Historical Development of Public Opinion

Abstract

Public opinion, defined for purposes of this historical review as free and public communication from citizens to their government on matters of concern to the nation, is a phenomenon of middle-class civilization. Its attainment of political significance was accompanied and facilitated by certain changes in the economic and convivial institutions of society and by shifts in social stratification. In its early phase public opinion was preoccupied with domestic affairs, but during the French Revolutionary wars and ater the Congress of Vienna the utilitzation of public opinion in international affairs became generally respectable among statesmen. Effective government by public opinion in the field of foreign affairs today is jeopardized by various specified characteristics of modern democratic civilization