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Article: Enlightened Despotism
- Article from:
- Europe, 1450 to 1789: Encyclopedia of the Early Modern World
- Author:
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ENLIGHTENED DESPOTISM
ENLIGHTENED DESPOTISM.
One must first clarify the origins of the term: today "enlightened absolutism" is more commonly used. But in its original form, the term as coined by eighteenth-century French thinkers
—
philosophers, philosophical popularizers, and social commentators, known collectively as philosophes
—
described the kind of government they felt was necessary to break through the complex of laws, attitudes, and habits that maintained a society of unjust privilege, stunted economic growth, and perpetuated governmental inefficiency and waste. What they (and their fellows in other countries) desired was a
despotisme
é
clair
é
.
But this had ...