French Revolution

The French Revolution took place as a popular movement to reform the 'absolute' rule of the monarch, Louis XVI .A number of factors caused the French Revolution.

The first  cause was the Old Regime. For centuries, the quality of  life in Europe had been determined  by the status that a person or family held. This status could not be earned, but it was determined by the family in which someone was born. That is why France was divided principally into three estates which had big differences between them.The first and second estates were made up of the clergy,and the nobility. The third estate was made up by the bourgeoisie .They were the peasants, and the wage earners.The peasants were forced to do military service, and to live in terrible conditions, but the clergy,or the nobility had authority over them.

The second cause was that France was living the worst moment in the 18th century .They had spent a lot of money fighting costly wars, and continued spending too much money on luxuries.Besides,terrible weather, heavy rain, hard winters,and  hot summers induce to three very bad  harvests in the city. This strong condition forced peasants and farmers to have smaller incomes. So, food prices rose sharply, and  many French farmers became unemployed. France was now into an economical crisis.

In consequence, the representatives of the third estate declared themselves a National Assembly, representing the 96% of the population, feeling themselves as the true Parliament.These members met at the Royal Tennis Court until the king agreed to meet their demands, and thus become part of the  Assembly.

Louis XVI assumed the power in 1774. He was an absolute monarch,so he had complete power.Like many other European monarchs,Louis believed his power had been given to him by god.Louis was a “family-man” and was dominated by his wife.She was criticised by many for the way she interfered with Louis´s attempts to govern the country.On 5 and 6 October,1789, the Paris Mob came to Louis´s palace at Versailles and attacked.They captured Louis and his family, and imprisioned him in the Tulleries, in Paris. Louis could have ordered his guards to fire on the mob,but he refused to do so. He claimed that he played the role of an English style “Constitutional monarch”.In the end, the Assembly decided to keep Louis as  their monarch ( one who has to obey the rules of a Constitution). On September  3rd,1971, the Constitution was proclaimed, and Louis  swore an oath of loyalty to it. On 30th, September 1791, the National Assembly declared  its work finished. It seemed the Revolution was over and the king was executed in 1793.

The period following Louis’s execution became known as ‘The Terror’(emergency government set up in 1792 — 1794) in France because  thousands of people suspected of anti-revolutionary activities, or of helping France’s enemies were sent to the guillotine.In February, it was clear that the war was still going badly for France. And in March, there was a peasant revolt in Vendee, in the northwest. In August, the Jacobins ( radical sort of French revolutionary) declared that ‘Terror is the order of the day’.

By the late summer, many areas of France were rebelling against the new radical Jacobin government  threatening  to the stability of France. A fear of traitors had grown in France following revolution,and war.This led to another measure, revolutionary tribunals.

The Jacobins controlled the Committee of Public safety. The leading figure in the Committee was Maximilien Robespierre,a representative of the jacobins.The Committee allowed revolutionary tribunals to convict people without hearing evidence.Eventually, people got sick of all the killing, and by mid-1794, the Terror had died out. As the Austrian threat decreased, many looked for someone to blame for the Reign of Terror. The leading Jacobin, Robespierre found himself at the centre of the blame, he was arrested and locked up. In July 1794, Robespierre found himself facing the same fate as thousands of other French people: the guillotine.

In conclusion, the French Revolution marked a decisive stage in the transition from feudalism to capitalism.In consequence, Capitalism became the new economic system; ideas of social equality, and socialism became popular,and all privileged classes were abolished.