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privileged groups, a court, a parliament, a capital, whose gossip, discussions, or debates they reproduced; they ended up directing opinion almost as they wished, modeling it, and imposing the majority of their daily topics upon conversation. We shall never know and can never imagine to what degree newspapers have transformed, both enriched and leveled, unified in space and diversified in time, the conversations of individuals, even those who do not read papers but who, talking to those who do, are forced to follow the groove of their borrowed thoughts. One pen suffices to set off a million tongues. Parliaments before the press differed so profoundly from those after the press that they seem only to have their name in common. They differ in their origins, the nature of their mandates, their functioning, the extent and the efficacy of their action. Before the press, the deputies to the Cortès, to the Diets, to the Estates-General could not express opinion, which did not yet exist; they only expressed local opinions of a very different nature, as we well know, or national traditions. . . . The old parliaments were groups with heterogeneous mandates, each organized around distinct interests, rights, and principles; the new parliaments are groups with homogeneous mandates (even if contradictory ones), concerned with identical preoccupations and conscious of their identity. Besides, the dissimilarity of the old deputies was due to the peculiarities of their original modes of election, which were all based on the principle of the inequality and the electoral dissimilarity of various individuals, on the eminently personal nature of the right to vote. Strength of numbers was not yet known or recognized as legitimate; and for this very reason, in the deliberations of assemblies thus elected, no one considered a simple numerical majority as having the force of law. . . . Universal suffrage and the omnipotence of parliamentary majorities were only made possible by the prolonged and accumulated action of the press, the sine qua non of a great leveling democracy (I am not speaking of a democracy limited to the ramparts of a Greek city or a Swiss canton). The differences just indicated explain another, namely the sovereignty inherent in parliaments after the press, which those before the press never had thought of claiming. . . . The monarchies before the press could and were supposed to be more or less absolute, intangible and sacred because they embodied national unity as a whole; after the press, they can no longer be so, because national unity is created outside them, and better than it was created by them. They can subsist, however, but they are as different from the old monarchies as present-day parliaments are from former ones. The monarch of old had the supreme merit of constituting the unity and the conscience of the nation; the monarch of today can no longer have any justification except in expressing the unity created by the continuity of a national opinion conscious of itself, in conforming to this opinion and bending with it without submitting to it. To complete our discussion of the social role of the press, is it not to the great progress of the periodical press that we owe the broader and clearer delimitation, the new and more prominent sentiment of nationality that is the political characteristic of our present period? Is it not the press that has caused the growth of our internationalism at the same time as that of our nationalism, which seems to be its opposite but may only be its complement? If growing nationalism has replaced decreasing loyalty to become the new form of patriotism, should we not credit this change to the same terrible and productive power? It is surprising to see that as nations intermingle and imitate one another, assimilate, and morally unite, the demarcation of nationalities becomes deeper, and their oppositions appear more irreconcilable. At first glance one cannot understand this contrast of the nationalistic nineteenth century with the cosmopolitanism of the previous century. But this result, however paradoxical, is actually very logical. While between neighboring or distant peoples the exchange of
merchandise, ideas, all kinds of items multiplied, the exchange of ideas, in particular, between people speaking the same language progressed even more rapidly, thanks to newspapers. Therefore, even though the absolute difference between nations diminished, their relative and conscious differences grew. Note that geographic limits of nationalities tend at present to be confused more and more with those of the principal languages. There are countries in which the language battle and the nationality battle are one and the same. The reason for this is that national sentiment was revived by journalism and that the truly effective influence of newspapers stops at the frontiers of the language in which they are written. The influence of books, which preceded that of newspapers and was dominant in both the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, could not produce the same effects; for even if the book made all who read it in the same language feel their philological identity, it was not concerned with questions both current and simultaneously exciting to everybody. National existence is well attested by literatures, but by their great daily fluctuations it is the newspapers that fire national life, stir up united movements of minds and wills. Instead of drawing its interest from the concrete facts it presents, as a newspaper does, a book seeks to interest the reader primarily by the general and abstract character of the ideas it contains. It is thus more apt to arouse a humanitarian current, like our literature of the eighteenth century, than a national or even international current. Conversation We have just cast a rapid first glance on our subject to give an idea of its complexity. After defining opinion we concentrated in particular on showing its relations to the press, but the press is only one of the sources of opinion, and one of the most recent. We studied it first because it is the most clearly visible. But now it is advisable to study in greater depth an unexplored domain, that factor of opinion that we have already recognized as the most continuous and the most universal, its invisible source, flowing everywhere and at all time in unequal waves: conversation. First, the conversation of an elite. In a letter of Diderot to Necker, in 1775, I find this very accurate definition: “Opinion, that motive (mobile) whose force for good or evil is well known to all of us, is originally no more than the effect of a small number of men who speak after having thought and who continuously form centers of instruction, in different parts of society, from which errors and well-reasoned truths flow by degrees until they reach the outer confines of the city, where they become established as articles of faith.” If no one conversed, the newspapers would appear to no avail—in which case one cannot conceive of their publication—because they would exercise no profound influence on any minds. They would be like a string vibrating without a sounding board. On the other hand, without papers or even speeches, if conversation did succeed in making progress without these nutriments—hard to believe—it would in the long run take over to a certain extent the social role of public oratory or the press as formers of opinion. By conversation I mean any dialogue without direct and immediate utility, in which one talks primarily to talk, for pleasure, as a game, out of politeness. This definition excludes judicial inquiries, diplomatic or commercial negotiations or councils, and even scientific congresses, although the latter abound in superfluous chatter. It does not exclude flirtations or amorous exchanges generally, despite the frequent transparence of their goals, which does not keep them from being pleasing in themselves. It includes all nonessential discussions (entretiens de luxe), even among barbarians and savages. If I were only concerned with polite and cultivated conversation as a special art, I could not trace it back farther (at least since classical antiquity) than the fifteenth century in Italy, the sixteenth or seventeenth in France and then in England, and the eighteenth in Germany. But long
- Page 114 and 115: evolution which is the inverse of t
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- Page 120 and 121: only a commercial treaty, or a new
- Page 122 and 123: were perfect. It is this ideal, an
- Page 124 and 125: 13 QUANTIFICATION AND SOCIAL INDICA
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- Page 130 and 131: consolation, but is it a matter of
- Page 132 and 133: eally a pure accident in the course
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- Page 138 and 139: VII. Social Control and Deviance
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- Page 142 and 143: with our subject? To read certain s
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- Page 150 and 151: 16 THE PUBLIC AND THE CROWD *1 1901
- Page 152 and 153: past; after the family it is the ol
- Page 154 and 155: simple epiphenomenon, in itself ine
- Page 156 and 157: of more than these two categories.
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- Page 160 and 161: Opinion 17 OPINION AND CONVERSATION
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- Page 166 and 167: efore this aesthetic flower of civi
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- Page 170 and 171: deep, entirely psychological and co
- Page 172 and 173: XXXI (1891): 123, 289. “L’art e
- Page 174 and 175: Notes Introduction 1 On Tarde’s l
- Page 176 and 177: 64 Part IV, 11, below. 65 On early
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merchandise, ideas, all kinds of items multiplied, the exchange of ideas, in particular, between people<br />
speaking the same language progressed even more rapidly, thanks to newspapers. Therefore, even<br />
though the absolute difference between nations diminished, their relative and conscious differences<br />
grew. Note that geographic limits of nationalities tend at present to be confused more and more with<br />
those of the principal languages. There are countries in which the language battle and the nationality<br />
battle are one and the same. The reason for this is that national sentiment was revived by journalism<br />
and that the truly effective influence of newspapers stops at the frontiers of the language in which they<br />
are written.<br />
The influence of books, which preceded that of newspapers and was dominant in both the<br />
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, could not produce the same effects; for even if the book made all<br />
who read it in the same language feel their philological identity, it was not concerned with questions<br />
both current and simultaneously exciting to everybody. National existence is well attested by<br />
literatures, but by their great daily fluctuations it is the newspapers that fire national life, stir up<br />
united movements of minds and wills. Instead of drawing its interest from the concrete facts it<br />
presents, as a newspaper does, a book seeks to interest the reader primarily by the general and<br />
abstract character of the ideas it contains. It is thus more apt to arouse a humanitarian current, like our<br />
literature of the eighteenth century, than a national or even international current.<br />
Conversation<br />
We have just cast a rapid first glance on our subject to give an idea of its complexity. After defining<br />
opinion we concentrated in particular on showing its relations to the press, but the press is only one<br />
of the sources of opinion, and one of the most recent. We studied it first because it is the most clearly<br />
visible. But now it is advisable to study in greater depth an unexplored domain, that factor of opinion<br />
that we have already recognized as the most continuous and the most universal, its invisible source,<br />
flowing everywhere and at all time in unequal waves: conversation. First, the conversation of an<br />
elite. In a letter of Diderot to Necker, in 1775, I find this very accurate definition: “Opinion, that<br />
motive (mobile) whose force for good or evil is well known to all of us, is originally no more than<br />
the effect of a small number of men who speak after having thought and who continuously form centers<br />
of instruction, in different parts of society, from which errors and well-reasoned truths flow by<br />
degrees until they reach the outer confines of the city, where they become established as articles of<br />
faith.” If no one conversed, the newspapers would appear to no avail—in which case one cannot<br />
conceive of their publication—because they would exercise no profound influence on any minds.<br />
They would be like a string vibrating without a sounding board. On the other hand, without papers or<br />
even speeches, if conversation did succeed in making progress without these nutriments—hard to<br />
believe—it would in the long run take over to a certain extent the social role of public oratory or the<br />
press as formers of opinion.<br />
By conversation I mean any dialogue without direct and immediate utility, in which one talks<br />
primarily to talk, for pleasure, as a game, out of politeness. This definition excludes judicial<br />
inquiries, diplomatic or commercial negotiations or councils, and even scientific congresses, although<br />
the latter abound in superfluous chatter. It does not exclude flirtations or amorous exchanges<br />
generally, despite the frequent transparence of their goals, which does not keep them from being<br />
pleasing in themselves. It includes all nonessential discussions (entretiens de luxe), even among<br />
barbarians and savages. If I were only concerned with polite and cultivated conversation as a special<br />
art, I could not trace it back farther (at least since classical antiquity) than the fifteenth century in Italy,<br />
the sixteenth or seventeenth in France and then in England, and the eighteenth in Germany. But long
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