London Crowds in the Reign of Charles II: Propaganda and Politics from the Restoration until the Exclusion Crisis

by Tim Harris

This study of the political attitudes of ordinary Londoners during the reign of Charles II examines not only the manifestations of public opinion - for example, riot and demonstration - but also the manner of its formation - religious experience, economic activity, and exposure to mass political propaganda. Professor Harris shows to be misleading the conventional view, that the whigs enjoyed the support of the London masses, and the tories were essentially anti-populist. Both sides had public support during the exclusion crisis, and this division stemmed from fundamental religious tensions within London political culture, dating back to 1660 and before. Attractively illustrated with polemical contemporary engravings, London Crowds demonstrates clearly the value of bringing together both high and low activity into a truly integrated social history of politics, and sheds important new light not just on urban agitation but on the nature of late-Stuart party conflict.

Genres: History

278 pages, Hardcover

First published November 27, 1987

About the author

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Tim Harris received his BA, MA and PhD from Cambridge University and was a Fellow of Emmanuel College from 1983 before moving to Brown in 1986. He teaches a wide range of courses in the political, religious, intellectual, social and cultural history of early modern England, Scotland and Ireland. A social historian of politics, he has written about the interface of high and low politics, popular protest movements, ideology and propaganda, party politics, popular culture, and the politics of religious dissent during Britain's Age of Revolutions.