De l’altérité sociale à la menace politique : la figure du vagabond dans l’imaginaire révolutionnaire (1789-1799)
Esposito, Cesare
De l’altérité sociale à la menace politique : la figure du vagabond dans l’imaginaire révolutionnaire (1789-1799) - 2026.
38
Longtemps marginal dans l’historiographie de la Révolution française comme dans celle du crime, le vagabond se situe au croisement de la pauvreté, de la criminalité et de la subversion politique. Entre 1789 et 1799, cette figure passe d’un désordre social et moral à une menace politique, symbole d’hostilité envers l’État et la nation. L’article analyse la manière dont le discours révolutionnaire transforme une inquiétude morale en délit public, en opposant le citoyen indigent, jugé digne d’assistance, au vagabond, perçu comme étranger au contrat social. À travers les débats parlementaires, les rapports administratifs et les représentations culturelles, il met en évidence l’émergence d’une grammaire politique fondée sur le travail, la sédentarité et la respectabilité. Sous le Directoire, le renforcement de la surveillance de la mobilité et les premières tentatives de codification juridique préparent la reconnaissance du vagabondage comme délit dans le Code pénal de 1810. La superposition entre irrégularité sociale et danger politique révèle ainsi la naissance d’une nouvelle conception de la citoyenneté et de la déviance au cœur de la modernité révolutionnaire. Long overshadowed in the historiography of both the French Revolution and criminality, the vagabond occupies a liminal space at the intersection of poverty, crime, and political subversion. Neither wholly criminal nor entirely blameless, he embodies that grey zone where social disorder, mobility, and moral suspicion converge. Between 1789 and 1799, this figure evolved from a social and moral concern into a political threat, symbolising hostility toward the State and the nation. By examining the representation of vagabonds in revolutionary discourse, this article explores how the Revolution redefined the boundaries between citizenship and exclusion, transforming a moral concern into a public offence.Drawing on parliamentary debates, administrative reports, and cultural representations, it analyses how the rhetoric of public disorder and safety, or rather the lack thereof, shaped the definition of the vagabond as an “enemy within.” Revolutionary discourse juxtaposed the industrious, indigent citizen – deemed worthy of assistance – to the idle and rootless wanderer, excluded from the social contract. This moral and political dichotomy reflected a deeper anxiety about the fragility of the new republican order, in which social irregularity came to signify political danger. The fear of an ungovernable mobility, coupled with the ideal of a disciplined and sedentary citizenry, informed the emergence of a political grammar grounded in labour, morality, and surveillance.Under the Directory, the institutionalisation of police control and the first legislative efforts to define vagrancy as an autonomous offence revealed the growing tension between assistance and repression, compassion and security. The debates surrounding the projects of Duprat and Bertrand du Calvados illustrate the gradual translation of a social condition into a juridical category. This process culminated in the Penal Code of 1810, which legally enshrined vagrancy as a criminal offence and consolidated the association between moral irregularity and civic unworthiness.By tracing this semantic and legal evolution, the article shows that the vagabond was not punished for what he did, but for what he was not – for his lack of domicile, work, and social ties. His criminalisation marks the birth of a new conception of deviance and citizenship at the heart of revolutionary modernity, one that continues to inform the political imagination of social exclusion well beyond the nineteenth century.
De l’altérité sociale à la menace politique : la figure du vagabond dans l’imaginaire révolutionnaire (1789-1799) - 2026.
38
Longtemps marginal dans l’historiographie de la Révolution française comme dans celle du crime, le vagabond se situe au croisement de la pauvreté, de la criminalité et de la subversion politique. Entre 1789 et 1799, cette figure passe d’un désordre social et moral à une menace politique, symbole d’hostilité envers l’État et la nation. L’article analyse la manière dont le discours révolutionnaire transforme une inquiétude morale en délit public, en opposant le citoyen indigent, jugé digne d’assistance, au vagabond, perçu comme étranger au contrat social. À travers les débats parlementaires, les rapports administratifs et les représentations culturelles, il met en évidence l’émergence d’une grammaire politique fondée sur le travail, la sédentarité et la respectabilité. Sous le Directoire, le renforcement de la surveillance de la mobilité et les premières tentatives de codification juridique préparent la reconnaissance du vagabondage comme délit dans le Code pénal de 1810. La superposition entre irrégularité sociale et danger politique révèle ainsi la naissance d’une nouvelle conception de la citoyenneté et de la déviance au cœur de la modernité révolutionnaire. Long overshadowed in the historiography of both the French Revolution and criminality, the vagabond occupies a liminal space at the intersection of poverty, crime, and political subversion. Neither wholly criminal nor entirely blameless, he embodies that grey zone where social disorder, mobility, and moral suspicion converge. Between 1789 and 1799, this figure evolved from a social and moral concern into a political threat, symbolising hostility toward the State and the nation. By examining the representation of vagabonds in revolutionary discourse, this article explores how the Revolution redefined the boundaries between citizenship and exclusion, transforming a moral concern into a public offence.Drawing on parliamentary debates, administrative reports, and cultural representations, it analyses how the rhetoric of public disorder and safety, or rather the lack thereof, shaped the definition of the vagabond as an “enemy within.” Revolutionary discourse juxtaposed the industrious, indigent citizen – deemed worthy of assistance – to the idle and rootless wanderer, excluded from the social contract. This moral and political dichotomy reflected a deeper anxiety about the fragility of the new republican order, in which social irregularity came to signify political danger. The fear of an ungovernable mobility, coupled with the ideal of a disciplined and sedentary citizenry, informed the emergence of a political grammar grounded in labour, morality, and surveillance.Under the Directory, the institutionalisation of police control and the first legislative efforts to define vagrancy as an autonomous offence revealed the growing tension between assistance and repression, compassion and security. The debates surrounding the projects of Duprat and Bertrand du Calvados illustrate the gradual translation of a social condition into a juridical category. This process culminated in the Penal Code of 1810, which legally enshrined vagrancy as a criminal offence and consolidated the association between moral irregularity and civic unworthiness.By tracing this semantic and legal evolution, the article shows that the vagabond was not punished for what he did, but for what he was not – for his lack of domicile, work, and social ties. His criminalisation marks the birth of a new conception of deviance and citizenship at the heart of revolutionary modernity, one that continues to inform the political imagination of social exclusion well beyond the nineteenth century.
Réseaux sociaux