Printed Drug: Banned Books and Political Change in Eighteenth-Century France

Yu Sasaki
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Yu Sasaki: Faculty of Economics, The University of Tokyo

No CIRJE-F-1252, CIRJE F-Series from CIRJE, Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo

Abstract: This article explores the diffusion of illegal literature and its impact on the French Revolution. Extant literature focuses on the role of modern communications technologies in understanding authoritarian longevity. I argue that pre-modern print media can be a powerful tool to generate support for political change. I construct a new data set by drawing on a corpus of more than 600 illegal books circulated in the eighteenth century. Using the number of émigrés and death sentences as my proxies for the revolution, I show that the diffusion of illicit literature has a positive and significant impact on nobles and clergymen who fled from France but not those who received death sentences. My analysis provides evidence that foreign publishers play a crucial role in the growth of the clandestine market and suggests that technological progress strengthens contemporary authoritarian survival by controlling the flow of information in society.

Pages: 50 pages
Date: 2025-06
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:tky:fseres:2025cf1252

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