what is the cause of french revolution?

On the eve of the French Revolution, that is in 1789 A.D. France presented a dismal look. Following were the conditions on the eve of the French Revolution. In other words we can say that following were the chief causes of the French Revolution:
(a) Social Causes - On the eve of the revolution, the French society was ridden with several inequalities. The clergy and the nobles led a life of luxury and enjoyed numerous privileges. On the other hand, the peasants and workers lived a wretched life. They groaned under heavy taxes and forced labour. The middle-class comprising of lawyers, doctors, teachers, etc also suffered humiliation at the hands of the clergy and the nobles. This state of social inequality was the chief cause of the French Revolution.
(b) Political Causes - Emperor Louis XVI of France was an empty headed despot. He and his queen, Marie Antoinette, squandered money on their luxurious living and wasteful festivities. The high posts were often auctioned, so inefficiency reigned supreme. The whole administration was corrupt and each department had its own laws. In the absence of any uniform system there was confusion all around. The people were tired of such a rotten system of administration and wanted a change.
(c) Economic Causes - France had been continually involved in wars which had broken her economy. The luxurious life led by the French King Louis XVI and his queen had made the matter still worse. The people groaned under heavy taxes. The system was so faulty that only a fraction of the taxes could be realized as the people were too poor to pay the taxes while nobles and the clergy who could pay, were completely exempted from all the taxes. The economy became so bad that the French Government had almost reached a state of bankruptcy. Thus the shattered economy of France proved a major cause of the Revolution.   
(d) Immediate Cause - Forced by financial bankruptcy, Emperor Louis XVI was compelled to call a meeting of the Estates General in 1789 A.D. after a lapse of 175 years. It generated much excitement as the members of the Third Estate were determined to put forth their problems. But when the first two Estates i.e. the Clergy and the Nobility refused to have a common meeting with the Third Estate, the people lost their temper. They had already suffered much in the severe famine in 1788 - 1789. In this way the calling of the Estates General in 1789 A.D. proved to be the immediate cause of the French Revolution.  

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 The causes of the French Revolution are the significant factors that led to the French Revolution in 1789.

Although France in 1785 faced economic difficulties, mostly concerning the equitability of taxation, it was one of the richest and most powerful nations of Europe. The French people also enjoyed more political freedom and a lower incidence of arbitrary punishment than any of their fellow Europeans. However, Louis XVI, his ministers, and the widespread French nobility had become immensely unpopular. This was a consequence of the fact that peasants and, to a lesser extent, the poor and those aspiring to be bourgeoisie, were burdened with ruinously high taxes levied to support a wealthy monarchy, along with aristocrats and their sumptuous, often gluttonous lifestyles.

The fall of the ancien régime in France may be blamed, in part, on its own rigidity. Aristocrats were confronted by the rising ambitions of the merchants, tradesmen and prosperous farmers, who were allied with aggrieved peasants, wage-earners and intellectuals influenced by the ideas of Enlightenmentphilosophers. As the revolution proceeded, power devolved from the monarchy and the privileged-by-birth to more-representative political bodies, like legislative assemblies, but conflicts among the formerly allied republican groups became the source of considerable discord and bloodshed.

A growing number of the French citizenry had absorbed the ideas of "equality" and "freedom of the individual" as presented by VoltaireDenis Diderot,Turgot, and other philosophers and social theorists of the Enlightenment. The American Revolution demonstrated that it was plausible for Enlightenment ideas - about how a government should be organized - to actually be put into practice. Some American diplomats, like Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson, had lived in Paris where they consorted freely with members of the French intellectual class. Furthermore, contact between American revolutionaries and the French troops who served as anti-British mercenaries in North America helped spread revolutionary ideals to the French people. After a time, many of the French began to attack the undemocratic nature of their own government, push for freedom of speech, challenge the Roman Catholic Church, and decry the prerogatives of the nobles.

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 The causes of french revolution was King Louis XVI's poor conrol over his country. King Louis found an empty treasury and France had many debts. The Third estate ( the only estate that payed taxes and the poorest estate in french society) had to pay higher taxes . They had no food to eat and bread became scarce. During these problems in Paris ,the King and Queen were leading an extravegant life in the place of Versailles , miles away from Paris.This made the people of france angry which led to the french revaolution.

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Hi..

(1) The French government under Emperor Louise XVI was under huge debt in the 18 th century.

(2) The government imposed heavy taxes on the French citizens to meet its expenditure caused by prolonged warfare.

(3) The King, the nobility and the clergy lived a lavish life whereas the common people of France lived in misery and were burdened with heavy taxation.

The economic causes of the French Revolution were as follows:

(1) The feudal system gave the big landlords the power to enjoy various privileges and exploit the poor peasants by extracting taxes and tributes from them.

(2) The clergy also collected separate taxes called Tithes from the people.

(3) The prices of essential commodities were very high due to increased demand and wages were low. This made survival difficult for the poor sections of the society.

 

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  Under Louis XVI, France helped America in gaining their independence from Britain.

 France was experiencing financial instability due to the long years of wars fought by her and the cost of maintaining an extravagant court at the palace of Versailles.
 Taxes were increased for meeting the expenses of maintaining an army, the court and running government offices or universities.
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