Depoliticisation after Revolution Moderation, Science and the State in the Nineteenth Century

In recent scholarship, the decades after the 1848–1849 revolutions have been depicted as characterised by a pursuit of moderation, expertise, and enhanced state power by governments across Europe. This chapter uses a broader historical lens to trace similar episodes of depoliticisation in the decades before 1848, starting with the French Revolution. It argues that just as the revolutions of 1848–1849 are often seen as the culmination of an earlier period of polarisation and contestation, the depoliticisation achieved after 1849 had deeper roots in the decades following 1795. In many ways, the ‘script’ of depoliticisation was first articulated in the years following the Terror and subsequently reworked in the first half of the nineteenth century, only to be implemented again after 1849. The chapter’s main argument is that modern depoliticisation was ‘invented’ after the various revolutions in the decades after 1795. Hence, this period witnessed not only the establishment of and experimentation with modern concepts and practices of politics but also the rise of modern depoliticisation efforts.