Study Guide

Bentley, chapter 28

“Revolutions and National Statesin the Atlantic World”

Part 1

Film: The Western Tradition: 36. The Modern Philosophers - Freedom of thought and expression opened new vistas explored by French, English, and American thinkers.

  1. The Renaissance and the Scientific Revolution: Renaissance emphasized literary and artistic classicism; based on humanism, greater secularism in Italy; Northern Renaissance more oriented toward Christianity; Scientific Revolution based on development of natural laws; greater belief in human perfectibility; science broke with classical perceptions; destruction of Aristotelian and Ptolemaic astronomy. Intellectual “revolutionaries" such as Galileo, Copernicus, Newton, and Liebniz had dramatically changed the Medieval view of the church as the center of life.
  1. The Enlightenment: Secular thought; Rationalism; natural laws govern human behavior and the universe; faith in progress; impressed with scientific experimentation; Deist religion. The Enlightenment emerged out of the Scientific Revolution. Enlightenment thinkers began to use reason and rational inquiry to examine the nature of society and therefore began to question the efficacy of the leadership of the nobility, monarchy, and the church. The Enlightenment's focus on creating a better world for humankind was led by radical ideas that challenged the traditional autocratic and absolutist power of the state, the monarchy, and aristocratic society. Descartes, Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau examined the relationship of people to the government. From these men came the notions of natural rights, government as an instrument of the people's will, and the right to rebellion.
  1. The Encyclopedia:
  1. Deism: “God as cosmic watchmaker” -- A generalized belief in a creator who superintends human events only generally and according to natural law. A popular eighteenth-century philosophy that described God as a kind of supreme watchmaker who created the world but never again intervened directly in nature or in the lives of human beings. Deists said that God set the world ticking like a well-oiled clock. Anti-clericalism
  1. Thomas Hobbes and John Locke: Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679), an enthusiast for the new science, Hobbes advocated a commonwealth that was tightly ruled by law and order and free from the dangers of anarchy (Leviathan, 1651). A less original, but more influential political thinker was John Locke (1632–1704). Locke opposed Hobbes and denied the argument that rulers were absolute in their power; man’s natural state was one of perfect freedom and equality. If a ruler failed in his responsibilities toward his subjects, he violated the social contract and could be replaced. Locke’s philosophy came to be embodied in the Glorious Revolution of 1688–1689.
  1. Jean Rousseau: Rousseau was most concerned with issues of social equality; he stressed that people were neither free nor equal in modern societies, but he believed they should be both. His most famous political work, The Social Contract (1762), described the traits of an egalitarian society and began with a famous opening line: “Man is born free, but everywhere he is in chains.” Rousseau’s argument stressed the idea of a link between liberty and equality; to be truly free, people must be equal—as in nature. Rousseau’s conception of equality suggested that nations are founded on the dignity of the common people rather than on hierarchies (though he said that only men should have a political role).
  1. Jeremy Bentham: The greatest happiness of the greatest number. Utilitarianism, rooted in pragmatism and materialism.
  1. CesareBeccaria: CesareBeccaria wanted to end the use of torture and capital punishment and provide for the rehabilitation of prisoners. The widespread belief in education and social reform encouraged the optimism of the age. Less terrible punishment, more humanism, less barbarism -- rationalism
  1. Benjamin Franklin: The embodiment of Enlightenment materialism and pragmatism. Devotion to rationalism and the scientific method. The “quintessential utilitarian” – Poor Richard’s Almanac
  1. Adam Smith:
  1. Capitalism, the bourgeoisie and literacy: The early Industrial Revolution led to the strengthening of the bourgeoisie as a self conscious social class. The European and colonial bourgeoisie (and plantocracy) were literate and hungry for new ideas that would justify both their individualism and prosperity. Enlightenment principles fit this yearning for self justification perfectly. The high literacy rate of the West allowed Enlightenment ideas to spread, and they became particularly familiar to the middle class through newspapers and essays by various thinkers. The popular protest of the eighteenth century was inspired in large part by these new ideas and the growing discontent of the population.
  1. Popular Sovereignty: The notion that legitimate political authority resides not in kings but, rather, in the people who make up a society.
  1. Revolution: These ideas were first transformed into a political revolution when the United States challenged the autocracy of Britain. This example of a successful revolution and the establishment of a new republic with a democratic government served as a model for France thirteen years when revolutionaries tried to effect changes to the absolutist reign of Louis XVI. Instead, however, this revolution led to the Terror.
  1. Republicanism: Republicanism represented a revolutionary ideology in the eighteenth century because it placed responsibility for political order not with a king or centralized authority but with the people, counting on them to act for the good of the whole. Revolutionary Americans such as John Adams called the British monarchy corrupt, degenerate, and brutish
  1. The American Revolution: The Revolution politicized the American people as never before. They infused their national interest with divine intent and believed themselves responsible for the fate of human liberty. The expanded activities of the new state governments evoked widespread political interest and participation. Death, property destruction, and economic disruption counted among the costs of the war. The revolution weakened the Native American peoples such as the Iroquois and Cherokee. While the revolution brought liberty to white males, African American slavery remained in place in the South and women still were not citizens
  1. The French Revolution: By the time of the Revolution, nearly a third of the Parisian work force was unemployed. Thus the rebellion of the French nobility--their greed and unwillingness to submit to higher taxes--was most immediately responsible for the Revolution, and the Third Estate (led by the bourgeoisie) joined in because it was already overburdened with taxes and in the midst of an economic depression.
  1. The Terror: In the wake of the French Revolution, and during a period of external invasion and internal rebellion/counter revolution, France under Maximilian Robespierre hosted a period of censorship and imposed orthodoxies backed up with torture, arbitrary imprisonment, and unbridled official violence.
  1. Napoleon Bonaparte: Napoleon was popular with the people of France for his defense of the republic and his extension of the war into Europe against those who sought to restore the monarchy (notably Austria and Prussia). He was also quite popular with the people for his role in stopping the abuse of power among the Directory, as well as for his military expeditions to the East. This gave him a platform on which to place himself as emperor in 1804, and he continued to maintain popular support through his implementation of public works programs and his overhaul of the legal system to promote equality under the law and protection of property rights. He appealed to the conservative orders because he supported the church and reestablished order in a chaotic world. In short, by appealing to all classes in a society turned upside down by revolution and lack of political cohesion, he was able to assume power as a dictator. His plans to extend the empire of France across Europe, however, gained him enemies throughout Europe, and a number of alliances against him were formed to try to rein him in, most notably by England, Russia, Prussia and Austria. Because these countries had experience in forming coalitions against Napoleon after his defeat at Waterloo, they found it was in their best interest to form a cooperative organization to restore monarchical and conservative political order to Europe.
  1. Napoleon and the Spread of Revolutionary Principles: In what ways did the Napoleonic period, despite the creation of an authoritarian regime, result in the extension of revolution to the rest of Europe? Spread concepts of revolution outside boundaries of France, liberal constitutionalism, equality under the law, parliamentary restrictions on absolutism; destruction of aristocratic privilege created demands for greater political voice among middle and working classes; encouraged popular nationalism on liberal lines; led to revolutions in 1820 in Greece and Spain, in 1830 in Belgium, France, and central Europe.
  1. The case of San Dominque: This is the only successful slave revolution in history. The foundation for the Haitian Revolution lay in the racism and brutality of slavery and the plantation system. The number of African-born slaves, as opposed to those born in Haiti, was a significant factor as well. The event that triggered the revolution was the revolutionary turmoil in France. Wealthy planters, poor whites, and the “free people of color” sent representatives to Paris to argue their points of view in the new legislative bodies. As the struggle for control between those groups within Haiti intensified, violence broke out. Violence first divided the “free people of color” and whites, and then a separate slave rebellion broke out in the north. Slaves gained strength when the radical National Convention in France outlawed slavery in 1793. The efforts of the plantocracy to continue slavery ensured that the general melee would turn into a struggle of slaves for their freedom.
  1. Toussaint L’Ouverture: “The slave who defeated Napoleon”: The greatest figure to emerge out of the revolution was Toussaint L’Ouverture. Touissaint began the revolt that led to Haitian independence. The grandson of an African, Toussaint was born on the island in 1743. Educated on the plantation, he spoke French (although poorly), an African language, and the local dialect of French known as Creole.
  1. What were the permanent reforms of the American and French revolutions? Both cases related to triumph of liberal constitutionalism, Enlightenment political philosophy; creation of parliamentary institutions, assaults on aristocratic and ecclesiastical privilege; broader voting rights for middle classes; abolition of serfdom in France; establishment of equality under the law.
  1. How did the Enlightenment effect changes in popular outlook? Belief in human perfectibility, application of scientific discoveries to improvement of human condition; reason was key to truth, while religion was afflicted with superstition; changes in upbringing of children, reduction of physical discipline, more education, greater bonds of familial affection; changes in economy reflected in mass consumerism; greater technology applied to agriculture, nitrogen-fixing crops, land drainage, improved stock-breeding, new tools such as seed drill, introduction of potato as major food crop; growth of reading clubs, coffeehouses, and popular entertainment.