How To Trust? Interpersonal Judgment and the French Revolution

This project proposes to investigate the means by which French people, before and during the great revolution of 1789, were expected and able to pass judgment on each other, as economic actors, fellow-citizens, and potential traitorous threats. It will offer a fundamentally new evaluation of how we can think about revolutionary political processes, which were driven by the desperate need, but tragic inability, to make such judgments effectively and indisputably. It will present a significant historical insight into the ways in which this remains an intractable problem down to the present day, and into our increasingly networked and monitored future.