91勛圖厙

Stephen Sawyer

Professor

  • Department: History and Politics
  • Office: 
    609
  • Office Hours: 
    By appointment

Stephen W. Sawyer is the Ballantine-Leavitt Professor of History and Director of the Center for Critical Democracy Studies. Sawyer came to 91勛圖厙from the University of Chicago center in Paris and the Ecole Normale Sup矇rieure-rue dUlm where he was lecturer in the final years of his dissertation. After receiving fellowships from the EHESS, Fulbright, and Sciences Po, Sawyer served as part-time assistant to Pierre Rosanvallon at the Coll癡ge de France. A specialist in political history and theory, Sawyer earned his PhD at the University of Chicago. He has served on the editorial board of the Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales and as the Associate Editor for its English version since 2012. In 2014-15, he was named inaugural Neubauer Collegium Fellow at the University of Chicago. Appointed Directeur de publications of The Tocqueville Review/La Revue Tocqueville in 2014, he founded the online platform Tocqueville21 in 2017. In 2018-2019, he was named research fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University. In Spring 2020 he was invited Kratter Visiting Professor to the History Department at Stanford University.

The core of his project articulates a history and theory of democracy as a mode of popular magistrature, administration and public regulation. The project advances along two dimensions: first, a critical intellectual history featuring a close rereading of key texts and authors that may be read surprisingly differently when one places democracy rather than liberalism or republicanism at the center of our histories of political modernity. Second, the project turns on a rediscovery and re-prioritization of the variety of substantive and concrete activities, programs, and policies that have constituted democratic action. The first volume of this project was published in 2018 under the title Demos Assembled: Democracy and the International Origins of the Modern State, 1840-1880 (University of Chicago Press). It was followed by a monograph entitled La contingence et le pouvoir (Armand Colin, 2018). This book, focusing on the highly contentious figure Adolphe Thiers, further elaborated the projects methodology, a pragmatic history of the political. He is currently preparing the second volume on Regulation and the Birth of the Democratic Social Contract, 1810-1850. The project as a whole self-consciously builds on late twentieth-century, primarily French, democratic and social theory. Sawyer has explored this work and its legacy in a series of edited volumes, including: In Search of the Liberal Moment: Democracy, Antitotalitarianism and Intellectual Politics in France since 1950 (Palgrave/Macmillan, 2016); Pierre Rosanvallon's Political Thought (Bielefeld University Press, 2018); Michel Foucault, Neoliberalism and Beyond (Rowman and Littlefield, 2019); and his translation of Michel Foucault's lectures Wrong-Doing, Truth-Telling: The Function of Avowal in Justice (University of Chicago Press, 2014). The international, historical and theoretical dimensions of this project have been explicitly elaborated in a series of co-edited volumes with his colleagues William Novak and James Sparrow, including Beyond Stateless Democracy (Tocqueville Review, Spring 2015), A Comparative History of the French and American Democratic States (Tocqueville Review, 2012) and Boundaries of the State in US History (University of Chicago Press, 2015). Alongside these 9 volumes, the project includes over sixty articles, book chapters and reviews, in six countries and leading journals including The American Historical Review, Annales. Histoire, Sciences sociales, The Journal of Modern History, Modern Intellectual History, The European History Quarterly and The Tocqueville Review.



Education/Degrees

  • PhD, University of Chicago
  • MA, University of Chicago
  • BA, Hanover College

News

Stephen Sawyer will be publishing his book泭泭with University of Chicago Press in January 2025 and has been invited to spend the 2024-2025 academic year at the Center for European Studies, Harvard University to begin work on the next volume of his history of the demos.

Publications

詁棗棗域莽泭
  • 2018.泭Demos Assembled:Democracy and the International Origins of the Modern State, 1840-1880泭(Chicago: University of Chicago Press)
  • 2018.泭Adolphe Thiers ou la contingence et le pouvoir泭(Paris: Armand Colin)
Edited Volumes and Translations
  • 2019.泭Michel Foucault, Neoliberalism and Beyond, co-editor with Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins (Rowman and Littlefield).
  • 2018.泭Pierre Rosanvallons Interdisciplinary Political Thought,泭co-editor with泭Oliver Fl羹gel-Martinsen, Franziska Martinsen, Daniel Schulz (University of Bielefeld Press)
  • 2016. Co-editor (with Iain Stewart) In Search of the Liberal Moment: Democracy, Anti-totalitarianism and Intellectual Politics in France, 1950 to present (New York: Palgrave)
  • 2015. Co-editor (with James T. Sparrow and William Novak), Boundaries of the State in United States History (Chicago: University of Chicago Press)
  • 2014. Co-editor (with Etienne Anheim, Romain Bertrand and Antoine Lilti),
  • 2014. . Bernard Harcourt and Fabienne Brion, eds. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press).
  • 2012. Editor, special issue on . The Tocqueville Review/La Revue Tocqueville, Vol. XXXIII, n簞 2
  • 2011. Editor,, Report submitted to the City of Paris, 195 pps, 55 maps and illustrations.
  • 2009. Co-editor with Jan Goldstein, edited volume of conference papers Paris-Chicago: Urban Cultures in Comparative Perspective. Special volume of the Cahiers Parisiens/Parisian Notebooks (Paris: University of Chicago Center in Paris).
Articles and Book Chapters
  • 2020 Was There an American Concept of Emergency Powers? John Dewey, Carl Schmitt, and the Democratic Politics of Exception, in泭States of Exception in American History, Gary Gerstle and Joel Isaac, eds. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press)
  • 2019. Social Freedom, Democracy and the Political: Three Reflections on Axel Honneths Idea of Socialism (with William J. Novak and James T. Sparrow),泭The Tocqueville Review/La Revue Tocqueville, Spring 2019.
  • 2019. Introduction (with Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins) to泭Foucault, Neoliberalism and Beyond泭(Rowman Littlefield)
  • 2018. Pierre Rosanvallons Pragmatic Turn in泭Pierre Rosanvallons Interdisciplinary Political Thought泭(U Bielefeld Press)
  • 2018. Introduction to Pierre Rosanvallons Political Thought (with泭Oliver Fl羹gel-Martinsen, Franziska Martinsen, Daniel Schulz) in泭Pierre Rosanvallons Interdisciplinary Political Thought,泭co-editor with泭Oliver Fl羹gel-Martinsen, Franziska Martinsen, Daniel Schulz (University of Bielefeld Press)
  • 2018. From the Aristocratic to the Democratic State: Louis Blanc and the Origins of the Modern State.泭Louis XIV: 300 ans apr癡s. Charles-Edouard Levillain ed. Paris: Honor矇 Champion
  • 2018. lie Hal矇vy ou les d矇fis de ltat d矇mocratique.泭Autour dElie Hal矇vy et lre des tyrannies, Vincent Duclert et Marie Scot, eds., Paris: Belles Lettres.
  • 2017. Democratic States of Unexception: Toward a New Genealogy of the American Political, (with William J. Novak and James T. Sparrow) in泭The Many Hands of the State, Ann Orloff and Kimberly Morgan, eds. Cambridge University Press.
  • 2016. A Fiscal Revolution: Statecraft in Frances Early Third Republic泭American Historical Review. October 2016.泭
  • 2016. We will always have Paris: Scales of Political Culture in Paris, 1900-1940. Review Essay, The Journal of World History.
  • 2016. Neoliberalism and the Crisis of Democratic Theory, In Search of the Liberal Moment: Democracy, Anti-totalitarianism and Intellectual Politics since the 1950s (New York: Palgrave).
  • 2016. New Perspectives on Frances Liberal Moment (with Iain Stewart) In Search of the Liberal Moment: Democracy, Anti-totalitarianism and Intellectual Politics in Post-War France (New York: Palgrave).
  • 2015.泭Time after Time: Narratives of the Longue Dur矇e in the Anthropocene Transatlantica, 1/2015
  • 2015. Beyond Stateless Democracy (with James T. Sparrow and William Novak), The Tocqueville Review, Spring, vol 36, no 1.
  • 2015. Foucault and the State, The Tocqueville Review, Spring, vol 36, no 1.
  • 2015. Introduction: Boundaries of the State in US History (with James T. Sparrow and William Novak) in Boundaries of the State in U.S. History (University of Chicago Press).
  • 2015. Beyond Tocquevilles Myth: Rethinking Models of the Liberal State in Boundaries of the State in U.S. History (University of Chicago Press)
  • 2014. Ces nations fa癟onn矇es par les empires et la globalization. R矇矇crire le r矇cit national du XIXe si癡cle aujourdhui published in English under the title, The Nation-States that Globalization and Empires Made: Writing the Nineteenth-Century National Narrative Today. Annales. Histoire et Sciences Sociales. 2014 (1): pp. 117-137.
  • 2013. Emancipation, and the Creation of Modern Liberal States in America and France, (with William Novak) The Journal of the Civil War Era, Vol. 3, No 4, December 2013, pp. 467-500.
  • 2013 An American Model for French Liberalism: The State of Exception in Edouard Laboulayes Constitutional Thought. The Journal of Modern History 4 (2013): pp 739-771.
  • 2012. Toward a History of the Democratic State, (with William Novak and James Sparrow)泭The Tocqueville Review/La Revue Tocqueville, Vol. XXXIII, n簞 2.
  • 2012. The Liberal Origins of Louis Blancs Republican State, The Tocqueville Review/La Revue Tocqueville, Vol. XXXIII, n簞 2.
  • 2011. Un Moment Atlantique ? : La F礙te de la F矇d矇ration et les r矇seaux franco-am矇ricains sous la R矇volution fran癟aise, La F礙te de la F矇d矇ration. Du 14 juillet 1790. Histoire et h矇ritage. Georges-Henri Soutou, ed. with E. Leroy Ladurie.
  • 2010.泭 The Infinite Space of the Particular: Planning the American City in the work of Louis Sullivan, Daniel Burnham and Frank Lloyd Wright, Cultural Transformations in the English Speaking World (Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Press), pp 152-169.
  • 2009.泭 D矇finir un int矇r礙t particulier parisien : les 矇lections et ladministration municipal de Paris au milieu du XIXe si癡cle, Annales. Histoire et Sciences Sociales, no 2, pp 407-433.
  • 2009. The Site of Generality: Placing Chicago in the American Regime of Commensurability in Paris-Chicago: Urban Cultures in Comparative Perspective. Cahiers Parisiens. Vol. 5 (University of Chicago-Paris).
  • 2009.泭 Edouard Laboulaye et la statue de la libert矇 La lettre du Coll癡ge de France, no 26.
  • 2009.泭 The French Foundations of the American Capital: Eighteenth-Century French Political Theory and the Creation of Washington D.C. La France en Am矇rique. Susanne Berthier-Foglar, ed. (ditions de l'universit矇 de Savoie), pp 187-205.
  • 200.9泭 Je peins le passage: Police Power in Foucaults 1978-1979 Coll癡ge de France lectures, Carceral Notebooks, Bernard Harcourt, ed. vol 4, pp 131-137.
  • 2008.泭 Placing Sovereignty: Democratic capitals as an histoire-probl癡me, La Revue Tocqueville, Vol. XXIX, n簞 2, pp 95-110.
  • 2007.泭 A Question of Life or Death: Administrative Bodies and Administrating Bodies in Nineteenth-Century Paris, in Fields of Expertise: A Comparative History of Expert Procedures in Paris and London, 1600 to present. C. Rabier, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Press), pp. 291-315.
  • 2005.泭 Locating the Center: Confining and Defining the Capital through the Parisian Fortifications. Special issue on Centers and Peripheries. Nottingham French Studies. February, pp 20-37.
  • 2002. Pamphlets and Periodicals from the Revolution of 1848. Interactive and fully searchable on-line database of over 200 rare and previously unavailable newspapers and pamphlets from the 1848 Revolution in France
History and literature
  • Manuscript in progress Veridiction and the Liberal State of Exception in Herman Melvilles Billy Budd, Sailor
  • 2008.泭 Between Authorship and Agency: Democracy as History in the Work of George Bancroft, Revue fran癟aise d矇tudes am矇ricaines, no. 118, vol. 4, pp 49-66.
  • 2008.泭 Valuable Values: Capitalizing on Representation in Theodore Dreisers Sister Carrie, 郭A娶眶梗紳喧, Presses Universitaires de Lille.
  • 2006. History and the Strength of the American Republic in Nathaniel Hawthorne's the Scarlet Letter, Philippe Jaworski, ed. Hawthorne et la pens矇e du roman. Dix 矇tudes sur la Lettre 矇carlate. Paris: Michel Houdiard.
Contemporary urban studies
  • 2014.泭(with DellaPosta, D.J., Clark, T.N., and Dini, A.) Civic and Arts Activities Can Energize Politics, France and Europe in T.N. Clark (ed.) Can Tocqueville泭 Karaoke? Global Contrasts of Citizen Participation, the Arts, and Development, Research in Urban Policy, volume 11, Bingley, United Kingdom: Emerald
  • Manuscript in progress (with Scott Salmon) Downscaling Competitive City Discourse: Local Forces in the Age of Global Megaevents.
  • Forthcoming (with C矇dric F矇riel) La petite travers矇e du Grand Paris. Vers lappr矇hension globale des ambiances dans lespace m矇tropolitain". Cahiers de recherche de linstitut pour la ville et le commerce, Finalist (1 of 3) for a prize of 2500 euros for best article by the Institut pour la ville et le commerce.
  • 2013. An Archaeology of the Parisian Underground in Paris-Amsterdam Underground: Essays on Cultural Resistance, Subversion, and Diversion, Andrew Hussey and Christophe Linder, eds. (University of Amsterdam Press).
  • 2012. Whats in the Fridge? Counter-Democratic Mobilization in Post-Industrial Urban Cultural Development The Politics of Urban Cultural Policy. Daniel Silver and Carl Grodach, eds. (Routledge).
  • 2012. (lead author with Terry Clark) La politique culturelle et la d矇mocratie m矇tropolitaine lage de la defiance. Politiques culturelles 21 : D矇bats et enjeux en Europe. Guy Saez et Jean-Pierre Saez, dir. (Editions de la d矇couverte).
  • 2012. (with Mathias Rouet) The Grand Paris: Cultural Milieu in the Process of Metropolitanization. Cultural Policy and Governance in a New Metropolitan Age. Cultures and Globalization Series, vol 5. Helmut Annheier, Yudhishthir Raj Isser, and Michael Hoelscher, eds. (Sage Publications).
  • 2011. Is There a Place for More Moli癡re? Cultural Planning and Metropolitan Politics in the Grand Paris Territorio.
  • 2011. Anting or the Antinomies of Ex-urban Shanghai Public. Art Culture Ideas, vol 43, Special issue on the suburbs. Spring 2011.
  • 2010. (lead author with Terry Clark) Villes cr矇atives ou voisinages dynamiques? D矇veloppement m矇tropolitain et ambiances urbaines. La Revue des politiques culturelles, pp 44-49.
Encyclopedia articles
  • 2012. "Paris". Global Studies Encyclopedia. Sage Publications.
  • 2009. "1848". Encyclopedia of Revolutions, Uprisings and Popular Movements. Blackwell.
  • 2009. "Hotel de Ville". Encyclopedia of Revolutions, Uprisings and Popular Movements. Blackwell.
  • 2005. "Duvergier de Hauranne, Ernest". Encyclopedia of French-American Relations. Ed. Bill Marshall. ABC-Clio.
Book reviews and review essays
  • 2020.泭La modernit矇 d矇senchant矇. Relire lhistoire du XIXe si癡cle fran癟ais by Emmanuel Fureix and Fran癟ois Jarrige (Paris泭: La D矇couverte, 2015), Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales.
  • 2019.泭Moralizing the Market: How Gaullist France Embraced the US Model of Securities Regulation by Yves-Marie P矇r矇on (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2017), American Historical Review.
  • 2019. Paris Ville Ouvri癡re泭by Maurizio Gribaudi (Paris: La D矇couverte, 2014),泭Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales.
  • 2018. The Transformation of the World: A Global History of the Nineteenth Century泭by Jurgen Osterhammel (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2014),泭Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales
  • 2018. Transparency in Postwar France: A Critical History of the泭Present by Stefanos Geroulanos (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 2017),泭H-Diplo
  • 2018. The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics泭by Mark Lilla,泭Tocqueville21
  • 2018. Toward Democracy by James T. Kloppenberg (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016) Journal of Politics, Ideology and Religion
  • 2016. Gold and Freedom: The Political Economy of Reconstruction, by Nicolas Barreyre (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2015). Le Mouvement social
  • 2016.泭The Making of Tocquevilles America: Law and Association in the Early United States (Chicago: University of Chicago Press) by Kevin Butterfield, Journal of Interdisciplinary History.
  • Houellebecq. Deformed Symmetries, review of Michel Houellebecq, Soumission, Los Angeles Review of Books.
  • Jean-Numa Ducange, La R矇volution fran癟aise et lhistoire du monde. Deux si癡cles de d矇bats historiques et politiques 1815-1991, Paris, Armand Colin, 2014, 634 p. 302.
  • Jean JAURES, Histoire socialiste de la R矇volution fran癟aise, Michel BIARD, Jean-Numa DUCANGE, eds, (Paris, Les 矇ditions sociales, 2014) Cahiers Jaur癡s
  • Jonathan M. House, Controlling Paris: Armed Forces and Counter-Revolution, 1789-1848 (New York : NYU Press, 2014) The Journal of Modern History
  • Pierre-Xavier Boyer, Angleterre et Am矇rique dans lhistoire institutionnelle fran癟aise, 1789-1958 (Paris: CNRS, 2012) Cahiers Jaur癡s
  • 2014. Mona Ozouf, Jules Ferry. La libert矇 et la tradition (Paris : Gallimard, 2014) Cahiers Jaur癡s
  • 2014.泭Suzanne Desan, Lynn Hunt and William Max Nelson, The French Revolution in Global Perspective (Ithaca : Cornell University Press, 2012) French History
  • 2013. Quentin Deluermoz. Les Policiers dans la ville. La construction d'un ordre public Paris (1854-1914) (Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 2012) H-France
  • 2013. R矇my Cazals, ed. Le mouvement Saint-Simonien. De Sor癡ze lgypte (ditions Midi-Pyr矇n矇es, 2012) Cahiers Jaur癡s
  • 2013. Charles Rearick. Paris Dreams, Paris Memories: The City and its Mystique (Stanford University Press, 2011) French History.
  • 2013. Quentin Deluermoz. Les Policiers dans la ville. La construction d'un ordre public Paris (1854-1914) (Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 2012) H-France
  • 2013. R矇my Cazals, ed. "Le mouvement Saint-Simonien. De Sor癡ze lgypte" (ditions Midi-Pyr矇n矇es, 2012) Cahiers Jaur癡s
  • 2013. Julian Wright and H.S. Jones, eds.,泭Pluralism and the Idea of the Republic in France泭(Palgrave, 2012) Cahiers Jaur癡s.
  • 2012. James T. Sparrow. "The Warfare State: World War II Americans and the Age of Big Government" (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011). La vie des id矇es.
  • 2012. Bruno Verlet, "Des pionniers au Texas (1850-1880)" (Paris: Verlet, 2011) Cahiers Jaur癡s.
  • 2012. Jean-Fabien Spitz. Louis Blanc. "Textes Politiques (1839-1852)" (Paris: Bord de leau/Biblioth癡que R矇publicaine, 2011) Cahiers Jaur癡s.
  • 2012. Gilles Malandain. "Lintrouvable complot. Attentant, enqu礙te et rumeur dans la France de la Restauration" (Paris: EHESS, 2011) Cahiers Jaur癡s.
  • 2011. Nathalie Jakobowicz. 1830. Le peuple de Paris. R矇volution et repr矇sentations sociales (Rennes : Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2009). Annales. Histoires et Sciences Sociales.
  • 2011. J. A. W. Gunn. "When the French Tried to Be British: Party, Opposition, and the Quest for Civil Disagreement, 1814-1848" (McGill-Queens University Press, 2009). Journal of Modern History.
  • 2011. Jean-Numa Ducange, ed. Jean Jaur癡s-Karl Kautsky: Socialisme et R矇volution Fran癟aise (pr矇face de Michelle Vovelle) (Paris: Demopolis, 2010). Cahiers Jean Jaur癡s
  • 2010. Jacqueline Lalouette. "Les mots de 1848" (Presses Universitaires de Mirail, 2007). Cahiers Jean Jaur癡s
  • 2010. Fabien Cardoni. "La garde r矇publicaine dune R矇publique lautre (1848-1871)", (Presses universitaires de Rennes/Service historique de la D矇fense, 2008). Cahiers Jean Jaures.
  • 2010. John Agnew. "Globalization and Sovereignty" (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2009). La vie des id矇es,
  • 2010. Casey Harrison. "The Stonemasons of the Creuse in Nineteenth-Century Paris" (Cranbury: Associated University Press, 2008). Journal of Modern History.
  • 2009. Bernard Marchand. Les ennemis de Paris. "La haine de la grande ville des Lumi癡res nos jours" (Rennes : Presses universitaires de Rennes, 2009). Cahiers Jean Jaur癡s, 3-4 (N簞 193-194).
  • 2009. Michelle Riot-Sarcey et Maurizio Gribaudi. "1848, la R矇volution oubli矇e" (Paris : La Decouverte, 2008). Cahiers Jean Jaur癡s, 3-4 (N簞 193-194).
  • 2009. Larry M. Bartels. "Unequal Democracy: The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age" (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008). La vie des id矇es,
  • 2008. Nicholas Papayanis. "Planning Before Haussmann" (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004). European History Quarterly,泭vol 38.
  • 2007. Yannick Marec, ed.泭Villes en crise? Les politiques municipales face aux pathologies urbaines (fin XVIIIe - fin XXe si癡cle) (Creaphis, 2007). H-France.
Article and lecture translations
  • 2008.泭 Pierre Rosanvallon, Democratic Universalism as a Historical Problem,
  • 2006. Monique David-M矇nard. Democracy and Subjectivity. Paper given for Trope, Affect, and Democratic Subjectivity at the Center for Global Culture and Communication, Northwestern University.
  • 2006. Pierre Rosanvallon. The Democracy of Distrust: Institutions and Practices of Counter-Politics in Historical Perspective. Cours au Coll癡ge de France given for the Sealy Lectures at Cambridge University.
  • 2004. Jean-Luc Nancy. The Technique of the Present. Trans. Agn癡s Derail-Imbert and Stephen W. Sawyer. In On Kawara: Paintings of 40 Years. New York: David Werner.

Research Areas

* Democracy, democratization, liberalism泭

* Transformations of the modern state, state-civil society relations泭

* Urban policy, Cultural planning泭

* Urban social and political movements泭

* European political theory, Political thought泭

* French and European politics

Curriculum Vitae