FRENCH REVOLUTION

Social impact of the French Revolution

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Social impact of the French Revolution

The French revolution

French Revolution denotes the period of political upheaval in France that began in 1789 and is generally considered to have been completed in 1799. The Revolution abolished absolute monarchy with feudal privileges for the aristocracy and clergy; in its place came a government that wanted to start from the Enlightenment ideas. Revolution ideals were equality, liberty, fraternity, and these key words used in the debate today. Upheaval was associated with significant conflicts. Violence was considered by the revolutionaries to be necessary in order to overthrow the ruling power (Whaley, 2003, pp.113-118).

The French Revolution began with the formation of the first National Assembly in June 1789 and the storming of the Bastille on 14 July of the same year and ended with Napoleon Bonaparte's defeat in 1799. Another direction sees revolution when the most radical revolutionary rulers overthrown (Plack, 2010, pp.290-303). It is also possible to consider the French Revolution, which ended when Napoleon Bonaparte had himself crowned emperor in 1804, as the revolution hereby traversed a lap from monarchy to empire. The revolution had foretold long before 1789 by the Enlightenment and its philosophers Voltaire and Rousseau and others, as well as thoughts on the government by the people and the human mind, which inspired the people to revolt and demands for greater equality against the monarchy and the nobility provocative luxury (Smith, 2000, pp.407-433).

The conflicts with England, most recently in the American colonies where the French helped the Americans to revolt, had forced the government to further raise taxes. The Revolution had a great impact also on the rest of Europe and the world. Ultimately it led to the liberal democracy was introduced, a number of monarchies were replaced by republics, feudal privileges were abolished, society secularized, and total warfare was invented. It had great significance for the Russian Revolution of 1905 and its ideas inspired Mao Zedong in building a communist state in China (Joseph, 2008, pp.161-163).

Background

The France taken by the Old Regime was a large building built for fifty generations for over five hundred years. Its foundations oldest and most profound works of the Church were established during thirteen hundred years. The French society of the eighteenth century kept the division into three states or orders typical of the Old Regime - First State or Clergy, Nobility or State Second, or Third People and State - each of which is governed by its own laws, with a King absolute at the top of the hierarchy of states. The King was above all the worker of national unity through its independent power of orders, meaning that it was he who had the last word on justice, economy, diplomacy, peace and war, and who would oppose him targets the prison of Bastille (Germani, 2003, pp.111-113).

France has undergone a remarkable evolution in recent years: there was no censorship, torture was prohibited in 1788, and the representation of the Third Estate in the Estates-General had just been ...