French Revolution

FRENCH REVOLUTION

ASSIGNMENT ONE

Modern European History Jonah Haines 1293

Mr. Potts

Г¬Privilege not poverty caused the French RevolutionГ®

To what extent do you agree?

The French Revolution was essentially a class war between the emerging Bourgeoisie

against the Privileged class, this meant they saw the Privileged class as the only hurdle

between themselves and equality within French society. Many of the ideas they pursued

stemmed from the enlightenment and they believed that in order to gain their full

economic, social and political potential and gain equality, the Bourgeoisie had to eradicate

the privileges that were halting their rise in society. To do this they had to seize power for

themselves and gaining power within the government and making badly needed changes,

such as, improving the tax system, creating a fair system of production where profits went

to the producer, improving the whole fiscal system of the government, improving the

geographical divisions of France and the problems they caused, plus many more. The

revolution was a fight for equality and recognition by the Bourgeoisie, it was not a revolt

against poverty, for many of the French people had been living in poverty for centuries and

had learnt to live with it.

France had prospered in the Eighteenth century. France had had no major famines or

plagues, its population had increased, there had been no wars on its soil, industry such as

textiles was doing well and offshore trading had increased enormously. It was the

Bourgeoisie that had enabled this abundance of wealth and they were emerging as the

economic power inside France. But their new found power was being smothered by the

privileged class. The privileged class of nobility and clergy, who owned the bulk of the

land, were using their ancient rights to plunder most of the profits that were made by the

lower classes. This meant that the;

Г¬Prosperity came only to those who held fairly large estates, who exercised feudal rights,

or who could manipulate farm rents.Г®1 The only people who fell under these categories

were the Nobles of the robe and the clergy. So in order to get the prosperity equally

divided in society and thus profit themselves, the bourgeoisie had to get rid of the

privileged classes ancient rights. To do this they had to revolt against the government, that

supported the privileged classes and which was reluctant to make the necessary reforms. It

is seen here that it was the Bourgeoisie were struggling against the Privileged class for

their rightful share of profits that was taken away by the privileges of the upper class, not

a fight by the peasants who were living in poverty.

Taxes and prices were another battlefield for the Bourgeoisie and the Aristocracy to fight

on. The tax base in France fell on the middle class who were the producers. Some of the

taxes in France were: the Taille which taxed commoners, nobility exempted, the Capitation

which was a poll tax on where you lived and what services you used, nobility exempted,

the Vingtieme was a five per cent tax on all income, again the nobility didnГ­t have to pay.

There were also taxes on salt and a tax whenever a person passed over a provincial

border, these taxes meant that a large cut of their profits from their work went to the