Please enable JavaScript.
Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.
The French Revolution, image, image, image, image, image, image, image,…
The French Revolution
The French Revolution and its causes
It was a period of violent political and social change, which saw the abolition of the absolute monarchy and the end of the estates system of the Ancien Régime that started in 1789
Its causes
The social crisis
The privileged states were able to maintain their income but the Third Estate suffered from rising prices because they were the only ones that pay taxes
The political crisis
To improve royal finances, Louis XVI's ministers suggested that the privileged estates should pay tax. The nobility and clergy refused and demanded that the king call the Estates General, but as the king knew that they could limit his power he opposed to the meeting. Finally, because of the demands that he was receiving from the privilege classes he called the Estates General in 1789
The economic crisis
Due to the court's excessive spending on parties, palaces, other luxuries and the participation in military conflicts, the French monarchy was heavily in debt.
Because of poor harvests, the prices of grain increased and as it was used to make bread, the peasants and the urban poor often suffered from hunger
The influence of the Enlightenment
French intellectuals and the bourgeoisie supported Enlightenment ideas and wanted to put them into practice, for example, they wanted to all the French subjects to be free and equal before the law
The Estates General
The cahiers de doléances
The cahiers de doléances were some documents in which the representatives of each estate collected the demands of its social group
The nobility and clergy opposed to losing their privileges
The Third Estate wanted to be free and equal before the law
The bourgeoisie wanted to end absolute monarchy so that they could participate in politics
The peasants wanted to end the tithes and feudal privileges
Unequal representation
The spread of Enlightenment ideas
Pamphlets were written by intellectuals who supported Enlightenment ideals contributed to the start of the French Revolution
The events of the French Revolution
The National Assembly
The Third Estate asked for a new voting system in which each representative would vote individually. When the king refused, the Third Estate declared that, as the true representative of the nation, it was forming a National Assembly.
The king locked the National Assembly out of the Estates General. They started meeting at a tennis court nearby and said that they would not move until France had a constitution
The Constituent Assembly
The king agreed to the Third State demands and a new Constituent Assembly was formed to write a constitution
IThere was a Riot in Paris on 14 July 1789 because of the troops that were sent to Versailles. The people attacked a prison with political prisoners on it, Bastille
The popular revolt spread from Paris to other cities and the countryside. The one of the countryside is known as the Grande Peur (Great Fear)
Because of these revolts that were happening, the Constituent Assembly passed a range of legal reforms to satisfy the demands of the peasantry and urban masses, which were: to abolish feudal privileges and the tithes the peasantry had to pay
The Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen was that document put Enlightenment ideas into practice
To solve French state's financial problems, the Constituent Assembly confiscated and sold church property and in 1790 the assembly passed the Civil Constitution of the Clergy
From that moment on, the clergy would be paid by the state and it would be choose by the people
This led to the emigration of many nobles to other countries because of the discontent that this measurements brought
Louis XVI asked Austria for support against the revolution and he also tried to escape from France, although it ended in failure
The constitution (1791)
Limited male sufrage
the separation of powers
The monarch had executive power
The assembly had legislative power
The courts had judicial power
A constitutional monarchy, the monarch powers were limited by the constitution
Women were not given the right to vote, they continued to be limited to domestic roles as wives and mothers
The Legislative Assembly
They were elections for the new Legislative Assembly and two different groups emerged
The Jackobins
They represented the petite bourgeoisie and they were more radical. They wanted to abolish the monarchy, establish a republic and introduce universal manhood suffrage
The Girondins
They represented the interests of the wealthy bourgeoisie. They had moderate views and supported the constitutional monarchy and limited suffrage
In 1792 France declared war to Prussia and Austria because it was in a constant threat of invasion
Because of France's defeats at the hands of the European armies and Louis XVI's reluctance to accept the revolutionary changes, in August 1792 the people of Paris revolted and attacked the Tuileries Palace
Louis XVI was imprisoned, the monarchy was abolished and France became a republic
The Convention
A new assembly called the Convention was established with universal manhood suffrage
In 1793 The Convention agreed to execute Louis XVI for treason and he was beheaded by guillotine
After Louis death, a dictatorship known as the Terror was established under the Jackobins
It was led Robespierre
The Terror
They wanted to end the internal revolts
A popular revolutionary army was formed
The measures that were introduced were supposed to contribute to the war that France was now fighting against its European enemies
There was widespread repression of counterrevolutionaries
Universal manhood suffrage was established
The Law of Maximum was adopted (It fixed maximum prices for basic products)
The Directory and the Consulate
The moderate deputies overthrew the Jacobins in 1794 and in 1795 they adopted a new constitution
The Directory was introduced, a new form of government
The government was made up by of five directors
They re-established limited male suffrage
Because of the foreign wars and the threat of radical revolutionaries returning to war, the power of army increased
In 1799 Napoleon Bonaparte organised a military coup so that he could restore peace at home and abroad
Napoleon established a new form of government called Consulate. It was formed by three consuls and the First Consul was Napoleon itself
In 1802, Napoleon was named First Consul for Life
In 1804, Napoleon had absolute power and the French Revolution had ended
