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Whats everyone's opinion on what the first "socialist" revolution?
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Marx distinguishes between the Frech Revolution and a communist one in the Communist Manifesto. He says that the object of communism is to removed bourgeous property, while the French Revolution removed feudal property in favour of bourgeous property.
I know it wasn't a true socialist uprising, but these were the early revolutionarys and people like Rosseau and Desmollins made some very good speeches and writing on the subject of revolution and property.
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the french revolution was a bourgeois revolution, as the bourgeoisie were its main beneficiaries and provided all the leaders after 1791.
many reforms of the constituent assembly were supposed to apply to all citizens equally but only the bourgeoisie could take full advantage of them. workers and peasants benfitted little when careers became open to talent, as they were not educated.
when the biens were put up for sale they were sold in large lots and this too benefitted the middle classes, who owned between 30 and 40 per cent of french land by 1799. the voting system also favoured the bourgeoisie, as it was limited to property owners.
consequentially, nearly all the members of the various assemblys were bourgeois, as were all the ministers. the bourgeois had always filled the lower and middle ranks of the judiciary and the administration, but with the revolutions they also took over the highest posts, which previously had all been held by nobles.
although they had some pretty good ideas, forget rosseau and desmolins for socialist ideas... have a look at a guy named Gracchus Babeuf. He hated the constitution at the time because it gave power to the wealthy. he believed the aim of society should be 'the common happiness', and that the revolution should secure the equal enjoyment of lifes blessings for all. he thought that as private property produces inequality, the only way to establish real equality was 'to establish communal managment of property and abolish private possesion'. many historians calls Babeuf the first communist. he came up with a plan to overthrow the Directory (all this was in 1796, when the Directory was in power) and establish a dicatorship in order to make fundamental changes in the organisation of society. his plan was revelaed by a fellow conspiritor and the directory had him executed a year later. Babeuf's role in the french revolution was slight, but his theories were very important. some marxist historians say that his theories passed through some like minded people and eventually influenced lenins ideas.
Imagine no possessions, I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger, a brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people, Sharing all the world - Lennon
I'll look into this Babeuf guy, if you have any links would be appreciated.
The French Revolution was on the principles of removing the monarchy (a worthy cause) and sure it all got a bit muddled when the bourgoeis took control and set up the new govt. after the aristocrats got the chop.
But it did set up a semblence of a democracy and did aim to make life better for most people, admitidly it is hard to find some kind of Socialist grain running through the revolutionarys but their intentions were honorable.
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Rousseau died in 1778; he wasn't a contemporary of the revolution and probably wouldn't have been happy with the outcome of it.
I wouldn't call it a socialist revolution, but it wasn't exactly a bourgeois revolution either; but it was the first modern revolution and there are a lot of lessons we can take from it.
"Liberty, equality, and fraternity" is not a bad slogan thought.
"We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. Power is not a means; it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard the revolution; one makes a revolution in order to establish the dictatorship." - George Owell, 1984
"I read all about the scourging and the crowning with thorns, and I could viddy myself helping in and even taking charge of the tolchocking and the nailing in, being dressed in the height of Roman fashion. I didn't so much like the latter part of the book, which is more like all preachy talking than fighting and the old in-out. I liked the parts where these old yahoodies tolchock each other and then drink their Hebrew vino, and getting into the bed with their wives' handmaidens. That kept me going."
The French Revolution was of course a bourgeouis revolution, it paved the way for Emperor Napoleon, a man of low birth, and he nearly conquered Europe.
The French Revolution greatly weakened the aristocracy and was therefore a good thing.
One striking feature of the FR was it's extreme hostility to the Church, Napoleon himself certainly despised priests.
The FR proved you did not have to be high-born or holy to rule.
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it also gave rise to the new French National Anthem, what a fucking great one as well, the best there is!
<span style=\'color:black\'>Culture sucks down words
Itemise loathing and feed yourself smiles
Organise your safe tribal war
Hurt maim kill and enslave the ghetto</span>
<span style=\'color:red\'>Life lies a slow suicide
Orthodox dreams and symbolic myths
From feudal serf to spender
This wonderful world of purchase power</span>
i don't have any links that relate to Babeuf, all i know about him is what I learnt earlier this year from the textbooks i have for history at school.
yes its true that their were some great revolutionary ideas, leadres and movments, and many had great intentions, but i would say one of the most important revolutionaries in the revolution was Robespierre. he had some great ideas, but power got to him and he ended up decapitating hundreds of thousands of people during 'the Terror', why? because they were not of virtue, and were enemies of the republic. he was bourgeois, and look who came out on top at the end? (before the rise of napoleon)
i have to disagree that the french revolution was a socialist one. its true that the french people were tired of the feudal society, and wanted to remove the notion of privileged classes of society (classes in France were very distinguishable and acknowledged by all society to be the first estate, who were the clergy, the second, who were the nobles, and the third, who were the bourgeois and the peasants.).
the third estate wanted so much to remove feudalism. it was the bourgeois who were in a prime position to do this because they were the most privelaged of the third estate, but they were still oppressed by the higher estates. they had to power. the bourgeois evtually got rid of feudalism, and replaced it many times by all sorts of regimes that only gave the impression of a better state. the french revolution was a bourgeois struggle against the aristocrats, clergy and feudalism. it made a state where the bourgois were in control. i guess it paved the way for capitalism.
and then napoleon came along.
Imagine no possessions, I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger, a brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people, Sharing all the world - Lennon
This is one of my areas of specialty. It was horrid; just an excuse for the French bourgeois to come to power! The 'people' of France actually had very little say in what was happening. I don't understand how people can find so much 'inspiration' in the FR. Inspiration in what? 'Revolutionary ideals and 'the people of a nation' being prostituted by greedy plutocrats?
He can robes his own pierre, as far as I'm concerned!
I think it's quite clear as to why many people are inspired by the events that transpired during the French Revolution. The French Aristocracy and Monarchy were destroyed, this is progressive and because of it feudalism was eventually replaced by capitalism. Limited democratic ideals came out of the revolution as well, more people had say in the government than previously was the case. The revolution also inspired other revolutions in South America against colonial oppression by Spain. It also helped create a new wave of nationalistic feeling and made other groups of people feel even more so bound to each other, especially in the areas Napoleon conquered. The feelings of nationalism eventually helped to cause the collapse of Austria's empire since the different nationalities wanted sovereignty. So even though many leftists see nationalism as counter productive, it can be positive when it helps cause collapse of an empire.
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The French Revolution was important for one reason, it showed revolution was possible.
It also gave rise to humanism which I respect, also religious authority was quashed in favour of a kind of communal supreme being thing which is quite radical historical context wise.
To many people it showed that revolution was possible, but terrible. The American Revolution (which came before the FR) serves as a much finer early example.
It was not a socialist revolution, and it was never claimed to be.
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The American Revolution was a war for independence, it was not a social revolution.
The French Revolution was the first modern revolution; in fact, it was probably the first 'revolution' in history, in the modern sense of the word.
The FR had every monarch in Europe shaking in fear.
"We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. Power is not a means; it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard the revolution; one makes a revolution in order to establish the dictatorship." - George Owell, 1984
"I read all about the scourging and the crowning with thorns, and I could viddy myself helping in and even taking charge of the tolchocking and the nailing in, being dressed in the height of Roman fashion. I didn't so much like the latter part of the book, which is more like all preachy talking than fighting and the old in-out. I liked the parts where these old yahoodies tolchock each other and then drink their Hebrew vino, and getting into the bed with their wives' handmaidens. That kept me going."
The American Revolution was an act slave-owning pseudo-libertarians who were pissed off about paying taxes.
Some good things came out of it though...Like...uh...An officially secular state and sane copyright laws (that became insane by the end of the 1920s, sadly).
If the French "Revolution" is an epitome of modern revolution, I want no part of it.
The French Revolution was a bourgeois revolution, yes, but sections of it were definately Socialists and some were even Communists (non-Marxist though), most notably Babeuf, who has already been mentioned. In addition, the 1793 constitution that was never brought into force is a fairly good constitution in my opinion and could easily be used, with some modifications of course.
In addition the French Revolution siginals the start of modern socialism. Yes, there had been Communists and communist ideas prior to the French Revolution (The Diggers, for instance) but only after the French Revolution can you trace a constant evolution in theory, practice and so on.
As fr Rousseau, he died long before the beginning of the French Revolution, although the Social Contract did become almost the 'handbook' of many French Revolutionaries, particularly the Jacobins. However it was bastardised and many of the key ideas put forward in the Social Contract were ignored.
The Great Terror has to be mentioned. I find it hard not to defend it. Was it extreme? Yes. But revolutions are not peaceful or calm things. I cannot shed tears about the deaths of the French Aristocracy.
"In reality, the difference is, that the savage lives within himself while social man lives outside himself and can only live in the opinion of others, so that he seems to receive the feeling of his own existence only from the judgement of others concerning him."- Jean-Jacques Rousseau
"The emancipation of the working class must be the work of the workers themselves.”- Flora Tristan
"Both those on the East and those on the West should be clear with the fact that we are not moving away from our road that we beat the path for in '48. That is to say, that we have our own ways. We always bravely say what is right on this side and what is not, and what is right on the other side, and what is not. It should be clear to everyone that we cannot be an appendage to anybody's politics, that we have our own point of view and that we know the worth of what is right, and what is not right."- Josip Tito
it wasn't just the aristocracy that was killed.
"delebo inquit hominem"
"You are my creator, but I am your master.''
No, of course not, however most of them were either members of the aristocracy or supporters/sympathisers (Monarchists and the like).
Books that give an overview of the French Revolution generally flip flop on this issue. At the start they generally give a description of the French Monarchy and its working, basically explaining just how decadent, excessive, corrupt and apathetic the regime was and how they, essentially, brough the revolution on themselves due to their own actions. Had they addressed the peoples concerns and not insisted on mainting autocratic rule France could have turned out like modern day England- a constitutional Monarchy. Anyway, then there's the revolution and then yuo get to teh Great Terror and suddenly the monsters of the first couple of chapters are poor, poor, innocent wuzzles who are being persecuted by the EVIL EVIL Robespierre and his brutal, sadistic, goatfucker friends!
"In reality, the difference is, that the savage lives within himself while social man lives outside himself and can only live in the opinion of others, so that he seems to receive the feeling of his own existence only from the judgement of others concerning him."- Jean-Jacques Rousseau
"The emancipation of the working class must be the work of the workers themselves.”- Flora Tristan
"Both those on the East and those on the West should be clear with the fact that we are not moving away from our road that we beat the path for in '48. That is to say, that we have our own ways. We always bravely say what is right on this side and what is not, and what is right on the other side, and what is not. It should be clear to everyone that we cannot be an appendage to anybody's politics, that we have our own point of view and that we know the worth of what is right, and what is not right."- Josip Tito
