A People Enraged: Causes of the French Revolution

1. A People Enraged: Causes of the French Revolution  By: Andrew Schumann HIST 1102-51 Spring 2019

2. Thesis and Background  • Research Question: What were the social and political conditions that produced mass upheaval in France during the 1780s/90s? How did these conditions dictate public opinion regarding France’s monarchy?  • Thesis:  The French Revolution was provoked due to a lack of political representation of the Third Estate, as well as increased wealth inequality between the poor and the rich within French society.  • Background Information: The French Revolution, which broke out in May of 1789, was one of the bloodiest rebellions in all European history. For a decade, the streets of Paris were littered with violent protests, public executions, and seemingly endless riots. While there is much debate as to whether the revolution was ultimately successful or not, there is no doubt that the revolution left a memorable scar on the social and political psyche of France. On a broader scale, the revolution promoted the ideas of liberty, equality, and fraternity, which then became characteristic features of every European revolutionary movement afterwards and would even influence the law of future federal governments. This analysis aims to discover the underlying social and political reasons for this revolution's inception, and hopefully add some clarity to the origins of one of the world's most misunderstood rebellions.

3. The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen  • Author: National Assembly of France, August 26th, 1789 • Type of source: Primary Source; Historical Document  • Link:https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=umn.31951002970991z;view=1up;seq=11 • Summary: This historical document details the declarations of freedoms published by the National Assembly of France, a representative body consisting of members of France's Third Estate and Estates General. Among the freedoms promoted by the assembly were the ability for open communication of ideas and opinions, the limiting of executive power in government, the establishment of fair taxation, the protection of private property, and the abolition of special privileges granted to nobles. This document provides an excellent foundation for understanding the grievances of the French representatives and, by extension, the French people during this time. In particular, the document is careful to empathize the importance of equitable taxation among the estates, and the implementation of governmental separation of powers to prevent the executive from having unjust rule. This would imply that an abuse of executive power and taxation, as well as genral lack of freedoms, were driving factors in the inception of the revolution.  • Evaluation: This is a credible source because it is a historical document written during the events of the French Revolution. I gained access to this source through a public pdf of the "Bicential Commemoration of the French Declaration of the Rights and Man and the Citizen and the American Bill of Rights", which was issued by the 100th Congress of the U.S and features a transcription of both aforementioned documents. The specific transcription I cited is a pdf published by the University of Minnesota. So, this source is credible because it is primary source transcribed by an official body and published by an accredited institution. 

4. Intellectual History and the Causes of the French Revolution • Author: Jack R. Censer • Type of source: Academic Secondary Source; Historical Journal Article  • Link:https://doi.org/10.1093/jsh/shy082 • Summary: This journal article features an overview the perspectives that historians, political scientists, and anthropologists have pertaining to the driving forces behind the start of the French Revolution. The theme that ties each of these perspectives together is that the masses of France were denied certain "ideational resources" (basically, the ability to speak freely about, interact with, and influence French government). Because the Third Estate were denied these powers, the First Estate and Second Estate came to have disproportionate political influence. Quite clearly, this system of political inequality was a perfect breeding ground for revolution. By learning the overarching themes behind different academic interpretations of the origins of the French revolution, we can observe the important factors which spurred the masses of France to take a stand.   • Evaluation: This source is credible because the author, Jack Censer, is an accomplished historical journalist with numerous articles about politics in history, many of which are focused specifically on France. Also, this particular article utilizes multiple sources of information, ranging from all across the academic fields, citing sociologists, historians, and political scientists. Another detail of note, this article was published in the Journal of Social History, a scholarly journal dedicated to documenting and analyzing the social happenings of history. 

5. The Coming of the French Revolution,1789 • Author: Georges Lefebvre  • Type of source: Academic Secondary Source; Book • Link:https://archive.org/details/comingoffrenchre0lefe • Summary: This book details the perfect storm of events which gradually led up to the French Revolution breaking out in 1789. Put simply, the book describes how France had been building an unsustainable amount of inequality between the societal elite and the commoners for the entire eighteenth century. This was especially harmful regarding economic disparity. As the book details, the Third Estate (commoners) were taxed at increasingly high rates despite earning the lowest income in France's social hierarchy. To add to this, the French government had been spending more money, going towards wars abroad as well as palaces for the nobility, than it was earning through taxes – placing the country in a massive deficit despite overtaxing the majority of citizens. By learning about the conditions in France leading up to the revolution, it becomes more evident as to why the revolution became mobilized.   • Evaluation: This is a credible source because the book's author, Georges Lefebvre, is one of the twentieth centuries most renown, although controversial, French historians. Additionally, all of the information presented in his book is based on historical records, archived documents, or artifacts, indicating that the points made throughout the book are based on actual historical data. 

6. Reflections on the Revolution in France • Author: Edmund Burke  • Type of source: Secondary Source; Political Pamphlet  • Link:https://socialsciences.mcmaster.ca/econ/ugcm/3ll3/burke/revfrance.pdf • Summary: In this Political Pamphlet, Edmund Burke, a prominent statesmen in the UK during the late eighteenth century, describes the influence of the French Revolutionary Doctrine on the European political sphere. Burke condemns much of the action undertaken during the revolution and labels the entire movement as a misguided desire by the public for reform of the existing monarchy, not complete revolution. In doing so, Burke highlights one of the focal points of the revolution – that when the masses desire substantial reform but have no way of effectively instituting it due to the existing monarchy, revolution is necessary. Through his critique of the revolution, Burke ironically gives a rather in depth look into the sound logic of the French Revolution.  • Evaluation: This source is credible because it is a historical document that although not technically primary, was published very near the origins of the French Revolution and gives useful insight into the international opinion of the movement. Additionally, the information that Burke provides can be viewed as credible because each claim is supported with supplemental evidence, either relating to history of political philosophy. 

7. Consequences of Radical Reform: The French  Revolution • Author: James Robinson • Type of source: Secondary Source; *Working Research Paper • Link:https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/jrobinson/files/jr_consequeces_frenchrev.pdf • Summary: This *working research paper discusses the affects the French Revolution had in regard to influencing the future civil codes of its neighboring countries. In doing so, it focuses on how the legal doctrine of the French revolutionaries centered around tearing down the longstanding legal and economic systems which artificially elevated the First Estate (clergy) and Second Estate (nobility) above the Third Estate (commoners). In practice, this equated to stripping the wealthy nobles of their systematically aggregated privileges, and established equality under the law (especially regarding taxation*). By analyzing the influence of the French Revolution on other countries legal codes, we are able to see the kind of legal change the revolution was attempting to implement in France.    • Evaluation: This is a credible source because it was written for the purposes of objective research and features historically archived information as well as mathematical data to support each claim it makes. Additionally, the arguments made in the paper serve only a historically investigative function, rather than being made from any personal bias. Furthermore, the paper was published for the National Bureau of Economic Research, a nonprofit organization founded for the purpose of disseminating historical economic information and relating it to the academic community. 

8. Personal Accounts of the French Revolution • Author: Peter McPhee • Type of source: Secondary Source; Academic Blog Post • Link:http://blog.yalebooks.com/2016/05/24/diaries-french-revolution/ • Summary: This blog post uses historical diaries to recount the personal experiences of real people who lived during the French Revolution. In particular, the blog speaks of Corporal Francois-Xavier Joliclerc, a solider in the French Army and later revolutionary, as well as Jeanne-Victoire Delzigue and Marie-Anne Charpentier, two young artisan women who spent much of their youth in the revolutionary era. All three of these accounts inform of the conditions in which regular people endured during the revolution. Joliclerc's letters to his mother reveal the atrocities committed during violent riots, and the bloody reality of the time begins to form in one's mind. Equally disheartening, the diaries of Delzigue and Charpentier illuminate how the revolutionary conflicts spurred food shortages which devasted the local market economies and had a detrimental impact on the livelihood of the general public. These accounts educate us on the lengths to which republicans were willing to go to secure liberty, and the horrid conditions the revolution placed many people in.   • Evaluation: This is a credible source because the author of the blog, Peter McPhee, is an internationally renowned Historian of Modern France, and serves as a Professor at the University of Melbourne. Additionally, the stories recounted are based on actual historical documents , such as diaries and letters, rather than folk tales. Lastly, the blog was published in the Yale University Press forum, which is specially designated for educational discussion. 

9. Helena Rosenblatt on The Lost History of Liberalism • Author: Helena Rosenblatt (interviewee) • Type of source: Social Media Source; Academic Blog Interview • Link:https://blog.press.princeton.edu/2018/10/16/helena-rosenblatt-on-the-lost-history-of-liberalism/ • Summary: This blog features an interview with Helena Rosenblatt, author of "The Lost History of Liberalism" - a history of the terms "Liberal" and "Liberalism" and how they've changed over time. In this interview, Rosenblatt discussed how the idea of modern Liberalism first came into being as a result of political discourse during the French Revolution. Political thinkers such as Benjiman Constant were advocates of popular sovereignty and promoted the idea of an educated democracy. Rosenblatt explains, despite the revolution's devolution into mob rule, the initial drive for a public voice in government had an unprecedented influence on the Western political sphere for ages to come. By displaying the origins of Liberalism as being intertwined with the wake of the French Revolution, we learn just how important the notion of popular sovereignty was to the radical revolutionaries.  • Evaluation: This source is credible because the author being interviewed, Helena Rosenblatt, is a well-known historical author, having published 7 books all relating to civic history. In addition, Rosenblatt is highly educated, having earned a Ph.D. from Columbia University and currently serving as a Professor of History. Aside from her credentials, the forum in which she was interviewed as the Princeton University Press, an educational forum set up by the Ivy League school to promote productive discourse since 1905.  

10. An interview with Biancamaria Fontana, author of "Germaine de Staël: A Political Portrait" • Author: Debra Liese (interviewer), Biancamaria Fontana (interviewee) • Type of source: Social Media Source; Academic Blog Interview • Link:https://blog.press.princeton.edu/2016/05/17/an-interview-with-biancamaria-fontana-author-of-germaine-de-stael-a-political-portrait/ • Summary: This Princeton University Press blog features an interview with Biancamaria Fontana, the author of "Germaine de Staël: A Political Portrait", a biography about one of the most outspoken female political critics of revolutionary France - Germaine de Staël. This interview highlights the reason why Fontana, and other academics, find Staël political positions to be important to France's revolutionary era. Specifically, Staël was an outspoken critic of France's lack of adequate representation, as well as the unjust subjection of women within the nation's political sphere - with Staël having to be reserved to the role of spectator in the National Assembly despite being more well versed in political rhetoric than over half of the male representatives. This blog informs us as to what modern day academics consider to be the influential progressives of France's revolutionary era, and the ideas of those progressives give us an idea of why the revolution was fought. • Evaluation: This source is credible because the author being interviewed, Biancamaria Fontana, is a well-established historical author and journalist, having written numerous articles for Times Higher Education, a UK based educational magazine, and published 6 books centering around historical investigation of prominent people. Moreover, this blog interview occurred on the online Princeton University Press, an open discussion forum for one of the nation's most prestigious universities. 

11. Conclusion Based on each of the sources analyzed thus far, we can ascertain that the origins French Revolution are within two central causes: 1. A Lack of Political Representation:  - The Third Estate of France, which consisted of the vast majority of its citizens, were denied the ability to have an actual power in French Government. Any real political influence was held by the societal elite, which unfairly influenced government to serve their needs rather than the needs of the masses. The Rights of Man Declaration by the National Assembly, as well as the outspoken critique of government by people like Germaine de Staël were representative of public desire to gain more political freedom. 2. Unsustainable Economic Inequality: - As mentioned above, the elite of French society unfairly controlled most of the nation's political influence. So too was the case with the nation's wealth. Despite the Third Estate being taxed at a far greater rate than the elite, the French government had spent a century building up an unsurmountable deficit fighting wars and building luxury palaces for the wealthy. This resulted in a massive spike in wealth inequality with the majority of taxation being forced on the lower class, yet the majority of wealth being aggregated to the nobility. Much of the legal change promoted by the French Revolution regarded equality before the law, and taxation according to ability. This was the revolutionaries attempt at correcting the wealth inequality issue, and it would be implemented in many western legal codes in the future. 

12. Works Cited:  • “An interview with Biancamaria Fontana, author of Germaine de Staël: A Political Portrait”, Biancamaria Fontana, Princeton University Press Blog, May 17th, 2016, https://blog.press.princeton.edu/2016/05/17/an-interview-with-biancamaria-fontana-author-of-germaine-de-stael-a-political-portrait/ • "The Coming of the French Revolution, 1789”, GeorgesLefebvre, and R R. Palmer. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1947. https://archive.org/details/comingoffrenchre0lefe • “Consequences of Radical Reform: The French Revolution”, James Robinson, National Bureau of Economic Research, April 2009,  https://socialsciences.mcmaster.ca/econ/ugcm/3ll3/burke/revfrance.pdf • "The French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen”, Digital Public Library of America, https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=umn.31951002970991z;view=1up;seq=11 • “Helena Rosenblatt on The Lost History of Liberalism”, Helena Rosenblatt, Princeton University Press Blog, Oct. 16, 2018, https://blog.press.princeton.edu/2018/10/16/helena-rosenblatt-on-the-lost-history-of-liberalism/ • “Intellectual History and the Causes of the French Revolution”, Jack R. Censer, Journal of Social History, Volume 52, Issue 3, 1 January 2019, Pages 545–554, https://doi.org/10.1093/jsh/shy082 • “Personal Accounts of the French Revolution”, Historian of Modern France Peter McPhee, Yale University Press Blog, May 24, 2016, http://blog.yalebooks.com/2016/05/24/diaries-french-revolution/ • “Reflections on the Revolution in France”, Edmund Burke, James Dodsley (Publisher), Nov. 1790, https://socialsciences.mcmaster.ca/econ/ugcm/3ll3/burke/revfrance.pdf