Which Was More Influencial, The French Revolution or the American Revolution?

Which Revolution Was More Influential?

  • The French Revolution

    Votes: 74 50.0%
  • The American Revolution

    Votes: 64 43.2%
  • The Thande Revolution (or, the "I Can't Decide" Option)

    Votes: 10 6.8%

  • Total voters
    148
I've been wondering this for a long time, and I'm just not sure...

The American Revolution would give rise to possibly the most powerful nation so far, and it could be said that it helped influence the events of the French Revolution. However, the ultimate effects weren't really felt on the world until the First World War.

The French Revolution on the other hand, is uselly called the start of the modern age, and the definition of politics and political movements to this day.It's been the inspiration of countless revolutions throughout European history.

So what do you think?Which Revolution was more Influential?

ps-poll to come
 
You just answered my thread first, now I to yours

Muhahahahahahahahahahahahahah (I don't know, don't ask ;):p:D)

As I am American, I am biased, but I'd say that the American Revolution was more influencial. After all, the French Revolution was largely influenced by the American one! (as you mentioned) America was the first enlightenment nation in the world whom stood up for the people's rights, and instigated really a worldwide revolution of democracy that has continued on to this day; especially in the Western Hemisphere at first. The colonists didn't see the motherland as their nation anymore, and now wanted their own nation, largely because of the American Revolution.

Overall, I think the French one was more of a European thing and America was a more global thing. Countless nations use the US constitution and US Bill of Rights to help make their own democracies work all over the world; rather than the French. My two cents, anyway.
 
The American Revolution did create this country, which would later become the largest super power in the world :p However even then I think the French Revolution had bigger, immediate, and more lasting affects. Yet I still went with the American one, because I think that the strain the ARW put on the French government and economy had large effects that pushed the situation over the edge.

Without the American Revolution things in France could have been radically different than OTL.
 

Thande

Donor
Well, the French Revolution would be very different without the influence of the American Revolution. (But then, the American Revolution would be very different without the influence of the Corsican Revolution, and so on).

I would say the French Revolution was more influential. It inspired governmental models, flags, symbolism across the world to a greater degree than what the Americans did, and also has never lost its image as being radical, even today. The American revolution by contrast now I think is seen as more of a bunch of aristocratic slaveholders getting narked off at being treated like commoners, to exaggerate slightly.
 
American, because of chronology, obviously. As Thande notes, if the Corsican Revolution had been listed, I would have voted for it.
 

Susano

Banned
Well, if we exclude the French Revolution as a consequence of the American Revolution (because its an answer in its own right), then Id say French Revolution, which so radically altered all of Europe. Creation of a later superpower is good and well, but the operative word here is "later". As in much later.
 
I'm one of the American Revolution camp, based almost entirely on the fact that the French Revolution would have been much, much different without it.
 
Question! Which was the first nation with a written, binding, Constitution? I'm fairly sure it was America followed by Poland.
 
The American Revolution was the impetus for the French Revolution. The former was much more stable, and didn't collapse into a monarchy within a decade.
 
I seem to be the only undecided vote since I believe the industrial revolution was more influential. OOoops. Me bad.
 
As Susano says, the American Revolution had a great deal of influence on the French (but not in the "miserable downtrodden French troops without free thought witness GLORIOUS AMERICAN FREEDOM and immediately seek to emulate it": the French revolution had its own deep intellectual roots, and some of them were rhyzomes of the American one, like Corsica), but if we ignore that for the purposes of the poll because ultimatly everything is influences by everything and both owed their exact circumstances to Genghis Khan, the French revolution had a much more immediate and major effect on more of the world.

I don't think it makes much sense to say "America because the French one failed and "collapsed back to a monarchy"". Napoleon's dictatorship (besides being the last in a series of military regimes) was a dictatorship on many revolutionary principles which emancipated the Jews and so on, but that aside, the French revolution generated ideas that would never leave France (and the ultra-reacyionaries were trying hard for a good fifteen years) or the world.
 
American Revolution wins out because it lasted longer (1770-1865) whereas the French Revolution only lasted a fraction of the time (1789-1815).

The American War of Independence on the other hand, influenced the French Revolution and the subsequent War of the First Coalition which escalated to the further French Revolutionary Wars. Not to mention Napoleon. Without Napoleon, Europe is radically (!!!) different. Think Holy Roman Empire into the middle-late 19th Century different. Think divided Italy forever different. Not to mention that Napoleon's weakening of the Spanish government further allowed the already American-influenced Latin American Revolutions to take place. (Super colonial Empires in the Americas lasting until the late 1850s without a Napoleonic Empire to speak of? Sounds like a kick ass TL to me)
 
I chose the American Revolution because of its basic government model and the future world wide changes it would bring. Though we must also look to the fact that one reason the French monarchy and state at the time were in such financial troubles was partly due to France's involvement in the American Revolution. So by effect, we could say that without the American Revolution, financial troubles would probably not have been as stressed as they were in OTL history and the monarchy could probably hold onto power for a while longer.

The French Revolution may have been more influential for the next couple of decades, but would eventually be dwarfed by the aftereffects of the American Revolution and the fact that it influenced the French Revolution.
 
American Revolution wins out because it lasted longer (1770-1865) whereas the French Revolution only lasted a fraction of the time (1789-1815).

How do we judge that, though? These dates seem arbitrary to me. Louis XVIII could only return to the throne in safety by promising to respect the Napoleonic Code, freedom of religion, and the confiscation of the land, and by granting France a British-style constitution. When Charles X tried to undermine this, the French had another revolution and chucked him out.
 
I chose the American Revolution because of its basic government model and the future world wide changes it would bring. Though we must also look to the fact that one reason the French monarchy and state at the time were in such financial troubles was partly due to France's involvement in the American Revolution. So by effect, we could say that without the American Revolution, financial troubles would probably not have been as stressed as they were in OTL history and the monarchy could probably hold onto power for a while longer.

I think the French would have found some other foreign adventure to burn up funds. The point was that French state was ticking along (the excellent armed forces were being kept up, an ambitious and succesful foreign policy was being masterminded, and Louis XVI was spending obscenely vast sums on his court) and unable to just stop, but no one had the necessary political will to break the nobility interest's power and reform the opaque finances: the king would appoint ambitious reformers from outside the nobility like Necker, but wasn't actually going to do anything to put their plans into action. When the king finally got round to appealing to the new middle classes, their long exclusion from power had radicalised them with enlightenment ideas and they reufsed to talk money until they were done talking constitution. Add rioting in Paris connected with food shortages and the Great Fear and there you are.

You certainly could avoid the revolution, but you'd really want a frugal, practical, decisive man in Versailles, a William IV or Louis XVIII. With Louis XIV, I can't see anything being achieved before the money runs out.
 
Last edited:
I would have to say that the biggest differences between the American Revolution and the French Revolution's are the perspectives that we have of those today.

the American Revolution is/has/was seen as a symbol of Hope. Many countries have come into being as a direct influence that those leading in the ARW had, Jefferson, Patrick Henry, Washington, Adams, and Franklin. their writings SPEAK to and inspire more than those of the French Rev. The ARW was more seen as overthrowing a Foreign ruler and having Self Governance. and while the individual people may have done things for selfish reasons the over all sense was about Liberty.

The French Revolution is seen in a wholly different light. Its more know for the Reign of Terror than anything else. It's seen as a overthrow of Morality and a darker time than that of the American Revolution. a "lifting up of Self" over that of the good of the people. While the French over threw a excessive self indulgent Monarchy they didn't replace it with anything like what the US had. and largely seen as a time of Chaos.

now this doesn't mean that either side is right, but it's a sense of what history tells us happened, not what actually happened.
 
long term, American... short term, France. It took a while for the US to become influential on a global scale. France's revolution, OTOH, had quite a few immediate (and dire) affects on Europe, what with the RoT, Napoleon, etc...
 
Top