Debating foreign policy in eighteenth-century Britain
By: Jeremy Black
Publisher: Ashgate
Published: 2011
Place of publication: Farnham, Surrey; Burlington, VT
Language: eng
Number of pages: 247
ISBN-13: 9780754658672; 9781409426103
Subjects: Public opinion; Foreign relations; History
Description: Focuses on how Britain's foreign policy during the eighteenth century was debated and written about in British society. Taking as a central theme the debate over policy and the development of public culture and politics, the author explores how these were linked to developing relations with Europe and helped shape colonial strategies and expectations. He highlights how widely-shared concerns about such issues as national defense, the strength of the Royal Navy, and trade protection presented little consensus in how they were to be realized, and were the subject of fierce public debate. He underlines how these kinds of issues were not considered in the abstract, but in terms of a political community that was divided over a series of key issues.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Prologue: documentary culture and the historian; title: Introduction: debating policy; title: The mechanisms of debate; title: The extent of debate; title: The quality of debate; title: The new age of war, 1689-1714; title: A continental dynasty: Britain and Hanover, 1714-60; title: Strategic culture and imperial warfare, 1754-63; title: A empire under challenge, 1763-83; title: New definitions and problems, 1783-1815; title: Conclusions: debating Britain and Europe.