Enlightenment, Governance and Reform in Spain and its Empire 1759-1808

Enlightenment, Governance, and Reform in Spain and its Empire, 1759-1808offers a new interpretation of political reform in Spain and its American empire in the second half of the eighteenth century. It examines the intellectual foundations of commercial, administrative, and colonial policy during the tumultuous reigns of Charles III (1759-1788) and Charles IV (1788-1808), and explores how crown reformers employed both the ideas of the European Enlightenment and Iberian juridical concepts to create a distinctive ideology of governance. They sought to use these ideas in order to reinvigorate the Spanish monarchy and to transform the institutions of the Old Regime into those of a modern state in both the Old World and the New. Drawing on archival research undertaken in Spain, Cuba, Chile, and Argentina, this book makes an important contribution to the histories of Spain, Latin America, and the Atlantic World.

GABRIEL PAQUETTE  is Junior Research Fellow at Trinity College, University of Cambridge, UK. He has previously published articles in European History Quarterly, Bulletin of Spanish Studies, Journal of Transatlantic Studies, and Clio.

Introduction * The Historiography of Imperial Governance * The Intellectual Impact of International Rivalry * 'Public Happiness', Regalism and New Ideologies of Governance * Imperial Governance and Reform: Ideas and Institutions * Colonial Elites and Imperial Reform * Conclusion Introduction * The Historiography of Imperial Governance * The Intellectual Impact of International Rivalry * 'Public Happiness', Regalism and New Ideologies of Governance * Imperial Governance and Reform: Ideas and Institutions * Colonial Elites and Imperial Reform * Conclusion