Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of maps
- List of tables
- Acknowledgements
- List of abbreviations used in notes
- Map 1 The departments of France and their capitals in 1814
- Map 2 The Haute-Garonne
- Map 3 The Isère
- Map 4 The Bas-Rhin
- Map 5 The Seine-Inférieure
- Introduction: Open questions
- 1 False starts and uncertain beginnings: from the First Restoration (May 1814) to the elections of September 1816
- 2 Battle commences: from September 1816 to July 1820
- 3 Self-defeating opposition: from July 1820 to February 1824
- 4 Back on track: from March 1824 to January 1828
- 5 Towards victory?: from January 1828 to July 1830
- 6 Aftermath: Liberal Opposition and the July Revolution
- Conclusion: Revolutionary tradition
- Bibliography
- Index
- NEW STUDIES IN EUROPEAN HISTORY
6 - Aftermath: Liberal Opposition and the July Revolution
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of maps
- List of tables
- Acknowledgements
- List of abbreviations used in notes
- Map 1 The departments of France and their capitals in 1814
- Map 2 The Haute-Garonne
- Map 3 The Isère
- Map 4 The Bas-Rhin
- Map 5 The Seine-Inférieure
- Introduction: Open questions
- 1 False starts and uncertain beginnings: from the First Restoration (May 1814) to the elections of September 1816
- 2 Battle commences: from September 1816 to July 1820
- 3 Self-defeating opposition: from July 1820 to February 1824
- 4 Back on track: from March 1824 to January 1828
- 5 Towards victory?: from January 1828 to July 1830
- 6 Aftermath: Liberal Opposition and the July Revolution
- Conclusion: Revolutionary tradition
- Bibliography
- Index
- NEW STUDIES IN EUROPEAN HISTORY
Summary
The July Revolution has been given less attention than those of 1789 and 1848, partly because it did not yield striking democratic progress, and partly because it did not bring a major transformation in the social system. The Revolution was, however, effective in establishing its limited objectives. Until recently, it has been treated largely as a Parisian rather than French affair, but such an interpretation has ignored the point that Parisian revolt required provincial approval to become revolution.
Two crucial elements allowed the July Revolution to proceed. The first consisted of public opinion generally, and in this regard the Liberal Opposition played a vital role by providing an elite leadership that possessed mass support. A second factor lay in the army's response to revolt. One can perhaps argue that the army had become so professional that it was incapable of acting in partisan fashion in a civil conflict, but such ‘neutrality’ was in fact tantamount to sealing the fate of the regime. Save for the King's Guard, by 2 August forces concentrated near Saint-Cloud had been reduced by desertion to roughly 1,350 men, and virtually all garrisons in a fifty-mile radius had declared for the Revolution, rendering royalist plans to continue the fight south of the Loire unfeasible.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Re-Writing the French Revolutionary TraditionLiberal Opposition and the Fall of the Bourbon Monarchy, pp. 286 - 332Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2003