Public Health and the Politics of Haussmannization in Nineteenth-Century Paris, 1830-1870

<p>Throughout the Second Empire, Napoléon III and his Prefect of the Seine, Georges Haussmann, engaged in a series of urban reform projects that transformed Paris. These projects, often collectively referred to as Haussmannization, entailed the construction of boulevards, expansion of the sewer system, and clearance of what the state considered insalubrious housing. This term was largely prescribed to worker-class housing and used as a medical justification to target and destroy working-class communities. However, as this paper discusses, the understanding of insalubrity was shaped by hygienists' pathologization of poverty, crime, and working-class militancy in response to the arrival of cholera and the increase in working-class unrest during the July Monarchy. Hygienists hypothesized that these issues stemmed from workers' moral degeneration and constituted public health crises due to their allegedly contagious nature. In framing these issues as public health crises, hygienists advocated for state intervention to regulate these workers. Leveraging hygienists' rhetoric, Napoléon III justified his destruction of working-class communities as a measure to improve public health while decreasing workers’ potential social and political power. This thesis adds to current literature that suggests Haussmannization aimed to consolidate control over workers by eradicating working-class spaces and elaborates on public health’s role in legitimizing Napoléon III’s marginalization of workers.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

History, MA

Level thesis:degree_level

Open Access Master's Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

School of Arts and Humanities

Year dc:date.available

2023

Author dc:creator

• Malsy, Mikaela

Contributors dc:contributor

• Andre Wakefield

• Haussmannization
• Second Empire
• Napoléon III
• Haussmann
• Georges
• Pathologization
• Workers
• Public health crises
• European History
• History

Repository record dc:identifier

https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgu_etd/548

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:scholarship.claremont.edu:cgu_etd-1570