The Crench Revolution: The Causes Of The French Revolution

The effects of the French Revolution still resonate in twenty-first century politics and western society. In a matter of years, the Old Regime, that had dominated European society for centuries, came to an abrupt and violent end. This world changing event has entranced historians since 1789 who sought to tease out necessary and sufficient causes for the revolution to begin. However, there is not one single cause, but a series of movements, material causes, intellectual causes, and events that coalesced in Paris during the eighteenth century to spark the French Revolution. Based upon the intellectual ideas emerging from the Enlightenment regarding popular sovereignty and individual human rights, coupled with a dire economic situation and an

Even though there is not one cause, there is still a hierarchy of importance when analyzing and assessing potential catalysts for the French Revolution. Economic and political turmoil plagued France in the years leading up to the storming of the Bastille, but the fundamental shift from absolute sovereignty to popular sovereignty exasperated rebellious thought into revolutionary action. Prior to the French Revolution, humans accepted their place in society, whether as nobles or as peasants, and followed the traditional forms of government. Once the notion of inherent and equal rights for all humans regardless of their socioeconomic status began to permeate through French society, the previously unquestionable authority of the monarch and the church began to be challenged. The Enlightenment intellectual movement was both a necessary and sufficient cause for the French Revolution to begin. Even though the intellectuals generally did not explicitly advocate rebellion or revolution, their philosophies resulted in incendiary actions from starving peasants who demanded a societal