IV.2.2. REMAKING THE CITY

THE DREAD THAT JUNE INSTILLS 

BRINGS AN AUTOCRACY THAT IMMEDIATELY

FORBIDS UNIONS AND DRAWS UP PLANS *

TO CRUSH FUTURE INSURRECTIONS

BY TRANSFORMING THE CITY 

*  Coup d'état, December 1851; the transformation get seriously underway in June 1853, when the Baron Haussmann replaces a timid administrator and strong-arms its financing.

Historians emphasize modernization,

which was inevitable

and could could coincide the military mutation, 

but downplay or omit it.*

* Two studies that unambiguously alude to it: Paris, Bivouac of Révolutions by Robert Tombs (1999), The Invention of Paris by Éric Hazan (2001). But Tombs allusion is made only in passing (p.56) and Hazan emphasizes it without calling it overriding. 

The City Museum grants the Baron Haussmann a room to himself and relegates June 1848 to a table at the back of the floor.

The next pages observe it.

*     *     *

Next,
IV.3.1.
The metamorphosis seen up close