Popular Government

by Henry James Sumner Maine

Sir Henry Sumner Maine was one of the great intellects of the Victorian era. In Popular Government he examines the political institutions of men. He saw that popular governments, unless they are founded upon and consonant with the evolutionary development of a people, will crumble from their own excesses. George W. Carey is Professor of Government at Georgetown University and editor of the Political Science Reviewer. Please This title is available as an ebook for purchase on , , and .

Genres: Politics, Philosophy, History, Nonfiction, American History, Political Science

256 pages, Hardcover

First published June 1, 1885

About the author

Sir Henry James Sumner Maine, KCSI, was an English comparative jurist and historian. He is famous for the thesis outlined in Ancient Law that law and society developed "from status to contract." According to the thesis, in the ancient world individuals were tightly bound by status to traditional groups, while in the modern one, in which individuals are viewed as autonomous agents, they are free to make contracts and form associations with whomever they choose. Because of this thesis, Maine can be seen as one of the forefathers of modern sociology of law.

Reviews

[Edward]

To join the Froude Society - actually, to become a deacon of the Froude Society - all you need to do is read three works of High Victorian political and historical criticism. I recommend this order: The Bow of Ulysses, by James Anthony Froude; Popular Government, by Henry Sumner Maine; and Latter-Day Pamphlets, by Thomas Carlyle. These books will change your life, or at least your mind.

There are more books, more authors, where these came from. Without blinking we could add Lecky, Stephen and Austin to this pantheon, for instance; nor are Ruskin, Arnold, and Kingsley to be sneered at. And the remaining oeuvre of Froude, Maine and Carlyle is no less vast. And this is not a random sample of Victorian thought, but the cream of a coherent tradition. And anyone can read it. It's free - thanks to Google. Now and for the foreseeable future, Froude is more accessible than Stephen King.

The task of the Froude Society is to restore High Victorian thought in the 21st century. And when I say restore, I mean restore to life - not study. The Society traffics not in critical formaldehyde.

[Vikas Erraballi · Rating 4 out of 5]

A masculine mind no doubt (that's Maine's preferred compliment), but the language is dated and cumbersome. Even translated, Jouvenel who continued Maine's work of critiquing popular forms of government, was the more enjoyable to read. Partly the problem is my own; a more familiar relation with comparative governance would draw out more value from this work.

"A candidate for Presidency, nominated for election by the whole people, will, as a rule, be a man selected because he is not open to obvious criticism, and will therefore in all probability be a mediocrity." Trump's election has more often resulted in fears of how much further we can collectively travel down the road to Idiocracy, however, one unexpected gift may be the ability for the capable and prestige-worthy person, who would otherwise have been written off for some minor indiscretion, to now be more acceptable to a public who has seen much worse.

[Tony · Rating 3 out of 5]

A sober look at the problems and difficulties of democracies with a lot of food for thought about where our own government is heading. A littile dry at times, but worth the effort. Also, I don't think the summary here on good reads is very accurate, or at least that's not the message I got out of it.

[Iegfb · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am not really sure what to think of this book, I found it to be a very English work. It's strongly analytical, often very dry and somewhat annoyingly pedantic at times.

I generally agree with the analysis laid out by Maine of popular sovereignty and the vision of progress of the modern age, as well as of the American constitution, but I guess for a reader already acquainted with 'reactionary' thought, there's hardly anything new to be found in here.

Also, I really disagree with Maine's claim that the inception of the American constitution as a very British phenomenon can almost only be understood properly by the English, or the claim to novelty of this observation. In fact, I would wager that the continentals have had a better grasp on it since its beginning, and it seems to me that it's only the Americans, who have internalized some self-conception of inherent anti-British-ness and anti-European-ness, that struggle to see the deeply British character of their institutions.

At any rate, this is not a bad book, it's just a rather uninteresting one in my opinion.

[Patrick Briatico-Kirwin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Critiques of democracy at the time it was spreading through the world and it was still young. You can get these in a more succinct and readable way elsewhere, but still a good first party account of the late 1800s

[Simon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fine.

[Estevão Lopes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sharp analysis, although a bit dry and sometimes repetitive. Superb writing style, if somewhat tiring.

[Abu Dhabi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good grounding in the French, British and American political institutions of the Victorian era. A bit hard to read because of the very long and complex sentence structures favored by authors of old.