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Police in civil society: police, Enlightenment and civic virtue in urban Scotland, c. 1780–1833

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2010

DAVID BARRIE
DAVID BARRIE*
Affiliation:
History, Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Western Australia, 35 Stirling Highway, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia
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Abstract:

Based on how notions of civil society and civic virtue were defined in Enlightenment Scotland, this article assesses how far these ideals shaped police development in Scottish towns, c. 1780–1833. It argues that both concepts provided a framework for the development of ‘police’ as a broad mechanism of urban government. Collectively, civil society and civic virtue offered a wide-ranging, intellectual backdrop presupposing ideas on police, improvement and polite society, with the new police model bearing a striking resemblance to how these ideals were imagined and constructed at the time.

Type
Research Article
Information
Urban History , Volume 37 , Issue 1 , May 2010 , pp. 45 - 65
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010

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References

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