The French Revolution - Case Study Example

THE FRENCH REVOLUTION The French Revolution1 is clearly one of the central events in Western civilization - a period of history whose characters and events have always remained fascinating. But the French Revolution ironically was a failed revolution: Liberté, Egalité, and Fraternité2 quickly descended to the towering figure of Robespierre and his Reign of Terror as the revolution spun out control and began to murder itself. 26 years after the "Declaration of the Rights of Man3 was written up, a Bourbon4 once more sat on the throne as the King of France. 1 French Revolution – 1815- 1914 – An Introduction by Sharif Gemie 2 French Revolution – 1815- 1914 – An Introduction by Sharif Gemie 3 Cultural Identity & the Nation State – Carol C. Gould 4 History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814, by François Mignet (1824), A legacy of the Age of Enlightenment5, the motto "Liberté, Egalité, Fraternity" first appeared during the French Revolution. Although it was often called into question, it finally established itself under the Third Republic6. It was written into the 1958 Constitution7 and is part nowadays of the French national heritage. Linked by Fénelon8 at the end of the 17th century, the notions of liberty, equality and fraternity became more widespread during the Age of Enlightenment. 5 - French Revolution – 1815- 1914 – An Introduction by Sharif Gemie 6 - Republicanism and the French Revolution – An Intellectual history of Jan Baptiste – Richard Whatmore 7 - Republicanism and the French Revolution – An Intellectual history of Jan Baptiste – Richard Whatmore 8- History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814, by François Mignet (1824), At the time of the French Revolution, "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" was one of the many mottoes in use. In December 1790, Robespierre9 advocated in a speech on the organization of the National Guards10 that the words "The French People" and "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" be written on uniforms and flags, but his proposal was rejected. From 1793 onwards, Parisians, soon to be imitated by the inhabitants of other cities, painted the following words on the façades of their houses: "Unity, indivisibility of the Republic; liberty, equality or death". But they were soon asked to erase the phrases final part as it was too closely associated with the Terror... 11 9 - History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814, by François Mignet (1824), 10 - History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814, by François Mignet (1824), 11 - Cultural Identity & the Nation State – Carol C. Gould This motto fell into disuse under the Empire, like many revolutionary symbols. It reappeared during the Revolution of 184812 marked with a religious dimension: priests celebrated the "Christ-Fraternité" and blessed the trees of liberty that were planted at the time. When the Constitution of 1848 was drafted, the motto "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" was defined as a "principle" of the Republic. Discarded under the Second Empire13, this motto finally established itself under the Third Republic, although some people still objected to it, including partisans of the Republic: solidarity was sometimes preferred to equality which implies a levelling of society, and the Christian connotation of fraternity was not accepted by everyone. This motto was inscribed again on the pediments of public buildings on the occasion of the celebration of 14 July 1880. It appears in the constitutions of 1946 and 1958 and is today an integral part of our national heritage.14 It is found on items used by the general public such as coins and postage stamps.15 | 12- History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814, by François Mignet (1824) 13- History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814, by François Mignet (1824) 14 - Republicanism and the French Revolution – An Intellectual history of Jan Baptiste – Richard Whatmore 15 - Republicanism and the French Revolution – An Intellectual history of Jan Baptiste – Richard Whatmore The Second Republic, however, is best remembered for having first established male universal suffrage and for Victor Schoelchers abolition of slavery on April 27, 184816. The February Revolution also established the principle of the "right to work", and decided to establish "National Workshops" for the unemployed.17 16 - Cultural Identity & the Nation State – Carol C. Gould 17 - Cultural Identity & the Nation State – Carol C. Gould On February 26th, 1848, the liberal opposition came together to organize a provisional government, called the Second Republic. Two major goals of this republic were Universal suffrage18 and Unemployment relief19. Universal male suffrage was enacted on March 2, giving France nine million new voters. As in all other European nations, women did not have the right to vote. However, during this time a proliferation of political clubs emerged, including womens organizations. Relief for the unemployed was achieved through National Workshops, which guaranteed French citizens "right to work". In 1848, 479 newspapers were founded. There was also a 54% decline in the number of businesses in Paris, as most of the wealthy had left; there was a corresponding decline in the luxury trade and credit was unobtainable. 18 – Cultural Identity & the Nation State – Carol C. Gould 19 - Cultural Identity & the Nation State – Carol C. Gould Arnold Toynbee in his "A Study Of History" saw the French Revolution as the point in our civilization when it stopped growing and started breaking down. Toynbee was able to identify the eruption of a class waras the common preliminary cause of social disintegration. He explained the explosion of civil violence as a result of the tyranny of the ruling class: the dominant minority is a perversion of the creative minority whose role of leadership it has inherited, and it embarks on a policy of social repression in order to impose by force the authority which it is no longer accorded in virtue of merit; the internal proletariat comprises that majority within a society which has formerly given its voluntary allegiance to a creative leadership, but which is now increasingly alienated from its own society by the coercive despotism of its corrupted masters;" While the rhetoric of the French revolutionaries may support Toynbees view about their king, an English contemporary denied this was the truth. Edmund Burke in Reflections On The Revolution In France made the opposite claim, stating: monarch, with more fury, outrage, and insult, than ever any people has been known to rise against the most illegal usurper, or the most sanguinary tyrant. Their resistance was made to concession; their revolt was from protection; their blow was aimed at a hand holding out graces, favours, and immunities. Burke made it clear that the democracy demanded by the French Revolution, and later adopted in principle throughout Europe and America, was a call for "shameless" and "fearless" rule. The popular support for this form of government within the Western world revealed by the adoption of universal suffrage, means the majority of citizens no longer consider themselves loyal subjects, but individuals who recognise no authority but their own wishes, which is the rule of selfishness. The French Revolution was not a protest against tyranny, but against authority. It marked the time when Authority stopped being the master and started being the servant of its charges. Being ruled by the occasional will of the people, which is democracy, is to replace the rule of wisdom with the rule of wishes, and inevitably obtain social decline The origins of modernity are commonly traced to the founding of the United States of America and, especially in France, to the Revolution of 1789. Modernity might be characterized by the three words of the motto of the French Republic: Liberty, Equality, Fraternity. In our Revolution, that triad represented the rejection of the old regime and, for some of the protagonists, the rejection of the substantially Christian culture of the preceding centuries. In the course of the two centuries since the Revolution, however, it has been more and more widely recognized that liberty, equality, and fraternity are, in fact, among the fruits borne by the biblical and Christian tradition. The understanding of liberty is that it undermines all tyrannical and totalitarian pretensions. Submission to God does not alienate human liberty, for the source of liberty cannot be the enemy of liberty. On the other hand, and as history bears abundant testimony, liberty as license, liberty as self-will, consumes and destroys itself. Man’s obscured and listless conscience seems unable to comprehend the true meaning of law. The result is that law is viewed as the enemy of liberty. Some of the pioneers of modernity understood themselves to be resisting the conformism of an ossified social order, but they ended up by confusing liberation with systematic transgression of all order. Liberty as license, on the other hand, ends up by destroying itself. The apostles of modernity had convinced nearly everyone that advances in knowledge would bring with it advances in liberty. Political and social equality is one of the most adamant demands of our time. The demand for equality, however, encounters opposition in the notion of liberty. Alexis de Tocqueville19 viewed the progress toward equality as an irresistible historical trend, and he went so far as to deem this "providential." He proposed an explanation of how this trend would unfold. Each person, he said, had first gained an equal juridical status with the passing of the feudal order. Every individual became legally capable of signing contracts, buying and selling property, and getting married. Closely associated with this, equal political rights were to be granted all. It followed, however belatedly, that women were to be given the right to vote and have a say in common decisions. Finally, in this scenario, the nations of the world would become more productive and wealthy. Gradually, the gap between rich and poor, affluence and poverty, would be closed. Moreover, in this optimistic view, everyone would eventually have access to education, health, and other goods, enabling them to share equally in the cultural treasures of society. 19 - Republicanism and the French Revolution – An Intellectual history of Jan Baptiste – Richard Whatmore Fraternity would seem to be no more than the logical consequence of liberty and equality. But it has other roots at the deepest levels of human self-consciousness. The idea of universal fraternity reflects the wish that all human beings might live together as loving brothers and sisters, each with the other as "another self." One can treat like oneself only another self, or somebody who is perceived to be another self, as with a brother or sister. The demand of fraternity raises its own questions, questions In its first victory the Revolution had put an end to absolutism in France. Instead of the ‘divine right of the Kings’ there was the ‘will of the people’.20 This was understood to mean limiting the powers of Government through a constitution and secondly electing an assembly and parliaments. Free speech, freedom of the press and freedom to form political parties were seen as basic human rights even though they did not really exist after Napoleon established a dictatorship. Universal Suffrage was started and then abandoned quickly. 20 - The Social Contract, Or Principles of Political Right English translation Political Liberties21 won by the revolution led to a constitutional parliament but not a democracy. The Revolution had provided one democratic election (National Assembly, and not for women) and this would be remembered throughout French History. The Revolution brought an end to privileges and the class system. Everybody came under the same law and taxation. Promotion became open to talent and citizens were equal before the law. Neither the new set of Nobles nor the returned set in 1815 could extract the same privileges present in the Ancien Regime’s nobility. 21- Republicanism and the French Revolution – An Intellectual history of Jan Baptiste – Richard Whatmore Rousseau has been called the precursor of the modern pseudo-democrats such as Stalin and Hitler and the "peoples democracies." His call for the "sovereign" to force men to be free if necessary in the interests of the "General Will" is a resonance of the Lycurgus of Sparta instead of to the pluralism of Athens.22 In fact the legacy of Rousseau is Robespierre and the radical Jacobins of the Terror who followed and worshipped him passionately. In the 20th century, his influence is further felt by tyrants who would arouse the egalitarian passions23 of the masses not so much in the interests of social justice as social control. 22 – Making Democracy in the French Revolution – James Livesey 23 - Making Democracy in the French Revolution – James Livesey Rousseau presages the rise of the Romantic movement in art and caused a sensation among the aristocrats of Bourbon France. Later on Napoleon is supposed to have claimed, "If there had been no Rousseau, there would have been no Revolution, and without the Revolution, I should have been impossible." Robespierre looked upon him like a spiritual father. Rousseau, it has been said, was an enigma. While Rousseau is frequently cited with approval by numerous leaders of the sans-culottes, or by Robespierre or Gracchus Babeuf, Rousseau was more a prophet of radical individualism than he was of cooperation. Nevertheless, several of Rousseaus ideas, taken out of context, do appear to have revolutionary and socialist implications. In The Social Contract (1762), Rousseau worked out the notion of the General Will, which, simply stated, referred to the will of the people, reflected through the rational needs of the body politic. The General Will24 is not specifically the mere representation of a majority opinion. If people should unwisely oppose themselves to the General Will, it might become necessary to force them to be free. 24 - Making Democracy in the French Revolution – James Livesey It has become a commonplace today to describe Rousseau as one of the intellectual founders of modern totalitarian dictatorships. There is no denying the fact that the French revolutionaries read Rousseau and walked away with a theory and justification for a democratic-authoritarian form of government. This is most readily identified by the figure of Robespierre, who made something of an idol of Rousseau. The French communist philosophers of the late eighteenth century went beyond Rousseau in many important respects. These thinkers did not refer to themselves as communists, since the word itself did not gain currency until the 19th century. These thinkers had a more consuming interest than Rousseau in the problem of avarice or greed, and were willing to go to greater lengths to combat it. They began with a criticism of private property that sounded similar to Rousseau, but they took the step of actually calling for its abolition and the establishment of a society based on the egalitarian and communal ownership of property. Mably (1709-1785)25 developed a notion of equality that went beyond the Stoic concept that all men possess a divine spark, and beyond the liberal belief in equality before the law. He even rejected the idea that important differences in people could arise through such influences as climate and geography, an idea which had gained amazing popularity in France since the early part of the 18th century. He granted that unhappy experiences in society might brutalize some, but their fundamental equality remained untouched. Mably was not a modernizer. He believed that virtue was far more important than material abundance. Babeuf’s26 beliefs were based on the Enlightenment idea that all men have a natural right to happiness. But he also argued that true happiness was not possible without "real equality," that is, social equality, which he also called a natural right. If a society failed to fulfill its obligations in these regards, then it was to be considered tyrannical and a person then had no obligation to obey its laws. On the contrary, one had the duty to struggle against it and to overthrow it. 25 – Making Democracy in the French Revolution – James Livesey 26 - Making Democracy in the French Revolution – James Livesey A harmonious society demanded strict equality. And speaking of strictness, Babeuf’s ideal society was both ascetic and fundamentally static. Although he did make a few stray comments about the benefits of machinery, he was, in general, quite like Thomas More, in that he wanted to go back to some pre-modern, pre-industrial state of affairs. Babeuf knew, like Rousseau, that people needed to be forced to be free. The common people were able, he thought, to find their own liberation, but too many could be deceived when it came to identifying their own true interests. So, Babeuf openly declared that the state might have to be organized along despotic-military lines at least until the ignorant masses had been brought up to a particular consciousness of their own aims and interests. The history of the French Revolution illuminates a number of ideological trends which were developing toward the end of the 18th century. Whether the Revolution truly realized the aims of the revolutionaries is a subject of debate. And whether or not the Revolution was bourgeois, pseudo-bourgeois, liberal, radical, correct or downright wrong are also matters which depend on the individual point of view. At the very least the Revolution meant change. But whether France needed a revolution to make that a reality is again a matter of personal judgement. The most amazing part about the French Revolution -- its noble principles and violent excesses taken together -- is that it occurred in the most powerful European country in the 18th century. Bibliography 1. French Revolution – 1815- 1914 – An Introduction by Sharif Gemie 2. Making Democracy in the French Revolution – James Livesey 3. Republicanism and the French Revolution – An Intellectual history of Jan Baptiste – Richard Whatmore 4. Cultural Identity & the Nation State – Carol C. Gould 5. Embattled reason – Essays on Social Knowledge - Reinhard Bendix 6. History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814, by François Mignet (1824), 7. The Social Contract, Or Principles of Political Right English translation 8. Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau English translation, as published by Project Gutenberg, 2004 [EBook #3913] 9. Constitutional Project for Corsica English translation 10. Considerations on the Government of Poland English translation 11. Works by Jean-Jacques Rousseau at Project Gutenberg Read More