Débats historiographiques autour de la politique européenne de Napoléon

Alphonse Aulard Revisited

“…60 Invocation of raison d'état signified that Aulard intended to highlight a middle path between that of contemporary Royalist and Bonapartist apologists, neither insisting on the benevolence of the ancien régime nor endorsing Napoleonic dictatorship. 61 Napoleon's 'génie realist', identification of the need for a coherent education system as a means to unify the nation, and the occasion of its creation in the peace won by Napoleon's military victories, in turn secured Aulard's personal admiration. 62 As a university professor and historian, Aulard saw the genesis of his own professional environment in the Napoleonic period, which in turn took on its own significance for him: By all his educational creations, [Napoleon] honoured and developed the scientific mind.…”