More successful France in 19th century

Just a little bit of brainstorming: France has lost the battle of Waterloo, Napoléon is sent into exile on St. Helena and Louis XVIII has returned to France.

How can France be more successful in the new century? Can it keep up with industrialization without being overtaken by Great Britain, Germany and the United States? Can it, along with the United Kingdom, be a first rank world power, or is it restrained to be just one of several European great powers?
 
Just a little bit of brainstorming: France has lost the battle of Waterloo, Napoléon is sent into exile on St. Helena and Louis XVIII has returned to France.

How can France be more successful in the new century? Can it keep up with industrialization without being overtaken by Great Britain, Germany and the United States? Can it, along with the United Kingdom, be a first rank world power, or is it restrained to be just one of several European great powers?
Maybe Napoleon accepts peace early on ?
 
The main cause of France's relative decline compared to the other European powers was her sluggish population growth. France, Germany, and the UK (Modern French borders, Kaiserreich without Alsace-Lorraine, and entirety of the British Isles), their populations are 30.5 million, 24.3 million, and about 19 milliion, respectively in 1815. By 1913 (using the same borders as listed above) this had evolved to 41.5 for France, 65 million for Germany, and 46 million for the UK (+36%, +167%, +142%, respectively).

In terms of productivity per capita France did relatively ok. Using 1990 dollars and the Maddison project: https://www.rug.nl/ggdc/historicaldevelopment/maddison/releases/maddison-project-database-2013

France: $1135 (1820) -> $3485 (1913) (+207%)
U.K.: $2074 (1820) -> $4921 (1913) (+137%)
Germany: No data in 1820, but probably similar or a bit less than France -> $3684 (1913)

So in terms of productivity/prosperity per inhabitant France didn't really lose that much relative ground in the 19th century, though I'm sure France could have done better. The main thing France needed to have to conserve her status as a first rank power, is to have a greater population. France's low 19th century birth rate is still not fully understood, but most sources I've read suggest that the Revolution was at least part of the reason (http://people.qc.cuny.edu/Faculty/Neil.Cummins/Documents/France TSA MAY_2011_BODY.pdf). So by the fall of Napoléon French demographic dominance is, I feel, pretty much bound to decline at this point, but maybe the decline in birth rates can be slowed down. Just spitballing here, but maybe a more stable regime led by a moderate-conservative Catholic Bourbon that slowly transitions into a constitutional monarchy would help France's demographic/demographic development, instead of the constant instability and regime changes. So I think avoiding the regime of Charles X is going to be pretty necessary, or maybe having him die earlier, but beyond that I'm not sure what would be the right regime to lead France.
 

Marc

Donor
It should be pointed out that outside the guns and butter perspective, 19th Century France continuing from the 18th century, was the apex Western society in terms of culture. And in the very long run, that is what really matters to humanity.
 
I think France has to industrialize faster, and more completely, to have a greater population. It's argued that egalitarian inheritance laws adopted during the Revolution discouraged large families, as most people worked the land. If you had a large family, your land would be divided up into a lot of small parts that might not be livable, so there was an incentive to have fewer children. But if there are work more options besides farming, you might see more births as more people would move to the cities. Or, have the inheritance laws changed during the Restoration to favor the eldest child, thus making it inconsequential how many total children a family has.
 
Just a little bit of brainstorming: France has lost the battle of Waterloo, Napoléon is sent into exile on St. Helena and Louis XVIII has returned to France.

How can France be more successful in thenew century? Can it keep up with industrialization without being overtaken by Great Britain, Germany and the United States? Can it, along with the United Kingdom, be a fi rst rank world power, or is it restrained to be just one of several European great powers?
This is actually surprisingly simple. Napoleon III was doing a great job expanding France's colonial empire, barring the failure in Mexico, was modernizing the French economy and society, greatly improved France's previously sub-par rail network, established good relations with the House of Savoy by granting them Lombardy, and overall was a pretty great emperor save for one massive fuck-up, the War of 1870. Nappy III failed to contain the threat of Prussia and in the end fell to it allowing the formation of the German Empire. Have Napoleon decide to intervene in the 7 Weeks War on the side of Austria and have him successfully crush Prussia, creating a puppet in the Rhineland for safer borders and access to the massive amount of resources in the area and help Austria regain control over the South German Catholic states. This delegitimizes Prussia's attempt to unify Germany and turns Bismarck into a smart and capable man who flew just too close to the Sun and was promptly brought down. With this, France's biggest future threat is contained, the Second French Empire continues and upon Napoleon III's death most likely passes to a less competent heir who delegates stuff and I assume France would turn into Constitutional Empire, with Napoleon IV being little more than a figure head. Germany would not become the rising power that would greatly harm France, Britain and France would get into spats but nothing like the fighting in the fields of France and Flanders in 1914-18 and 1940. What transpires from here, I can't give you much, but France would most definitely maintain a top 3 spot at worst.
 
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