Friday, April 9, 2010

FRENCH REVOLUTION

French Revolution is also an Enlightenment practice, but there is a mismatch between ideals of the Enlightenment and social realities of 1780s.

Social structure of France, 3 orders: 1. Nobility 2. Clergy 3. The Rest/Third Estate/Tiers Etat. Each had only one vote in the Parliament.

Third Estate dominated by the bourgeosie, ambitious to be recognized as equal to the others, unconcerned with the case of large masses.

First phase of the revolution, 1789-1792, king remains in his place, bourgeois phase.

Second phase, 1792-1794, is the radical phase, led by the Jacobins under the leadership of Maximilien Robespierre. King executed, new calendar, Christianity prohibited, the cult of the Supreme Being.

Increasing strength of Napoleon Bonaparte in France, finally declaring himself as emperor.




DANTON