1st Edition
Hospital Politics in Seventeenth-Century France The Crown, Urban Elites and the Poor
By Tim McHugh
Copyright 2007
202 Pages
by
Routledge
202 Pages
by
Routledge
202 Pages
by
Routledge
Also available as eBook on:
The seventeenth century witnessed profound reforms in the way French cities administered poor relief and charitable health care. New hospitals were built to confine the able bodied and existing hospitals sheltering the sick poor contracted new medical staff and shifted their focus towards offering more medical services. Whilst these moves have often been regarded as a coherent state led policy,... Read more
Introduction; Chapter One Theories of Charity and Poor Relief; Chapter Two Hospitals and the State; Chapter Three The Reform of the Paris Hôtel Dieu; Chapter Four The Reform of Poor Relief in Paris; Chapter Five Social Welfare in a Developing Provincial Capital: Montpellier; Chapter Six Reforming Social Welfare in a Divided Town: Nîmes; conclusions Conclusions;
Biography
Tim McHugh is Wellcome Trust Researcher and Lecturer in the History of Medicine in the School of History at Oxford Brookes University, UK.
’Tim McHugh's book offers a fresh and highly readable treatment of an important subject... McHugh's careful research, clear writing, and comparative findings on an important set of historical problems make his study a solid contribution to the history of poor relief, the history of French political development, and early modern urban history.’ Renaissance Quarterly ’By focusing on the traditional role of local elites in providing for local poor in cities and towns, McHugh successfully challenges previous interpretations.. ...Hospital Politics is most useful for graduate students and professional historians interested in early modern French, institutional or medical history. Beyond these particular areas, McHugh makes a significant contribution to the larger discipline by extending important challenges. ...Ultimately, this study both adds to the historiography and accomplishes its objectives by successfully questioning previously held notions about the extent of the crown’s authority with a thorough examination of the role played by local elites within early modern French hospital politics.’ French History ’McHugh’s well-written account of the influence of local elites and their connections to poor relief utilizes an amazing amount and array of primary sources and skilfully situates itself in the debate over the power of the French monarchy in absolutist France.’ Sixteenth Century Journal ’All in all, this book provides a useful and well-constructed contribution to our knowledge of the relations between the Crown and local elites in early modern France, as well as to the history of larger hospitals.’ European History Quarterly ’McHugh’s book is a refreshing and informative contribution to the growing annals on hospital and poor relief reform in the Early Modern period.’ Parergon
