The Regulation of Male Homosexuality in Revolutionary and Napoleonic France, 1789–1815

Sibalis, Michael

doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195093032.003.0005

Cited by 90 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 0 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…57 While there is no record of any debate on this matter in the assembly and the legislators' motives remain unclear, the most obvious change implicating homosexual behavior was that "sodomy" (or any similar term) was absent from the new criminal codes. 58 Instead, they mentioned other sex-related crimes. Rape remained a criminal offence, as it had been before.…”

Section: The End Of An Eramentioning

confidence: 99%

The End of Sodomy: Law, Prosecution Patterns, and the Evanescent Will to Knowledge in Belgium, France, and the Netherlands, 1770–1830

Hofman¹

2019

Journal of Social History

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article analyses discourses concerning male same-sex sexuality produced in the context of law and policing in Belgium, France, and the Netherlands between 1770 and 1830. Intervening in the debate over the making of “the homosexual” and the change from homosexual “acts” to “identities,” I argue that shifts in sexual discourses were not linear. In the late eighteenth century, the courts and the police displayed a strong “will to knowledge” in same-sex sexual matters, collecting, requesting, and recording discourses on inclination and, in some regions, even innateness. This will to knowledge all but disappeared in the early nineteenth century, when in the aftermath of the official decriminalization of sodomy, same-sex sexual acts became mostly devoid of further meaning in legal and police records. The emergence of sexual discourses was therefore uneven.

show abstract

Section: The End Of An Eramentioning

confidence: 99%

The End of Sodomy: Law, Prosecution Patterns, and the Evanescent Will to Knowledge in Belgium, France, and the Netherlands, 1770–1830

Hofman¹

2019

Journal of Social History

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The penal code adopted by revolutionary France in 1791 no longer criminalized same-sex acts in private; the legislators did not provide an explanation for the omission of such laws, nor did they debate this issue. It probably was a ‘fortuitous and unforeseen consequence of their [the legislators] secularization of criminal law’ (Sibalis, 1996: 82). The new code eliminated offences punishable solely on the basis of the Christian doctrine, or in the words of Le Pelletier de Saint-Fargeau ‘those phony offenses, created by superstition’ (quoted in Sibalis, 1996: 82).…”

Section: Early Penal Code Reforms: Decriminalization In the 18th And mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It probably was a ‘fortuitous and unforeseen consequence of their [the legislators] secularization of criminal law’ (Sibalis, 1996: 82). The new code eliminated offences punishable solely on the basis of the Christian doctrine, or in the words of Le Pelletier de Saint-Fargeau ‘those phony offenses, created by superstition’ (quoted in Sibalis, 1996: 82). This does not imply that gays and lesbians were socially accepted; they were merely tolerated.…”

Section: Early Penal Code Reforms: Decriminalization In the 18th And mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This does not imply that gays and lesbians were socially accepted; they were merely tolerated. The violation of public decency remained a criminal offence and the decriminalization of same-sex acts in private was later justified in part by claiming that public morale would suffer if same-sex sexuality became visible through prosecution (Sibalis, 1996: 85).…”

Section: Early Penal Code Reforms: Decriminalization In the 18th And mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There are a number of country studies on the decriminalization of same-sex acts (e.g. Berco, 2002; Hinsch, 1990; Kon, 1997; Long, 1999; McLeod, 1996; Pflugfelder, 1999; Rydström and Mustola, 2007; Sibalis, 1996; Weeks, 1990) and also international comparisons, which tend to be more descriptive in nature (Waaldijk, 1994, 2000). In addition, there are quantitative analyses identifying structural factors that precede decriminalization (Asal et al., 2013; Frank and McEneaney, 1999; Frank et al., 2010); these studies do not focus on the actual process of decriminalization, however.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Routes to decriminalization: A comparative analysis of the legalization of same-sex sexual acts

Hildebrandt

2014

Sexualities

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In many places around the world, sexual acts between persons of the same sex have been criminalized for centuries. The process of decriminalization started as early as 1791 but has not been completed as same-sex acts remain illegal in 77 countries. This article analyses this process showing that in the course of the last two centuries it expanded in several dimensions. Geographically, legalization was for a very long time almost exclusively limited to Europe and Latin America until it became a global phenomenon in the 1980s. For 200 years, national legislators and scientific elites in advisory functions were the drivers of decriminalization. The late 20th century marks a critical turning point. Gay and lesbian movements, national and international courts, and international and supranational organizations such as the Council of Europe and the European Union came on the scene as key players in driving decriminalization. Countries that still criminalize same-sex acts are increasingly put under pressure by the international community to legalize them, which most African and Muslim countries have withstood so far. External intervention is perceived as the continuation of colonial politics, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa.

show abstract

The French Revolution and the Family

Desan¹

2012

A Companion to the French Revolution

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The Regulation of Male Homosexuality in Revolutionary and Napoleonic France, 1789–1815

Cited by 90 publications

References 0 publications

The End of Sodomy: Law, Prosecution Patterns, and the Evanescent Will to Knowledge in Belgium, France, and the Netherlands, 1770–1830

The End of Sodomy: Law, Prosecution Patterns, and the Evanescent Will to Knowledge in Belgium, France, and the Netherlands, 1770–1830

Routes to decriminalization: A comparative analysis of the legalization of same-sex sexual acts

The French Revolution and the Family

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About