Probably the best bio on Napoleon III and the Second Empire

A fascinating book and absolutely necessary to understand the end of a century and the beginning of a following. Far from the caricature which he is the subject in popular historiography, Napoleon 3, although having neither the charisma of his uncle nor his military genius nor his political vision, has marked his time and participated in the modernization a country that, in many ways, was still stuck in the Middle Ages to the beginning of his reign while our competitors and traditional enemies (England and Germany) had already successfully launched in the industrialization of their country. It is above all economically that has distinguished Napoleon 3; we owe him the industrialization of our country, liberalization of the economy including the easing of tariffs that will promote our exports, modernizing our agriculture and socially, we owe the right to strike and the first workers unions (the Socialists did not invent much actually ...) We also need him these great works that will enable France to enter fully into the twentieth century: expansion and improvement of the network road, creation and development of the rail network, generalization of the telegraph, the beginning of electrification, modernization of our Navy will become the second in the world. More concretely close to us, he gave us the Paris we know today, through these Pharaonic works entrusted to Haussmann and without which, our capital would have remained that cesspool Middle Ageux and unhealthy he was still in the middle of XIX. His kingdom will have however resisted the rise of German nationalism, which would cause us concern well for another 70 years ...