Causes of Revolution in Russia and France

France and Russia, today, are two very different countries with seemly different governments but they share a history of violent revolutions and social reform. In 1787, the French people would lead a well-known revolt against the monarch, King Louis XVI, which resulted in the beheading of the king and his family and changed in the French political and social systems. Over a hundred years later, in 1917, the Russian people began a series of revolts against Tzar Nicolas II that would lead the country to become the first communist state. What lead these two societies to revolution? In the years leading up to their revolutions, these countries were plagued by extreme social, political and economic issues. Issues that lead the people to revolution and the execution of their monarchs.

While a king rules with absolute power, there is a need to maintain a curtain amount of favor with their subjects inorder to keep control and maintain order. Connections that a king makes, whether political or personal, are judge by the people and effect a kings popularity. A major factor that lead to the down fall of King Louis and Tzar Nicolas was their inability to maintain favor with their people through the political connections they made. Both monarchs connected themselves to advisers that acted for their own gain and added to the growing doubt that the people felt for their ruler. Young King Louis XVI inherited his country’s poor economy and social inequality from his father and relied on those same advisers for finical help. Attempts by newly appointed advisers to lessen the taxes on the lower class or ads restrictions to the upper classes resulted in great opposition. “ ” . The inability of the King and his advisers to find a solution t...

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...go on to becoming a world superpower. While the french revolution would allow for the raise of Napoleon Bonaparte and the continuation of the French republic.

Works Cited

Timur Kuran “Sparks and prairie fires: A theory of unanticipated political revolution,” Public Choice 61, no. 1 (1989) : 41- 74. doi: 10.1007/BF00116762

Leon Trotsky, History of the Russian Revolution. Illinois: Haymarket Books 1961.

Francois Furet, Interpreting the French Revolution. New York: Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge 1979

Albert Soboul, The French Revolution, 1787-1799: From the storming of the Bastille to Napoleon New York: Random House 1975

Henri Sée, Economic and Social Conditions in France During the Eighteenth Century Batoche Books 1927 translated 2004

Robert Service, A History of Modern Russia from Nicholas II to Vladimir Putin Harvard University Press, 2005