Abstract

The article is focused on Fourier’s Théorie des quatre mouvements, published in 1808. With respect to Fourier’s borrowings from the discourses of cosmology and natural history it is shown how the author developed a quite idiosyncratic social science: a social utopianism inspired by geological »deep time« leading from social chaos to »universal harmony « and the happiness of mankind. Although the work of an academic outsider Fourier’s theory can be used to explore the rather divergent ways in which the dynamics of cosmic and human history was conceived around 1800.