William H. Sewell Jr. is the Frank P. Hixon Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus in Political Science and History at the University of Chicago. He is the author of several books, including, most recently, Logics of History: Social Theory and Social Transformation, published by the University of Chicago Press.

• Introduction: The French Revolution and the Shock of Civic EqualityChapter 1: Old Regime State and SocietyChapter 2: The Eighteenth-Century Economy: Commerce and CapitalismPart 1: The Emergence of an Urban PublicChapter 3: The Commercial Public SphereChapter 4: The Empire of FashionChapter 5: The Parisian PromenadePart 2: The Philosophes and the Career Open to TalentChapter 6: The Philosophe Career and the Impossible Example of VoltaireChapter 7: Denis Diderot: Living by the PenChapter 8: The Abbé Morellet: Between Publishing and PatronageChapter 9: Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Self-Deceived ClientagePart 3: Royal Administration and the Promise of Political EconomyChapter 10: Tocqueville’s Challenge: Royal Administration and the Rise of Civic EqualityChapter 11: Warfare, Taxes, and Administrative Centralization: The Double Bind of Royal FinanceChapter 12: Political Economy: A Solution to the Double Bind?Chapter 13: Navigating the Double Bind: Efforts at ReformConclusion: The Revolution and the Advent of Civic EqualityEpilogue: Civic Equality and the Continuing History of CapitalismAcknowledgmentsReferencesIndex

"[An] ambitious work. The result of years of reflection... it presents a compelling vision of the way a specifically French variety of capitalism developed in the 18th century, and how resulting forms of social experience in turn laid the groundwork for a new, revolutionary politics."