France before 1789

• ›Louis XVI came to the throne in 1774 and found the treasury drained by wars, including help to the American colonies

• ›a subsistence crisis — population growing faster than grain, bread prices rising faster than wages
• ›a middle class of merchants, lawyers and officials, rich but without privilege, read the philosophers:
• ›John Locke, Two Treatises of Government — against the divine right of kings
• ›Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract — government by the consent of the people
• ›Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws — power divided among legislature, executive and judiciary

The trap: the division of powers comes from Montesquieu; the social contract from Rousseau — both are set as matching pairs.

The Revolution, 1789–1815

What changed — censorship was abolished; the Convention abolished slavery in the French colonies in 1794 (Napoleon restored it; it ended for good in 1848); women like Olympe de Gouges demanded equal rights, but French women won the vote only in 1946.

The trap: the Tennis Court Oath (20 June) came before the Bastille (14 July) — the order is set as a sequence question.

Socialism, the Russian Revolution and Nazism

New political ideas — liberals wanted a government of elected representatives but not votes for all; radicals wanted government by the majority, including women; conservatives resisted change. Socialists opposed private property; Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels wrote The Communist Manifesto (1848).

Russia, 1905–1922

Under Stalin, farms were forced into collective farms — kolkhoz — from 1929.

Nazism — Germany, humiliated by the Treaty of Versailles (1919) and ruined by the Great Depression (1929), turned to Hitler, who became Chancellor on 30 January 1933 and took dictatorial powers by the Enabling Act that March; his regime murdered some six million Jews in the Holocaust and began the Second World War (1939–45).

The trap: the Tsar fell in February 1917; the Bolsheviks took power in October — two revolutions in one year.

Nationalism in Europe

• ›the French Revolution spread the idea of the nation — la patrie and le citoyen; Napoleon's Civil Code of 1804 ended privileges based on birth and gave equality before the law
• ›after Napoleon's defeat, the Congress of Vienna (1815), led by the Austrian chancellor Metternich, tried to restore the old monarchies
• ›Giuseppe Mazzini founded Young Italy to work for a united republic; the Greeks won independence, recognised by the Treaty of Constantinople (1832)

Unification

Picturing the nation — nations were drawn as women: Marianne for France, Germania for Germany; the artist Frédéric Sorrieu painted a dream of democratic republics in 1848.

The trap: Bismarck unified Germany; Cavour and Garibaldi Italy; Mazzini inspired Italy but did not live to see a republic.

Points to Remember

• ›Louis XVI 1774 · three estates — third ~97%, paid taille and tithe · subsistence crisis
• ›Locke — against divine right · Rousseau — The Social Contract · Montesquieu — separation of powers
• ›Estates General 5 May 1789 → Tennis Court Oath 20 June → Bastille 14 July → Rights of Man, August
• ›1791 constitutional monarchy, active citizens · Louis XVI executed 21 January 1793 · Terror — Robespierre · Napoleon emperor 1804
• ›Slavery abolished 1794, finally 1848 · Olympe de Gouges · French women vote 1946
• ›Liberals, radicals, conservatives · Marx and Engels, 1848
• ›Russia: Bloody Sunday 1905 · February 1917 — Tsar falls · October 1917 — Lenin, Bolsheviks · USSR 1922 · kolkhoz
• ›Versailles 1919 · Depression 1929 · Hitler Chancellor 30 January 1933 · Enabling Act · Holocaust
• ›Civil Code 1804 · Vienna 1815 — Metternich · Mazzini — Young Italy · Greece 1832
• ›Italy 1861 — Cavour, Garibaldi · Germany 1871 — Bismarck · Marianne, Germania
• ›Exam tip: in a sequence question, fix the anchor dates — 14 July 1789, October 1917, 30 January 1933 — and place the rest around them