Taking Up the Bet on Connections : a Municipal Contribution

Taking Up the Bet on Connections : a Municipal Contribution

[SHS:HIST] Humanities and Social Sciences/History

globalization

universalisation

municipal connections

transnational history

municipal internationalism

International Union of Local Authorities

Globalisation, the buzzword of the late twentieth century, calls for the attention of historians. As others have already suggested, one way to contribute to the historicisation of the phenomena encapsulated in this idiom is to pay attention to connections over long periods. Connections between municipal governments and exchanges about the subject have both been neglected by historical scholarship for various reasons, but they can contribute to the history of the "construction of the universal". Indeed, the information systems of municipal connections – their vectors, actors and structures – have defined, intersected with, nourished or undergone a series of would-be universalist "transboundary formations". These formations are shifting combinations of values, collective actions, practices, rules, organisations and individuals, all of which are advanced as possible futures for mankind. By examining some of these discourses of ‘social order' and "world order" and the way in which they combine with municipal connections, this article attempts to produce the "‘municipal contribution" announced in its title.

Saunier, Pierre-Yves

Contemporary European History

ISSN:0960-7773

contemporary european history

contemporary european history

2001

FRE

article in peer-reviewed journal

http://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-00002770

http://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/00/34/55/PDF/CEHintro.pdf