Hello Everyone
How can France become the first nation in the world to industrialize?
How can France become the first nation in the world to industrialize?
French Industrialization
- Thread starter Russian Sailor
- Start date
Anything is good with me... French history is not my forte
EDIT: Actually the late 17th century and early 18th century seems good with me
mowque
Banned
Then you have to adjust the French Rev. Somehow. Might be wise to somehow nerf the British too. Avoid Napoleon for sure.
Industrialization is not just an event that occurs on a certain date. So the Pod would be pretty huge and require slot of rewriting of history. Like No wars of religion and tolerance of protestants by Francis I, by the 1800's France would be immensely wealthy, if civil strife is avoided.
Or the alternative is to make Britain much worse off.
Or the alternative is to make Britain much worse off.
I know Industrialization is a process but what I want to know is what will be the neccessary POD to get france to have the social and economic conditions needed to start industrializing.
Skokie
Banned
http://www.erih.net/industrial-history/france.html
France is such a quixotic footnote in industrial history. It reminds me of pre-modern China...the bureaucracy, self-sufficient agriculture, and focus on fine objects (silk, clocks, perfumes).
France is such a quixotic footnote in industrial history. It reminds me of pre-modern China...the bureaucracy, self-sufficient agriculture, and focus on fine objects (silk, clocks, perfumes).
No revocation of the Edict of Nantes could be a good start; it was the fact that the Huguenots were primarily moneyed which made their emigration towards Britain and Prussia among others that would spur on the development of those two.
What type of jobs did Hugenots prefer?
Where they part of the middle class, or where they just in the lower class districts of society.
And are their any other events that would spur French industrialization?
Mostly middle class, whose lack of stabilizing influence was felt come French Revolution.
So without the guiding hand of the middle class the french revolution kind of toppled on itself...
I bet if france had more irrigation and canals they would become more industrialized
The standard date of the outset of the Industrial Revolution is circa 1750 in England. I think we can rule out the Napoleonic PODs! 
Not terribly hard, I think. Just alter the outcomes of a couple 17th and 18th century wars and you're done. James has some luck and a brilliant loyalist general in 1687, so the Glorious Revolution skips the glorious part. Instead you have yet another religious civil war in the British Isles. For simplicity's sake, assume William of Orange eventually wins. Still, the English economy is badly damaged. Combined with measures to suppress and persecute suspected Catholics, emigration to the American colonies drastically accelerates. Somewhere in there a couple laws get passed to make England less perfect for industrialization (though it is still an ideal location). Proto-industrialization starts a third of a century late and progresses less dramatically.
Have the French successfully annex the Spanish Netherlands, possibly after more success in the War of Spanish Succession. It was arguably the second-best location for the revolution to start. The reason it didn't start there in OTL was much the reason it did in England - stability. It was a battleground, fought over by the Dutch, Spanish, Austrians, French, and occasionally others. The only thing most powers agreed on was that it shouldn't be French, because they were the only power in a position to fully exploit and defend it. That's why it went to the Hapsburgs rather than France in OTL. If it does go to France, though, all bets are off. Even the fairly awful French legal system for business, it would be a serious challenger with OTL England.
In a TL where the English aren't so well off.... It just might be the first one to the table.
Not terribly hard, I think. Just alter the outcomes of a couple 17th and 18th century wars and you're done. James has some luck and a brilliant loyalist general in 1687, so the Glorious Revolution skips the glorious part. Instead you have yet another religious civil war in the British Isles. For simplicity's sake, assume William of Orange eventually wins. Still, the English economy is badly damaged. Combined with measures to suppress and persecute suspected Catholics, emigration to the American colonies drastically accelerates. Somewhere in there a couple laws get passed to make England less perfect for industrialization (though it is still an ideal location). Proto-industrialization starts a third of a century late and progresses less dramatically.
Have the French successfully annex the Spanish Netherlands, possibly after more success in the War of Spanish Succession. It was arguably the second-best location for the revolution to start. The reason it didn't start there in OTL was much the reason it did in England - stability. It was a battleground, fought over by the Dutch, Spanish, Austrians, French, and occasionally others. The only thing most powers agreed on was that it shouldn't be French, because they were the only power in a position to fully exploit and defend it. That's why it went to the Hapsburgs rather than France in OTL. If it does go to France, though, all bets are off. Even the fairly awful French legal system for business, it would be a serious challenger with OTL England.
In a TL where the English aren't so well off.... It just might be the first one to the table.
Well were the majority of British leaders of industry at the start of the industrial revolution not middle class? I might be wrong but were the middle class in pre-revolution France not largely ignored (after all it was the middle class who led the revolution) so wouldn't a good POD be some event earlier than 1789 to give the middle classes more influence. For example George Stephenson who can be credited for being one of the most important people in the development of railways, and I live in the same village where he was born just outside of Newcastle and his home is basically a tiny cottage. I just can't see the same social mobility where he could have been able to get to a position where he could influence the width of railways for the majority of the western world and build the worlds first railway in pre-revolution France.
Paul MacQ
Donor
There was some great advances done in France regards steam including.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude-François-Dorothée,_marquis_de_Jouffroy_d'Abbans
Was not as good as John Fulton’s designs, But certainly predated him, And Jouffrey was in no doubt part of the nobility. Pre French Revolution Steam boats anyone?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude-François-Dorothée,_marquis_de_Jouffroy_d'Abbans
Was not as good as John Fulton’s designs, But certainly predated him, And Jouffrey was in no doubt part of the nobility. Pre French Revolution Steam boats anyone?
Short form:
Steam engines? Unreliable, probably underpowered, new fangled, steam engines? Not while I'm Admiral.
Overcoming that would be tough.
Same to a lesser extent in the civilian field. More "this will probably be an expensive failure".
Not impossible to resolve this - just that its not an easy task. And starting off with something failing within fifteen minutes is not promising.
Steam engines? Unreliable, probably underpowered, new fangled, steam engines? Not while I'm Admiral.
Overcoming that would be tough.
Same to a lesser extent in the civilian field. More "this will probably be an expensive failure".
Not impossible to resolve this - just that its not an easy task. And starting off with something failing within fifteen minutes is not promising.
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Money makes influence. The French middle classes were indeed subborned to the aristocracy, but in practice this meant that the successful could buy their own aristocrats to get what they needed done done. For that matter, the extremely successful could potentially buy the titles outright for themselves.
Of course, France was already less disposed to having a middle class for sheer geographic reasons. Classes with money go after increased rights and status, it's just how it works. If you can get France a serious middle class - by incorporating Flanders and Wallonia, for example - then they'll make up a lot of the difference themselves.
Britain had had a perfectly obnoxious nobility of their own, after all. It was the rise of a strong mercantile class that allowed their reduction in importance.