"Every revolutionary party, every oppressed
people, every oppressed working class can claim Jaurès, his memory, his
example, and his person, for our own" - Leon Trotsky
For each new class which puts itself in the place of
one ruling before it, is compelled, merely in order to carry through its aim,
to represent its interest as the common interest of all the members of society,
that is, expressed in ideal form: it has to give its ideas the form of
universality, and represent them as the only rational, universally valid ones. Marx, German Ideology (1845)
Published just a few years before his death, A
Socialist History of the French Revolution is one of the most important books written on the French Revolution.
Despite the passage of time, interest in the French
revolution has not diminished. Aside from the abridged translation of Jean
Jaures's multi-volume Socialist History of the French Revolution, the last
decade has seen a significant output from writers like Éric Hazan's People's
History of the French Revolution (published in French in 2012) and several
other high profile books.
The French Revolution was an event of world-historical
importance. It would not be an overstatement to say that it changed not only
European history but world history. The revolution also changed the way future
generations saw revolutions. Like the English revolution, the French revolution
is till being fought over by historians. This new abridged version of the writings of Jean
Jaures painstakingly put together by translator Mitchell Abidor is a welcome
addition to an already crowded market. Jaures's original work filled several
volumes.
Biography
Jaurès was born in Castres in Midi-Pyrénées in 1859.
He became a leading international socialist who was later assassinated for
opposing the first world war. He was also the celebrated leader of the French
Socialist Party leader. His history of the revolution was published in 1914. His work has stayed fresh and has endured the rigors
of time. It is one of the most important and influential accounts of the French
Revolution. Mitchell Abidor's much-anticipated translation brings Jaures's work
to an English audience for the first time. Jaures application of the historical
materialism method will help students, academics, and the public to a greater
understanding of this complex event.
Jean
Jaures
Jaures account of the revolution is not without
controversy. Throughout his work on the revolution, he defended Robespierre's
reputation. Jaures believed that Robespierre acted out of necessity and in the
words of one writer "to save the new republic from its enemies.
Robespierre, like Jaurès after him, was anti-militarist and argued passionately
against war with Europe in 1792. Jaures use of narrative history makes his work very
readable without lowering political or academic standards. Despite Jaures
concern to portray ordinary people in his work, this is not a "history
from below".
Despite the working class appearing on the scene,
Jaures was careful enough not to portray this revolution as a proletarian
revolution while the working class may have stormed the Bastille this was
firmly a revolution in the control of the developing bourgeoisie.
As Jaures states "The revolution's origins were
so profoundly bourgeois that a few weeks after July 14, when the National
Assembly, freed by the people from the court's attacks, set up the electoral
regime and excluded millions of the working poor from the vote... not even the
most democratic of them remembered that at the Bastille the workers of Paris
had conquered the title of active citizens for the poor of France.[1]
Jaurès continues "that the proletarians were
neither bold enough, conscious enough, nor organized enough to substitute their
revolution for the revolution, they marched light-heartedly against the
chateaux and turned against the ancien régime the weapons they'd seized... We
can see that there was a kind of conservative movement of contraction, or
tightening, which was followed by a revolutionary expansion. Under the fear of
the unknown and before the uprising of the have-nots, the communities of the
villages withdrew into themselves, elected men of whom they were sure,
established a militia, and, having thus guaranteed the order of property within
the revolution, attacked the feudal system". The contradiction between the
entry of the working class onto the stage of history and the bourgeois nature
of the revolution is at the heart of Jaures work on the revolution.
Henry Heller, in his introduction, is correct to
point out that Jaures saw the French revolution as the first struggle of
socialists to overthrow capitalism. Given the abridged nature of the book,
Heller's introduction takes a more important role than is normal for an
introduction. As Jaurès writes "Perhaps one generation alone
could not bring down the ancien régime, create new laws and rights, raise an
enlightened and proud people from the depths of ignorance, poverty, and misery,
fight against an international league of tyrants and slaves, and put all
passions and forces to use in this combat while at the same time ensuring the
evolution of the fevered, exhausted country towards normal order and
well-ordered freedom".
The
Bourgeois Revolution
Jaures was an astute enough writer to know the French
revolution was not a chemically pure revolution. The bourgeoisie was not a
homogenous class and was made up of factions who were still integrated into the
social and economic structures of the ancient regime. Other sections of the middle class who were unable to
profit under the old regime established new forms of production undertook a
revolution to profit from it. As Jean Jaures said, the finance bourgeoisie
represented a hybrid social force at the crossroads of the ancient regime.
The reaction to the revolution of the European
bourgeoisie was one of fear and horror. Best summed up by Edmund Burke "France
has always more or less influenced manners in England; and when your fountain
is choked up and polluted, the stream will not run long, or not run clear, with
us, or perhaps with any nation. This gives all Europe, in my opinion, but too
close and connected a concern in what is done in France. Excuse me, therefore,
if I have dwelt too long on the atrocious spectacle of October 6, 1789, or have
given too much scope to the reflections which have arisen in my mind on the occasion
of the most important of all revolutions, which may be dated from that day, I
mean a revolution in sentiments, manners, and moral opinions".[2]
The French revolution was the catalyst for national
revolutions to follow. The 18th century was a century of crises for various
European regimes. The French revolution was not the only one to take place,
i.e. the French heavily influenced the American Revolution. Therefore, it is
not surprising that this time was called "The age of democratic
revolutions". Having said this, the bourgeoisie in France and
Europe was not opposed to scupper democratic norms when they got in the way of
making money.
As the Marxist writer, Ann Talbot shows us "The
imperatives of private property and profit were not about to stand still, and
the Jacobins had no alternative form of social organization to offer.
Robespierre did not need to imagine conspiracies. They arose in plenty. Just
across the Channel, the emerging capitalist power of Britain could afford to
finance the armies of the surviving ancien regimes and uprisings such as that
in the province of La Vendée. The domestic opposition was produced by the war
profiteers and grain merchants, who exploited the continuing shortages of grain".[3]
Jaures was clear that this most dramatic revolution
was certainly the most politically significant within Europe. While there are
some parallels with the English revolution, this was unlike any other previous
revolution. In Britain and America, Tom Paine was an extremist in
France he was a moderate. As Talbot writes "Paine's life story reflects
the experience of a new social type: self-educated men from poor backgrounds
who were making their way in industry, science and, in Paine's case, politics.
He was the most brilliant example of this new phenomenon".The country of
which he had become a citizen was menaced from within by aristocratic
conspiracies and from without by aggressive neighbours, as intent on furthering
their own interests as restoring the ancient regime. France was isolated; its
economy and currency were collapsing. These facts coloured the history of the
revolution. The French revolutionaries were increasingly forced to create an
emergency wartime regime and take drastic measures. The Great Terror grew out
of the Great Fear".[4]
Reasons
for revolution
Like many things regarding the French revolution, the
reason for its outbreak has little or no agreement amongst historians.The
crisis began in 1787 the trigger being the king's attempt to stop state
bankruptcy. Coupled with this was the fact that France had been involved in a
significant number of wars on an international scale. Deregulation of agriculture began to hit the poor the
most. Hostility against the excess of the clergy and the nobility who had
creamed off most of the money. The advent of the humanist and scientific
development produced the ground for the philosophers to challenge the monarchy.
Many thinkers came from the bourgeoisie who sought to undermine the
aristocracy.
The position of the peasantry had been growing worse
for over 20 years. France had run up huge debts during the war in America. The revolution
was started by the assembly of notables demanded an extension of their
privileges. The revolution was not led by a formal political party with a
systematic program. The revolution did have a striking consensus amongst its
leader's. At its heart was a new capitalist class, who had enlightened thinkers
who were confident of their ideas. Although the revolution would have happened
without them. They made sure that when the regime broke down, something could
replace it.
Their demands were laid down in the declaration of
the rights of man, men are born equal, but some are more equal to than others l.
Their regime would, however, constitute the will of the people and to represent
the French nation. A national assembly was constituted to enshrine the power of
this new class. Absolutism was at an end, Mirabeau was to declare to the king "sire,
you are a stranger in this assembly, you have not the right to speak here"
[5].
The new assembly had a broad base and represented the
labouring masses and peasantry. A Bad harvest had turned things nasty, and open
revolt occurred. The king refused to accept the status quo' the next stage of
the revolution saw the storming of the Bastille. July 14. What began as peasant
uprising sparked a wider movement? Feudalism was abolished in1793; the middle
class finally consolidated its regime.
The middle class had to deal with both the
conservative right and left-wing who were determined to pursue their agenda?
This brought two groups to the fore, the Jacobeans and the Sansculottes both
represented the small middle class. Small farmer's artisans who were being
squeezed by the new larger middle class. The sharp changes brought about in
France stirred fervent actions outside its borders, as monarchies grew fearful
that it could be repeated elsewhere. The purpose of the revolution was to usher
in a new class.
The bourgeoisie, however, unstable this was to be the
subsequent revolutions were an attempt by the various contending factions to
gain power at this the working class did not constitute an independent class
yet sided and was led by one section of the middle class. In much respect, the
history of this revolution determined the history of Europe.
Historiography– Classical and revisionists
It is not within the realm of this review to discuss
every single revisionist historical trend of the revolution. There is a similar
theme amongst all of them in that the French revolution was not a bourgeois
revolution.
Eric Hazan, the author of numerous books of the
revolutions in France, claims that Marxist historians have exaggerated the
presence of the bourgeoisie in France "In their struggle against the
bourgeoisie, the revolutionary peasants and sans-culottes were working against
the grain of history as they opposed the establishment of capitalism."
Hazan continues "that the words "bourgeois"
and "bourgeoisie" were rare in late-18th-century France: "I have
found 'the rich', 'hoarders', 'aristocrats', 'plotters', 'monopolists', 'rogues',
'rentiers', but scarcely a single 'bourgeois'." He concludes that the
question "Was the revolution bourgeois or not?" does not mean
anything.[6]
Amongst the more classically minded historians was
Alfred Cobban (May 24 1901-1 April 1968)who opposed a historical materialist
understanding of the French revolution. Cobban wrote an article entitled The Myth of
the French revolution whose basic premise was to deny the anti-feudal and
bourgeoisie nature of revolution.
Albert Soboul sought to defend a materialist method
of understanding the cause of the French revolution. He believed that even
within the liberal school of historians, the revolution was a social act that
paved the way for the bourgeoisie to come to power. That the revolution had
been prepared ideologically had prepared its ideas, which undermined the existing
feudal regime.
Conclusion
To conclude as Lefebvre "Without scholarship there is no
history".[7]
It is clear the revolution itself was the result of complex changes in inside
France and Europe. Each generation of historians has added immense
understanding to this event. It also must be stated that the attack on a
historical materialist understanding of the revolution has done great damage.
Despite this, there will be a thirst in the coming period for a materialist
understanding of past revolutionary events.
In this context, the work by translator Mitchell
Abidor should be a tremendous service to increasing one's knowledge of the
complex historical event. While the problem with any abridgement is that it
must choose what to leave out, it will hopefully push readers into reading far
more on the subject than they had intended which mean that some readers might
want to read further on the revolution.
I leave the final word with Jaurès "We will not
mock the men of the revolution who read Plutarch's Lives. It's certain that the
great burst of inner energy Plutarch inspired in them did little to change the
march of events, but at least the men of the revolution remained upright in the
storm." To judge them as if they should have brought the drama to a close
as if history was not going to continue after them, is both childish and
unjust. Their work was necessarily limited, but it was great."
[1]
Jean Jaurès, History of the French Revolution.
1901-https://www.marxists.org/archive/jaures/1901/history/july-14.htm
[2]
Reflections on the Revolution in France-Burke
[3]
Present historic: Carlyle, Robespierre and the French Revolution
Part one-By Ann Talbot-15 July 2010-https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2010/07/fren-j15.html
[4]
Citizen of the world: a brief survey of the life and times of Thomas Paine
(1737-1809)
By Ann Talbot-8 June 2009
[5]
Age of Revolution: 1789-1848- By Eric Hobsbawm
[6]
France's left will never accept the revolution is over-Ruth Scurr-http://www.newstatesman.com/culture/books/2015/08/frances-left-will-never-accept-revolution-over
[7]
Quoted in https://thecharnelhouse.org/tag/albert-soboul/
