The Spanish Atlantic World in the Eighteenth Century: War and the Bourbon Reforms, 1713-1796

ISBN-13: 9781107043572 / Angielski / Twarda / 2014 / 402 str.

Allan J. Kuethe; Kenneth J. Andrien

Opis

This volume elucidates Bourbon colonial policy with emphasis on Madrid's efforts to reform and modernize its American holdings. Set in an Atlantic world context, the book highlights the interplay between Spain and America as the Spanish empire struggled for survival amid the fierce international competition that dominated the eighteenth century. The authors use extensive research in the repositories of Spain and America, as well as innovative consultation of the French Foreign Affairs archive, to bring into focus the poorly understood reformist efforts of the early Bourbons, which laid the foundation for the better-known agenda of Charles III. As the book unfolds, the narrative puts flesh on the men and women who, for better or worse, influenced colonial governance. It is the story of power, ambition, and idealism at the highest levels.

Recenzje

'One of the triumphs of Andrien's and Kuethe's book is their coverage of the entire eighteenth century, which helps to reveal the continuities and discontinuities of pre - and post - 1763 government policy. A second triumph is to have considered the Spanish empire as a geographical whole, an achievement aided by the respective regional and topical expertise of each coauthor … Kuethe and Andrien have demonstrated how reforms were not merely acts of executive fiat dispensed by a revamped monarchy asserting its regalian rights but rather the unpredictable outcome of a vibrant, transatlantic political culture, one that was sufficiently capacious and malleable to encompass and yet contain rival ideologues and interest groups. Kuethe and Andrien have produced a book that should be mandatory reading for scholars of the eighteenth-century Atlantic Empires.' Gabriel Paquette, The Journal of Modern History

Spis treści

Part I. Alberoni, Patiño, and the Beginnings of Atlantic Reform, 1700–1736: 1. Alberoni and the first stirrings of reform, 1714–1721; 2. Alberoni and colonial reform; 3. José de Patiño and the revival of reform, 1726–1736; Part II. The Second Wave of Reform, 1736–1759: 4. War and reform, 1736–1749; 5. Clerical reform and the secularization of the Doctrinas de Indios; 6. The downfall of Ensenada and the pause in reform, 1750–1762; Part III. Pinnacle of the Bourbon Reforms, 1759–1796: 7. The first phase of reform under Charles III, 1762–1767; 8. The reorganization of Spain's Atlantic empire, 1767–1783; 9. Adjustments and refinements in the reformist agenda, 1783–1796; Conclusion: war and reform in the Spanish Atlantic world.