Hofstad of koopstad? Den Haag in de stedelijke pers, 1850-1860

Court-Capital or Commercial Centre? The Hague and the urban press, 1850-1860

In the 18505, urban newspapers played a crucial role in defining the identity and future development of The Hague. Focusing on the increasing conflict between two divergent urban representations - the court-capital versus the commercial centre - Furnée argues in his article that newspapers have played a particularly important role both in the legitimating and in the contestation - and, eventually, in the transformation as well - of the strong class-hierarchy existing in this urban society. The Dagblad van 's-Gravenhage, the city-council's own newspaper, plainly supported the established urban system of the court-capital and Consolidated it both in the selection and the organization of its dreary messages. In the wake of the constitutional revolution of 1848, opinion papers such as the 's-Gravenhaagsche Nieuwsbode and the 's-Gravenhaagsch weekblad however, constructed, a new vision of The Hague as the 'third commercial centre' after Amsterdam and Rotterdam. In leading articles and letters to the editor, they not only asserted a dramatic revision of public policy, but also reflected and stimulated the formation of dealers, manufacturers, shopkeepers and artisans in their joint quest for increasing social status and political power.