PHANTOM TERROR: THE THREAT OF REVOLUTION AND THE REPRESSION OF LIBERTY, 1789 - 1848 by Adam Zamoyski
Phantom Terror: The Threat of Revolution and the Repression of Liberty, 1789 - 1848 by Adam Zamoyski
The French Revolution and the bloodcurdling violence it engendered terrified the ruling and propertied classes of Europe. Unable to grasp how such Horrors could have come about, many concluded that they were the result of a devilish conspiracy, hatched by Freemasons, inspired by the ideas of the Enlightenment with the aim of overthrowing the entire social order, along with the legal and religious principles it stood on. Others traced it back to the Reformation or the Knights Templar, and ascribed to it even more sinister aims.
Faced by this apparently occult threat, they resorted to repression on an unprecedented scale, expanding police and spy networks in the process. Napoleon managed to contain the revolutionary elements in France and those parts of Europe he controlled, but whil many welcomed this, others saw in him no more than the spawn of the Revolution, propagating its doctrines by other means. After his defeat at Waterloo in 1815, the victors united in a Concert of Europe dedicated to the maintenance of the old order, the suppression of all opposition, and the ferreting out of the conspirators whom they believed to be plotting mayhem and murder in the shadows.
In this groundbreaking study, bestselling historian Adam Zamoyski exposes how the rulers of Europe resorted to a pusillanimous, yet cynical, use of the police spy and the bayonet, which only intensified their own fears and pushed ordinary people towards subVersion, building up the pressure of opposition to their rule. This compelling history, occasionally chilling and often hilarious, tells us a great deal about how the modern state evolved through the expansion of its organs of control, and holds urgent lessons for today.
William Collins, Hardcover, 1st Edition, 1st Printing, 569 pages, 2014
THIS IS A BRAND NEW BOOK. THERE IS A "CLOSEOUT/REMAINDER" MARK ON THE BOTTOM PAGE EDGES.