describe the circumstances leading to the outbreak of revolutionary protest in France?
Answers
The circumstances leading to the outbreak of revolutionary protest in France were: → Social Inequality: French society in the eighteenth century was divided into three estates namely The Clergy, The nobility and third estates
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The following circumstances led to the outbreak of revolutionary protest in France :
(i) Louis XVI was an autocratic ruler who could not compromise with his luxurious life. He also lacked farsightedness.
(ii) When he ascended the throne, the royal treasury was empty. Long yeairs of wars had drained the financial resources of France. Added to this was the cost of maintaining an extravagant court at the immense palace of Versailles.
(iii) Under Louis XVI France helped helped the thirteen American colonies to gain their independence from Britain, the war added more than a billion lvres to a dept credit. So the French government was obliged to spend an increasing percentage of its budget on interest payments alone.
(iv) The state finally increase the taxes to meet its regular expensive such as the cost of maintaining an army, running government offices and universities.
(v) The French society was divided into three estates but only members of the first two estates i.e. , the clergy and the nobles were exempted to pay taxes. They belonged to privileged class. Thus , the burden of financing activities of the state through taxes was borne by the third estate only.
(vi) The middle class that emerged in the 18th century France was educated and enlightened. They refuted the theory of divine rights of the Kings that absolute monarchy. They believed that a person social position must depend on his merit. They had access to the various ideas of equality and freedom proposed by the philosopher's like John Locke , Jean Jacques Rousseau , Montesquieu ,etc. Their ideas got popularized among the common mass as a result of intensive discussions and debates in salons and Coffee houses and through books and newspapers.
(vii) The French administration was extremely corrupt. It did not give weightage to the French common man.