to dominate previous studies.