The Causes of the French Revolution

The Ancien Regime

• The Ancien Régime , also known as the “Old Regime”, was the political and social
system of the Kingdom of France from the late Middle Ages (circa 15th century)
until the French Revolution of 1789.
• Officially every subject of the French King belonged to one of the three official
classes, called estates.
• On paper the King was absolute; his will was the law.
Divine Right

• This is the short form of Divine Right of Kings, the political theory that a monarch’s right to
rule, his or her legitimacy, is conferred by God.
• The monarch’s will, therefore, becomes closely associated with the will of God.
• Legitimacy is the characteristic of government that has the support of those whom it
rules. It is the belief, by the ruled, that the government is the rightful ruler.

The French Revolution of 1789

• The French Revolution was a period of major social upheaval that began in 1787
and ended in 1799.
• It was a process that completely change the relationship between the rulers and
those they governed and to redefine the nature of political power.
• Revolutionary movement that shook France between 1787 and 1799 denoting
the end of the ancien régime in France.
 King Louis XVI

Long-term causes of the French Revolution.

Intelectual causes of
the French Revolution

• Growth of new ideas. Ideas of Enlightenment. • Enlightenment thinkers:

Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Voltaire and Montesquieu. • The influence of America.

Enlightenment

• The Enlightenment (the Age of Reason) was an intellectual and

philosophical movement that dominated Europe in the 17th and 18th
centuries with global influences and effects. • The Enlightenment included a
range of ideas centered on the value of human happiness,
the pursuit of knowledge obtained by means of reason and the evidence of
the senses, and ideals such as liberty, progress, toleration, fraternity,
constitutional government, and separation of church and state.A central
uestion of the 18th centur thinkers was:
Who should rule?
• A central question of the 18th century thinkers was: Who should rule?
• Philosophers and scientists of the period widely circulated their ideas through
meetings at scientific academies, Masonic lodges, literary salons, coffeehouses
and in printed books, journals, and pamphlets.
• The ideas of the Enlightenment undermined the authority of the monarchy and the
Catholic Church and paved the way for the political revolutions of the 18th and
19th centuries.

A state of nature

• Is the theoretical state of humans in the absence of organized

society.
• This is the starting point from which many Enlightenment thinkers tried to
determine the ideal form of government.
• It is closely related to “human nature”
Thomas Hobbes

• In his conception, humans would give up their individual rights to the absolute ruler
in return for the stabiltiy provided by this ruler.
• Once people gave up their rights, their fate, for good or ill, was in the
hands of the ruler. • In practical terms, citizens had no right to rebel
regardless of the actions of the government.
• For Hobbes, absolutism was not the end in itself, but rather a means to an end, and
this end was civil peace and concord.

Rational thought

• Hobbes and Locke shared a conviction that the legitimacy of any form of government
had to be justified through rational thought and not, as it had in the past, by resort
to theology or tradition.
Locke vs Hobbes

• John Locke, starting from an alternative view of human nature, arrived at a

very different conclusion as to the nature of government.
• While Hobbes believed that humans in a state of nature were in a state of perpetual
conflict, Locke saw humans as reasonable and peaceful, naturally inclined to co-
operate in the best interests of society. According to Locke, humans in this state
of nature had certain inalienable rights by virtue of the fact that they were
human.
Inalienable rights

• These rights are those personal rights that accrue to people by virtue of the fact
that they are alive.
• These are rights conferred by nature and cannot be taken away.
• Exactly what these rights are is a matter of debate.

King of Britain George III (1760-1820)

The US Declaration of Independece, 1776

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they
are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these
are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights,
Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the
consent of the governed,—That whenever any Form of Government becomes
destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and
to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and
organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their
Safety and Happiness.

Revolution

General Will

• The General Will was Rousseau’s notion of what was good or desirable for a society
as determined by the population as a whole and not just individual interests.

Political Causes of the

French Revolution

• The Absolute Monarchy

• The weakness of the Monarchy • Louis XVI was a weak leader •
The luxury spending of the Crown.

Social Causes of the French Revolution

• Increasing poverty.
• Growth of industry and the rise of the Middle Class. (Bourgeoisie)

• Growing burden of taxation. (Feudal dues)

 The Ancien Régime in reality • In the context of the Ancien Régime, a venal office
refers to an office sold by the state to raise money. These offices, which were
mostly in areas of the judicial system, were retained in exchange for an annual tax
of one sixtieth of the value known as the paulette. • These offices provided access
to power and opportunities for profit for those who bought them. The more
important offices, which were more expensive, also conferred on their holders
personal noble status that became hereditary, generally after three generations.
Nobility of the Sword
• The Nobles of the Sword were the noblemen of the oldest class of nobility in France
dating from the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period. It was originally the
knightly class, owing military service in return for the possession of feudal
landed estates. They played an important part during the revolution since their
attempts to retain their old power monopoly caused the new nobility’s interests
to align with the newly arising French bourgeoisie, creating a powerful force for
change in French society.
Nobility of the Robe
• This was a class of hereditary nobles who acquired their rank through holding a high
state office. The class was already in existence by the end of the 16th century, but it
was only in the 17th century that its members acquired the right to transmit noble
status to their heirs. In an attempt to bargain for political support during the
troubled minority of Louis XIV, the crown granted detailed charters of nobility to
judicial officials. Because of their bourgeois background, the families of the
noblesse de robe were at first disdained by
Bourgeoisie

• The Middle class (the social group between the rich and the poor)
• The Bourgeoisie was created by the Industrial Revolution.
• The Bourgeoisie was rising in economic power and cultural confidence.
• The Bourgeoisie demanded political power.

owing government debt • Extravagance of

Foreign War • The Financial Crisis
• Tax burden on the Third Estate. • Attempt to tax
the Nobles
 Calonne
• As a last resort, Calonne proposed that the king abolish internal customs duties and
implement a property tax on nobles and clergy. Turgot and Necker had tried and
failed to get these reforms adopted. Calonne attributed their failure to the opposition
of the parlements, so he called another Assemblée des notables in February 1787.
After he made a
presentation to the assembly on the French deficit Calonne proposed the
establishment of a subvention territoriale, which would be levied on all
property without distinction.
The Physiocrats

Physiocracy is an economic theory developed by a group of 18th-century Age of

Enlightenment French economists who believed that the wealth of nations derived
solely from the value of "land agriculture" or "land development" and that agricultural
products should be highly priced. Their theories originated in France and were most
popular during the second half of the 18th century. Physiocracy became one of the
first well-developed theories of economics.
Former Policy: Mercantilism

Mercantilism is an economic policy that is designed to maximize the exports and

minimize the imports for an economy. It promotes imperialism, colonialism, tariffs
and subsidies on traded goods to achieve that goal.
 The policy aims to reduce a possible current account deficit or reach a current
account surplus, and it includes measures aimed at accumulating monetary reserves
by a positive balance of trade, especially of finished goods.

Historically, such policies frequently led to war and motivated colonial

expansion. Mercantilist theory varies in sophistication from one writer to
another and has evolved over time.
The Physiocrats

François Quesnay (1694–1774), the marquis de Mirabeau (1715–1789) and

Anne-Robert-Jacques Turgot (1727–1781) dominated the movement, which
immediately preceded the first modern school, classical economics, which began
with the publication of Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations in 1776.
Calonne dismissed

• This suppression of privileges was badly received. Despite Calonne's plan for reform and
his backing from the king, they suspected that he was in some way responsible for the
enormous financial strains. Protests against Callone erupted, supported by the middle
and lower-middle classes, who burnt effigies of Calonne in support of the notable
assembly's resistance to tax. Louis XVI dismissed him on 8 April 1787 and exiled him
to Lorraine.

The Estates General

• The First Estate represented the Catholic Clergy. Two-thirds of the 303 delegates
were ordinary parish priests, only 51 were Bishops.
• The Second Estate represented the Nobility. About a third of the 282 deputies
representing this Estate were landed.
• The Third Estate representation was 578 men, representing 95 percent of the
population of roughly 25 million. Half were well-educated lawyers or local officials.
Nearly a third were in trade or industry, 51 were wealthy land owners.
 The Cahiers de doléances

• The Cahiers were the lists of grievances drawn up by each of the three Estates in
France, between March and April 1789.
• Their compilation was ordered by Louis XVI, who had convened the Estates General of
1789 to manage the revolutionary situation, to give each of the Estates the chance to
express their hopes and grievances directly to the King.
• They were explicitly discussed at a special meeting of the Estates-General held on 5
May 1789. They were suggestions of reforms.
 The Tennis Court Oath

On 17 June, the Third Estate began to call themselves the National Assembly, led by
Mirabeau.
On the morning of 20 June, the deputies were shockedto discover that the chamber
door was locked andguarded by soldiers. They immediately feared the worstand were
anxious that a royal attack was imminent, sothe deputies congregated in a nearby
indoor RoyalTennis Court near the Palace of Versailles. There 576 members from the
Third Estate took a collective oath
"not to separate, and to reassemble wherevercircumstances require, until the
constitution of thekingdom is established".
 The Great Fear (Grande Peur)

• It was a general panic that took place between 22 July to 6 August 1789, at the start of
the French Revolution.
• Rural unrest had been present in France since the worsening grain shortage of the
spring, and, fuelled by rumors of an aristocrats' "famine plot" to starve the
population, both peasants and townspeople mobilized in many regions. In
response to these rumors, fearful peasants armed themselves in self-defense and,
in some areas, attacked manor houses.

Symbol of the Revolution

 • As its name suggests, the Declaration of the Rights of Man and
Citizen was a written expression of the natural rights of citizens in
revolutionary France.
• Inspired by British and American covenants, France’s declaration was the most
ambitious attempt to protect individual rights in any European nation to that
point.
• It would remain a cornerstone document of the revolution, motivating
revolutionaries of all stripe and colour.

Three political groups

• Radicals, who sat on the left side of the hall, opposed the idea of a monarchy and
wanted sweeping changes in the way the government was run.
• Moderates sat in the center of the hall and wanted some changes in government,
but not as many as the radicals.
• Conservatives sat on the right side of the hall. They upheld the idea of a
limited monarchy and wanted few changes in government
Liberalism

• Liberalism is a political and moral philosophy based on the rights of the individual,
liberty, consent of the governed, political equality and equality before the law.
• Liberals generally support private property, market economies, individual rights (civil
rights and human rights), liberal democracy, secularism, rule of law, economic and
political freedom, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly,
and freedom of religion.
Liberalism and the Revolution

• As an ideology and in practice liberalism became the preeminent reform movement in

Europe during the 19th century. The national character of a liberal movement could
even be affected by religion. Liberalism in Roman Catholic countries such as France,
Italy, and Spain, tended to acquire anticlerical overtones, and liberals in those
countries tended to favour legislation restricting the civil authority and political
power of the Catholic clergy.
Spread of Liberalism

• Throughout Europe and in the Western Hemisphere, liberalism inspired

nationalistic aspirations to the creation of unified, independent,
constitutional states with their own parliaments and the rule of law.
• The most dramatic exponents of this liberal assault against authoritarian
rule were the Founding Fathers of the United States and the leaders of
the Risorgimento in Italy.
Liberalism in Italy and Germany

• The failure of the Revolutions of 1848 highlighted the comparative weakness of

liberalism on the Continent. Liberals’ inability to unify the German states in the
mid-19th century was attributable in large part to the dominant role of a
 militarized Prussia and the reactionary influence of Austria. The liberal-inspired
unification of Italy was delayed until the 1860s by the armies of Austria and of
Napoleon III of France and by the opposition of the Vatican.
Nationalism and the French Revolution

• The French Revolution of 1789 was instrumental in the emergence and growth of
modern nationalism, the idea that a state should represent, and serve the
interests of, a people, or "nation“ , that shares a common culture and history
and feels as one. But national ideas, often with their source in the otherwise
cosmopolitan world of the Enlightenment, were also an important cause of the
Revolution itself.
Nationalism and the French Revolution

• The rhetoric and documents of the

Revolution demonstrate the importance of national ideas.
• The Republic relied on national symbols, such as the tricolor flag and
the
“Marseillaise” anthem, to spread nationalist ideas throughout French
society; and by means of a nationalized military to other countries.