Sam Triantafillopoulos | ID 832691 | Word Count: 548

“Is pre-revolutionary France best described as a society of ‘estates’ or as a society of

economic ‘classes’ or in some other way?”

Despite the primacy of class as an economic divisor, it was nobility which was the defining

quality of pre-revolutionary France, and would in turn be the primary target of a

fundamentally bourgeois movement.

The desire for upheaval among the third estate began with the inherent failures of feudalism,

and the reassessment of the first and second estates’ duties. The concessions made to the

nobility rested on the premise of their responsibility of defence, yet it became evident the

nobility was no longer equipped to assume the mantle of war, with even members of the

clergy questioning the unassailable privileges maintained at the expense of the vast majority

of the those without noble birth1. In this regard it may be argued that France was not a society

of estates, given one of its components could be considered a complete nation in its own

right.

Despite being the foremost distinctions of the period, the estates were of little relevance to

those of the lowest among the third estate and their dissolution would ultimately serve to

amplify the divisions on the basis of class, displacing the inequalities dependent on noble

status. Even before the revolution, it was plausible to imagine the wealth and income of well-

heeled members of the third estate outstripping that of lesser nobles, for whom their only

capital was their blood.

While the majority of the privileges granted to the nobility were remnants of the noblesse

oblige, hunting rights2 were perhaps the only among them which could have a material

impact on the standard of living of lower classes of the third estate, however it remains

1
Philip G. Dwyer and Peter McPhee, The French Revolution and Napoleon: A Sourcebook (Routledge, 2002),4-
5.
2
Laura Mason and Tracey Rizzo, The French Revolution: A Document Collection (Boston: Houghton Mifflin,
1999), 20.
Sam Triantafillopoulos | ID 832691 | Word Count: 548

unclear the extent to which these entitlements were exercised. On a practical basis class

would have been the foremost determinant of a French citizen’s standard of living, yet class-

based revolution was not yet sought, rather the pressing issue of pre-1789 France remained

the sclerotic nature of its legal and tax codes.

Ultimately it was the distinction of nobility, being the most threatening to France’s solvency,

which would prove the most pivotal and urgent among Ancien Regime’s shortcomings. The

crisis had two implications: firstly, that noble exemptions from various taxes, notably the

taille, was an aggravator of the government’s credit position; and secondly, that there was

crisis of trust in a bureaucratic government which deferred to the whims of the second estate.

As such the revolution of 1789 proved to be in service of the interests of the bourgeoisie; the

quarrel of this “new political class”3 was not inequality, but rather the restraints placed on

their upward mobility.

Despite growing scepticism of the efficacy of the nobility, debt subscriptions doubled as a

result of Necker’s appointment4, signalling the market’s faith in the Estates General and the

French crown as a reliable debtor. It is noteworthy then that this optimism cannot be

attributed to the abolition of feudalism, which occurred later, suggesting “the lords of the

nineteenth century”5 had in some regards usurped the nobility, conveniently benefitting from

their newfound access with the abolition of feudalism thereafter.

In spite of this, inequality among the former third estate would not be addressed until much

later; the interests of the poorest in France were not accounted for; as such class disparity was

not a uniquely pre-revolutionary quality in the same way the estates were.

3
Simon Schama, Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution (London: Penguin, 2004), 290.
4
Schama, Citizens, 280.
5
Schama, Citizens, 290.
Sam Triantafillopoulos | ID 832691 | Word Count: 548

Sources
Dwyer, Philip G., and McPhee, Peter. The French Revolution and Napoleon: A Sourcebook.
Routledge, 2002. https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?
direct=true&AuthType=sso&db=cat00006a&AN=melb.b3225476&site=eds-
live&scope=site.
Mason, Laura and Rizzo, Tracey. The French Revolution: A Document Collection. 1999.
Houghton Mifflin.
Schama, Simon. 2004. Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution. Penguin.
https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?
direct=true&AuthType=sso&db=cat00006a&AN=melb.b2968330&site=eds-
live&scope=site.