Political Discourses of the Polish Revolution, 1788–92

Abstract

The Polish Revolution, usually known as the Four Years Sejm (Diet or Parliament), was not a violent insurrection. Instead it was a parliamentary seizure of power within a political system that was formally ‘republican’, but in practice controlled until 1788 from St Petersburg. It yielded a series of far-reaching reforms, notably the Constitution of 3 May 1791. This article emphasizes the role of shifts in political discourse in bringing about constitutional change, employing a methodological mélange of Quentin Skinner, Paul Ricoeur, Maurice Cowling, and Lewis Namier. It introduces the extraordinary phenomenon of the Revolution in Polish-Lithuanian political culture, before sketching the dominant and minority discourses at the beginning and end of the Revolution, and explaining the decisive shift that took place in 1790. In 1788-1789, the chief political polarity was between an opposition led by aristocrats, whose discourse was republican and violently (if not always sincerely) Russophobic, and a court party, whose discourse, realist in respect to Russia and moderately enlightened, with an anti-aristocratic emphasis on order, with regard to internal affairs, was intended to appeal to middling noblemen. In 1791-1792, the principal division was between a reduced aristocratic opposition that looked to Russia for support, whose discourse appealed to traditional noble republican emotions, and a broadly Russophobic and enlightened ‘patriot’ party. Such ‘enlightened republicans’ added a more socially inclusive discourse of the nation and an activist discourse of national independence to the enlightened monarchist discourse of ordered government, under the guidance of a wise and benevolent king and the favour of Divine Providence. It is contended that this triumphant merged discourse, with its condemnation of ‘aristocratic anarchy’, continues even today to influence negative assessments of the unreformed Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. This article is based to a greater extent than previous research on the manuscripts of the parliamentary diary, and upon the instructions of the local assemblies of the nobility (the sejmiks).

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