Newspapers are a vital component of print and political cultures, and as such they informed as well as documented the social and political upheavals of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. However, despite the huge influence attributed to them by both contemporary observers and historians, our knowledge of the nature and function of the newspaper press itself remains scant. Press, Politics and the Public Sphere in Europe and North America, 1760–1820 aims to fill this gap by examining aspects of the press in several European countries and America, both individually and comparatively, during this particularly turbulent and important period. Contributors explore the relationship between newspapers and social change, specifically in the context of the part played by the press in the political upheavals of the time. The collection examines the relationship between newspapers and public opinion, and attempts to define their place in the emergence of a 'public sphere'.