This section explores the tensions and ambitions of 18th-century Europe, between colonial expansion, imperial rivalries, the emergence of global trade, and ideals of peace and civilisation. It seeks to understand how, in the colonial context of the 18th century, Europe was theorised as a “civilisation”, a notion linked to the idea of progress in the arts and sciences.
Three themes structure this reflection:

• Trade, civilisation, empire: while “gentle trade” was accompanied by imperial rivalries, philosophers, historians and writers questioned the virtues and vices of the emerging trading society: the aim here is to understand the uses of the concept of “civilisation”.
• Freedoms in Enlightenment Europe: because the century of the “invention of freedom” was also that of the expansion of slavery, this theme proposes, in dialogue with post-colonial studies, to revisit conceptions of political and civil liberty in Enlightenment philosophy and literature.
• Culture of curiosity and domination of nature: the aim is to conduct a critical examination of the desire for knowledge and the widespread enthusiasm for science that flourished in Europe at that time.

This section offers a critical reading of the Enlightenment, in dialogue with contemporary debates on colonial heritage and universalism.

Responsible: Christophe Martin