Are sex scandals simply trivial distractions from serious issues or can they help democratize politics? Looking at six major British scandals between 1763 and 1820, this book demonstrates that scandals brought people into politics because they evoked familiar stories of sex and betrayal.

List of Illustrations ix Acknowledgments xi Abbreviations xiii CHAPTER ONE Introduction 1 CHAPTER TWO Wilkes, Sexuality, and Liberty: How Scandal Transforms Politics 19 CHAPTER THREE Influence or Independence: Women and Elections, 1777-1788 53 CHAPTER FOUR Edmund Burke and the Begums of Oudh: Gender, Empire, and Public Opinion 84 CHAPTER FIVE Scandal in an Age of Revolution 113 CHAPTER SIX From Petticoat Influence to Women's Rights? 126 CHAPTER SEVEN The Mary Anne Clarke Affair and the System of Corruption 148 CHAPTER EIGHT Queen Caroline and the Sexual Politics of the British Constitution 177 CHAPTER NINE Sexual Scandals and Politics, Past and Present 208 Notes 225 Index 301

"Anna Clark has pioneered research on sex, scandal, and democracy. Here she shows why scandal is not just engaging, nay fascinating, but how sexual politics is important to power, to political discourse, and the constitution, how it disturbs the fiction of public and private, and how it connects with the contradictions of everyday life-the life that we all live."—Beatrix Campbell, writer and broadcaster, author of Diana, Princess of Wales: How Sexual Politics Shook the Monarchy

"In this original and engaging work, we are shown a series of detailed, gripping scandals and how they were instrumental in shaping the world of Georgian politics and in laying the ground for Britain's move toward a modern democracy. The stories are vividly told-the actors move across the stage in all their flawed humanity. Clark's insights into the reforming of acceptable masculine and feminine behavior and the role of sexual innuendo in struggles for power are particularly original. With the publication of Scandal, all types of political scandal, including those based on or attributed to what current opinion defines as sexual misdemeanors, will have to be taken with the seriousness they deserve, no longer written off as the quaint by-ways of history."—Leonore Davidoff, coauthor of Family Fortunes: Men and Women of the English Middle Class 1780-1850

"In her fresh and exciting study, Anna Clark reframes a set of well-known episodes in British political history during the reign of George III and the Regency period. Combining political, cultural, and gender history, she demonstrates in superb fashion the importance of scandal, particularly sexual scandal, to understanding the politics of the age. Clark has written a work of originality that deserves a wide readership."—James Epstein, author of In Practice: Studies in the Language and Culture of Popular Politics in Modern Britain

Anna Clark has pioneered research on sex, scandal, and democracy. Here she shows why scandal is not just engaging, nay fascinating, but how sexual politics is important to power, to political discourse, and the constitution, how it disturbs the fiction of public and private, and how it connects with the contradictions of everyday life-the life that we all live. -- Beatrix Campbell, writer and broadcaster, author of "Diana, Princess of Wales: How Sexual Politics Shook the Monarchy" In this original and engaging work, we are shown a series of detailed, gripping scandals and how they were instrumental in shaping the world of Georgian politics and in laying the ground for Britain's move toward a modern democracy. The stories are vividly told-the actors move across the stage in all their flawed humanity. Clark's insights into the reforming of acceptable masculine and feminine behavior and the role of sexual innuendo in struggles for power are particularly original. With the publication of Scandal, all types of political scandal, including those based on or attributed to what current opinion defines as sexual misdemeanors, will have to be taken with the seriousness they deserve, no longer written off as the quaint by-ways of history. -- Leonore Davidoff, coauthor of "Family Fortunes: Men and Women of the English Middle Class 1780-1850" In her fresh and exciting study, Anna Clark reframes a set of well-known episodes in British political history during the reign of George III and the Regency period. Combining political, cultural, and gender history, she demonstrates in superb fashion the importance of scandal, particularly sexual scandal, to understanding the politics of the age. Clark has written a work of originality that deserves a wide readership. -- James Epstein, author of "In Practice: Studies in the Language and Culture of Popular Politics in Modern Britain"