Diderot et l'abbé Baudeau

Gianluigi Goggi (with the collaboration of Georges Dulac) : Diderot and abbé Baudeau : the Saratov Colonies and the Civilisation of Russia. Baudeau published in Jan-Sept 1776 six articles on Russia in the Ephimérides du citoyen, in which he discussed Catherine II's reforms, particularly her project of establishing colonies in the Saratov area near the river Volga, in order to attract foreigners. According to Baudeau these colonies would be the starting-point for a process of civilisation from the bottom up and from within Russia that would create a third estate and thus radically transform society. The novelty of this programme is emphasized by the word civilization which Baudeau uses frequently in these articles. This term (whose use spread in the 1760s thanks to him and to the marquis of Mirabeau) takes on a special meaning: it is not the slow, gradual and somehow natural process which, for the Scottish thinkers, characterizes the "natural history of society", but instead a political project intended to transform society from the barbarian to the civilized stage, via certain intermediate stages. The importance of these hitherto ignored articles can be seen in the fact that Diderot certainly read them and that they played a role in the genesis of his "political fragment" Sur la Russie (1772), afterwards developed in the Mémoires pour Catherine II

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• Civilisation et naissance de L'histoire mondiale dans l'histoire des deux indes de raynal

  Open Access•Kenta Ûhji•Revue de Synthèse•2008

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• Diderot and the foreign colonies of Catherine II

  Roger P Bartlett, Roger Bartlett•Cahiers du monde russe et…•1982

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