This article analyses the importance that prestige and reputation played in the social legitimacy of liberal elites. While the literature has traditionally assumed that the social preeminence of liberal elites relied on their control of the "mechanisms of influence" (e.g. clientelism and patronage), and to their adscription to broader spaces of sociability (e.g. political parties and networks of affinity), our intention is to examine the function that public image played in the survival (and decline) of political elites. By focusing on a scandal that affected one of the great press baron dynasties in Barcelona, the article will uncover the historical transformation of moral values concerning the values of legitimacy and authority, and at the same time examine how the growing importance of public opinion and the press profoundly transformed routine liberal politics. In this way, scandals will be used as an heuristic tool to renew the study of elites based on an interdisciplinary perspective that combines cultural and media history.

Modern Spain has remained largely absent from the debates and narratives of global history. In sharp contrast to the early modern period, the case of Spain in the nineteenth century has been overwhelmingly studied from regional and national perspectives. Fortunately, valuable efforts to integrate this country into wider frames of analysis have emerged in the last decade. Building on these writings, this article will argue that connections and entanglements represent two valuable perspectives, which allow the insertion of the Spanish experience into contemporary narratives of global history. The article has two aims. First, it seeks to ‘decentre’ modern Spain, by moving beyond its territorial borders within the Iberian Peninsula, and by examining its global dimensions, through connections with territories, colonies, and nations on several continents. Second, it aims to reveal valuable insights for current debates on global history, which arise from a focus on a country that is usually considered to have been both marginal and peripheral.

Scandal, corruption, exploitation and abuse of power have been linked to the history of modern empire-building. Colonial territories often became promised lands where individuals sought to make quick fortunes, sometimes in collaboration with the local population but more often at the expense of them. On some occasions, these shady dealings resulted in scandals that reached back to the metropolis, questioning civilising discourses in parliaments and the press, and leading to reforms in colonial administrations. This book is a first attempt to discuss the topic of corruption, empire and colonialism in a systematic manner and from a global comparative perspective. It does so through a set of original studies that examines the multi-layered nature of corruption in four different empires (Great Britain, Spain, the Netherlands and France) and their possessions in Asia, the Caribbean, Latin America and Africa.

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