Mary Wollstonecraft and Patriotism

Abstract

  This paper discusses Wollstonecraft's idea of patriotism in the context of the so-called “Revolution Debate” of the 1790s. In A Vindication of the Rights of Men, she undermines Edmund Burke's sentimental concept of patriotism by putting forward a version which stressed “universal benevolence”, “enlightenment” and a “disinterested” contribution towards the public good. She was influenced in this through her involvement with Rational Dissent, most notably by Richard Price whose writings in support of the French Revolution display a certain “internationalism”. Her patriotism involves a “feminist” claim for the fuller participation of women in the public sphere. Despite the cosmopolitan stance of her work, she was not entirely free from the dominant prejudices of her time.

  The British radicals (including Wollstonecraft) were labelled during the mid-l 790s by loyalist propaganda as anti-patriots who sought to destroy Britain in alliance with France. This situation made their appeals to “universal” patriotism especially difficult. Despite the loyalist backlash, despite the growing disillusionment with the events in France, Wollstonecraft's critical and reformist attitude towards her society remains unchanged. Her last novel, Wrongs of Woman, addresses the kind of patriotism which was dominant in the repressive Britain of the late 1790s. My paper seeks to demonstrate Wollstonecraft's “alternative” patriotism which should not be so easily dismissed as Linda Colley so evidently does in Britons.