So, lately I've been thinking about an interesting scenario:
Louis-Ferdinand, the dauphin of France and only surviving son of King Louis XV had a total of five sons: Louis-Joseph, duc de Bourgogne (1751-1761), Xavier, due d'Aquitaine (1753-1754), Louis-Auguste (the future Louis XVI), Louis-Stanislas (the future Louis XVIII), and Charles-Philippe (the future Charles X).
Now, the eldest of these, the duc de Bourgogne, was from all accounts a very bright and promising child, and known to have been well educated and the apple of his parents' eyes. Indeed, many of the younger sons would later suffer the emotional scars of the favoritism shown to Bourgogne. Sadly, the young duke died at the age of 10, after contracting tuberculosis.
So here it goes, using this as my POD, WI the duc de Bourgogne had not contracted consumption and instead survived. Assuming his father dies in 1765 as scheduled and the duke becomes the new dauphin, how would things play out?
I have read a very interesting work by one Colin Jones (The Great Nation) that theorizes that the revolution was far from inevitable, and indeed, could have been avoided easily (given a stronger and more able leadership, as well as fiscal reforms and avoidance of the American revolution). France had, after all, recovered from worse financial crisis than that of the 1780s (such as during the late reign of Louis XIV and the minority of Louis XV). Assuming that Bourgogne manages to become king as Louis XVI and appoints a very able financial minister (something akin to a eighteenth century Colbert), not to mention avoid the war of American independence and other mistakes, I wonder if he could very well have avoided the catastrophe of 1789 and the resulting years.
So, WI things did go this way, the revolution never takes place, and the world of the ancien regime (aside from some minor reforms) manages to continue onwards, perhaps to present day?
I have seen other TLs dealing with a no revolution scenario, but none close to the tune of what I've written above.
I'm interested in everyone else's input and opinions.