What does it mean to be a politician? Introduction

Abstract

In this Forum, we use the history of 'the politician' from the eighteenth century until the present to start a discussion about what it means to be a politician. According to the German tradition of Begriffsgeschichte, a new understanding of 'politics' manifested itself around 1800. The politician, as a consequence, turned into a professional who operated within the context of a 'modern' administration. The history of what is considered 'political' and who is considered to be a 'politician' thus became a history of modernization (see, for example, Weber's famous Politics as a Vocation). Recently, this narrative of modernization has been challenged. This raises the question of the extent to which the nature of 'the politician' has developed over time. Surprisingly, there have been few studies on this topic. This Forum aims to put the subject on the historian's agenda and offer an incentive for future research. The contributions discuss different historical forms of professionalization, public perceptions of professional politicians, the interaction with common citizens, and the question of when it was profitable not to be, or to pose as, a professional politician. They demonstrate how there might be continuities in the way that political professionals operate and the qualities that they need, but it also becomes clear that each time, the profession has had to adapt to the demands of society.