Latest date to avoid the French Revolution/Revolutionary Era?

What would it take for it to be totally avoided and put Europe instead on a path towards gradual, incremental reform like that in Britain? This has to butterfly away Napoleonic Wars and 1848 Revolutions as well.
 

RousseauX

Donor
What would it take for it to be totally avoided and put Europe instead on a path towards gradual, incremental reform like that in Britain? This has to butterfly away Napoleonic Wars and 1848 Revolutions as well.
Louis XVI makes a slightly better set of decisions in 1789-91

The support for gradual movement towards a constitutional monarchy was there, Louis XVI just made a bunch of decisions that made enough concessions on his power to render himself helpless, while not enough to satisfy the radicals.
 
Louis XVI makes a slightly better set of decisions in 1789-91

The support for gradual movement towards a constitutional monarchy was there, Louis XVI just made a bunch of decisions that made enough concessions on his power to render himself helpless, while not enough to satisfy the radicals.

But that just makes it seem like the revolutions were an accident of history? What about the underlying issues and ideology that fuelled them? How to ensure that the French Revolution being forestalled here doesn't happen again at a later date or in the Germanies eventually?
 

RousseauX

Donor
But that just makes it seem like the revolutions were an accident of history? What about the underlying issues and ideology that fuelled them? How to ensure that the French Revolution being forestalled here doesn't happen again at a later date or in the Germanies eventually?
There would still have being a french revolution, just a different outcome than otl. You would have had the French revolution of 1789-90 rather than 1793. It ends with a constitutional monarchy rather than Napoleon.

If Louis had never called for the estate-general and just ate up the impending bankruptcy (as Spain did numerous times in the 16th-17th century), there wouldn't even have being the "liberal noble" revolution.

At the time most of the men who started the revolution didn't have in mind a democratic republic or the terror, they wanted what amounted to an idealistic version of Frederick the Great: an "enlightened despot" who base promoting officials on merits rather than birth and respects the ideals of the enlightenment

And yeah, revolutions are never inevitable (see Britain), the idea that they are is a form of crude marxist determinism
 
Last edited:
There would still have being a french revolution, just a different outcome than otl. You would have had the French revolution of 1789-90 rather than 1793. It ends with a constitutional monarchy rather than Napoleon.

If Louis had never called for the estate-general and just ate up the impending bankruptcy (as Spain did numerous times in the 16th-17th century), there wouldn't even have being the "liberal noble" revolution.

At the time most of the men who started the revolution didn't have in mind a democratic republic or the terror, they wanted what amounted to an idealistic version of Frederick the Great: an "enlightened despot" who base promoting officials on merits rather than birth and respects the ideals of the enlightenment

And yeah, revolutions are never inevitable (see Britain), the idea that they are is a form of crude marxist determinism

I mean a violent revolution that caused massive social upheaval and wars. How to avoid that in particular. Even if Louis 16 accepts the constitutional monarchy, his son might not and he might try to rule with the support of the nobility. Then you have the same thing perhaps uglier, playing out again. And what about the rest of Europe? How to reform the German states? Without Napoleon, things could be a powder keg there waiting to explode, so how to ensure that nobles all rule like Frederick the Great? Plus there's the factor of German nationalism to consider as well.
 
If there is no French Revolution of 1789 (or 1830, 1848) there may be no gradual British reform either. Fear of revolution was a motivating factor for a lot of reformers in that century.
 
If there is no French Revolution of 1789 (or 1830, 1848) there may be no gradual British reform either. Fear of revolution was a motivating factor for a lot of reformers in that century.

That's true but any other solution? One could also say that fear or revolution made Britain more reactionary than it needed to be otherwise, among their elites. Say the French Revolution is forestalled with French constitutional monarchy. And then France gradually reforms, such reforms encourage and spur the British through their parliament to compete with France. Is this plausible? I can't see the British monarchs caring too much anyways. The question is the German states though. If they continue to be trampled by European wars with no reforms and with looming German nationalism, they will revolt eventually.
 

RousseauX

Donor
I mean a violent revolution that caused massive social upheaval and wars. How to avoid that in particular. Even if Louis 16 accepts the constitutional monarchy, his son might not and he might try to rule with the support of the nobility.
Constitutional monarchy meant -precisely- that you rule with the support of the nobility, eventually whenever ttl's version of 1848 roles around, voting rights and other legal rights could have being expanded to include a rising bourgeois as well

Then you have the same thing perhaps uglier, playing out again. And what about the rest of Europe? How to reform the German states? Without Napoleon, things could be a powder keg there waiting to explode, so how to ensure that nobles all rule like Frederick the Great? Plus there's the factor of German nationalism to consider as well.
Without Napoleon German nationalism might be stillborn: it was opposition to Napoleon which gave rise to modern German nationalism

Powder keg sure, I mean, I'm not saying another revolution somewhere else was impossible, only that the French revolution was not inevitable
 
Constitutional monarchy meant -precisely- that you rule with the support of the nobility, eventually whenever ttl's version of 1848 roles around, voting rights and other legal rights could have being expanded to include a rising bourgeois as well

Then I'm not sure a system that privileges the nobility will endure in the long run. It will have to be reformed as well. How can we do this without a bloody revolution? Assuming the French elites don't behave like the British ones?

Without Napoleon German nationalism might be stillborn: it was opposition to Napoleon which gave rise to modern German nationalism

I can still see a Northern and Southern German Confederation eventually. How to prevent these formative states becoming radical will be a challenge unless the German rulers prove to be exceptional which they were not.

Powder keg sure, I mean, I'm not saying another revolution somewhere else was impossible, only that the French revolution was not inevitable

I want to think up a scenario that plausibly avoids ANY violent revolutions post 1789, and the entire European continent (the western part at least) is nearly as idyllic as the British experience.
 

RousseauX

Donor
Then I'm not sure a system that privileges the nobility will endure in the long run. It will have to be reformed as well. How can we do this without a bloody revolution? Assuming the French elites don't behave like the British ones?
The French nobility otl gave up almost all their feudal rights and privileges in 1789 without a bloody revolution back when liberal nobles were in the driver's seat:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abolition_of_feudalism_in_France#August_decrees

it was one of the weirdest episodes of European history
I can still see a Northern and Southern German Confederation eventually. How to prevent these formative states becoming radical will be a challenge unless the German rulers prove to be exceptional which they were not.
Without Napoleon, the Holy Roman Empire would have stayed in place, as would have hundreds of German micro-states which would have made unification of either north or south difficult. It was Napoleon who removed political barriers to German confederation by getting rid of both.

I want to think up a scenario that plausibly avoids ANY violent revolutions post 1789, and the entire European continent (the western part at least) is nearly as idyllic as the British experience.
Entirely bloodless, maybe not, but it's quite possible you don't have anything nearly as violent as the French revolution, instead you get a bunch which looks more like 1848
 
Top