Public order as an anti-political dimension (18eht-19th centuries)

Résumé En

Public order, as a notion, is not yet a history object. It’s more something like dead corner of historical research. Part of my interest for it is that it’s studying unifies the 2 periods (early and modern history) but not from the supposed result of all of it, the so called liberal state, but starting from the necessity for the governments to be obeyed or to obtain obedience. It’s like if, behind the front scene of the story of liberties, behind the reality of normal life, of normal rules, of normal times, stand another dimension, the Public order dimension, you can step in using the back door of the legal system. This dimension connects the extraordinary circunstances of the survival of the whole society, the sacred defense of the common identity or values, to the day-to-day defense of the social order and the day-to-day efficiency of the obedience system. The name of this dimension is Public order. The proposal starts with the french revolution debates, where Public order is referred as an absolutist notion. Actually, it had been forged by the work of Jean Domat at the end of the 17th century and used in several types of circumstances. It served as an affirmation of the natural verticality of power. The travel of this notion to the Spanish monarchy started with very special circumstances and with a very special man who recognize in the Public order what he called “the fundamental constitution of the monarchy”, after the 1766 and the 1772 riots. So, when the revolutions of the end of the century repeated and worsen the polemicisation that open worldwide politics to the appropriation of all men, from freeborn to slaves, it seems that the theory of people’s will, sovereignity of the nation and legal system built on it were contrary to the absolutist notion of Public Order. Nevertheless, the Public order has survived and, actually did more than just survive: it has apparently become a kind of spinal cord of the liberal state.