@LSCatilina - I cannot force you to actually do so, but if you were to peruse my various comments on this board, you would soon see that I am by no means some kind of 'reactionary'.
Where did I said that? I don't know what your stances are (and frankly, for this kind of discussion, I couldn't possibly care less). What I said is that a lot of informations you're giving are generally issued from politicized, more or less reactionnary, historiography (one exemple as many, the "genocide" part is definitely associated with such).
I react "as a bullet" because it's really amazing to me, that this sort of arguments and claims made it so easily on this discussion.
As it is, you opt to provide quotes of excerpts from my posts,
Because it's just easier to quote excerpts than posting the whole long posts, when it come to readability. Huge walls of texts quoting everything and themselves quoting everything before is an obstacle to discussion.
I assume anyone barely interested on the discussion will go to read your post, when I just quoted part of your posts because it's eventually more comfortable : there's no great plan to dissect your posts or to "hide" something. Again, I assume anyone interested will look on your post directly.
Especially in your second post, you deviate from argumentation and into caricature. I must say, I find that poor form.
I'm sorry if you saw it this way.
It's not just the general economic and otherwise material background that shapes events. Well, we seem to disagree on that. Fine. A difference of opinion.
I'm surprized that, for someone that doesn't like his posts being caricaturized, you nevertheless do to others.
As I never said you were some kind of legitimist reactionary, I never said that JUST the general economic background played. What I wrote, no more, no less, is that you missed important factors, such as the economical-social background of the XVIIIth century.
You're perfectly entitled to have your own vision of history, even if I indeed doesn't share it as far too idealistic, but that wasn't why I pointed these factors : they needed to be mentioned in order to have an actual allohistorical discussion.
For instance, he considered the Albigensian Crusade to have involved genocide
Is this is an exemple of a "broader" view, then I don't see which kind of people knowing a bit the period could agree, to be honest.
I mean, I try to remember one historian going this way, but I fail to : I think it eventually come down to politics. While Vendean insurgency is heavily politicized in France by people that, while largely outside universitarian structure, are generally tied up with far-right; Albigensian Crusade doesn't at the latest have the same political "label".
But your rather vehement claim that anyone who doesn't agree with your view is propagating "reactionary historiography" is uncalled for.
It's not a vehement claim : virtually every proponent of this theory is associated with french far-right or ultra conservative right. It's a fact you can't dismiss when it comes to politicized history.
Even François Furet, that can hardly be considered as a revolutionary apologist, considered it as a poor and politicized historiography. Hell, even Max Gallo said that.
"Vendean Genocide" is part of the french reactionnary historiography, that is mostly widespread trough non-universitarian authors as Zemmour or Deustch. I'm surprised, genuinly, that you choose to ignore it.
I would much appreciate it if you showed me the same courtesy.
It's not because I think one theory a member pulls there is basically inane, that I think ill of the member that posted it in first place. Showing courtesy isn't, at least as far as I'm concerned about deliberetly ignoring huge problems with your posts, but pointing these without considering you personally responsible for their existence.
Or, to make it shorter : it's not because you pull a far-right sided theory that I think you're such.
That's very nice. What I find strange is that you have reacted to one fragment of my comment on this subject, and seem to have missed the part where I wrote "Needless to say, a move towards "natural law" (Enlightenment-inspired) and codification was already underway, and would likely influence legal developments... but more gradually and more diversely (on a country-by-country basis)." Which is pretty much what you just repeated. So... thanks for agreeing with me...?
Listen, if you want to get snarky, we can play both this game : you want to avoid being caricaturized? Fine. But act accordingly.
Anyhow.
The legal basis of Napoleonic Code wouldn't be "largely gone", as in butterflied in great extent, because the legal basis was already underway to be built in most cases.
The pre-révolutionary legal work was already being less and less relevant (Pothier's works on written customs can show that) and while it would probably not look as the IOTL Civil Code, you'd likely end up with a IATL equivalent without a country-by-country basis (this was, as well, declining by the XVIIIth, which can be pointed trough appeals) and maybe less gradual than you think, mostly due to the state direct legal interventionism.
It's one of the reasons parlements were declining and fossilisating : they were less and less relevant, and provincial parlements even less than Paris.
Nor do I deny it. But I was explicitly talking about all of Europe, where French occupation really did introduce radical centralisation, which was in many cases not reverted.
You did stated "No radical move towards centralisation
in France.", but fair enough on the European part.
That said, I think you're mentioning particular exemples, nd that have more to do with napoleonic than revolutionary politics.
It does have its importance : while napoleonic policies mostly answer to the really specific conditions of the last decade of the XVIIIth, revolutionnary policies were more issued from both ideological and social tenants present more broadly in the XVIIIth and, as such, more probable to pop up ITTL rather than napoleonic policies.
You gave Netherlands as an exemple, but the Batavian assembly of 1796 points how much the debate between federalist/centralized/decentralized constitution wasn't that clear. It seems that Directoire was mostly fine with the mostly federalist look of the Batavian Republic, until monarchists became an actual political threat in France, forcing a much more centralized structure.
ITTL, I think the decentralising features of the first part of French revolution (whatever Feuillant or Jacobin, on this regard) could have indeed a far better chance. But overall, French centralism as a model was a real thing even before the revolution : Bourbon Spain is an obvious exemple, Joseph II's reforms as well : you had a centralizing tendency in Europe at this point, and that would likely continue to exist without Napoleon.
The argument could be made, actually, that centralisation effort could be slower, but smoothier ITTL
When I point out that the system of state schooling has historically been used to indoctrinate, you call that 'caricature'?
Yep. Equalling national eduction with "imbue with a usually partisan or sectarian opinion, point of view, or principle" is a caricature or at the very least, judgemental.
Not only that couldn't have been made by revolutionnaries would have they wanted to (a bit like, in spite of all the big speeches about the necessity of having only one national language, most of political work was made in various speeches and languages when needed to) : the reality of revolutionnary education is generally (with the disappearance of religious-issued schools) a more or less uneasy continuation of the pre-revolutionnary situation (at least in province : I agree that in Paris and the greatest towns it was different) with the maintain of particular schools in face of the more or less lukwarm attempts at cantonal schools and by 1797, these effectivelly disappeared.
Most of the republican schooling consisted at learing some passages of the Declaration of Rights of Men, not on an "indoctrination", even if it would have been planned, there wasn't structures for that. You didn't have "abuses" becayse the educative system was so broken by the mid-1790's that there was nothing to abuse from.
Most of revolutionary projects were just that : projects. You really need to wait for the XIXth century to have an actually national education going on.
I think you're underestmating how the (very real) political changes during the revolution went much more smoothly overall in the main part of the country : you usually find the same local names from one part to the other part of the decades, sometimes without even a blink.
(To be specific: you seem to think that you are debating a rabid reactionary, when you are in fact talking to a progressive with heterodox views on various subjects.)
So, basically : "I don't like when you assume things about me, that's rude : so I'll assume things about you!"
To say the least, it's not very coherent.
Do you really think this is in any way good form, or intellectually honest? (That's not a rhetorical question: I really wonder.)
I'd be extremely surprised, if during two years on this board, you'd never had been introduced to sarcasm.
I will gladly agree that much of what the revolutionaries did was a more drastic and - crucially - nationalised form of things that had existed previously. This does not take away the fact that the revolutionaries doing (some of) these things inspired people such as the Communards later on, which in turn inspired various leading socialist thinkers.
At this point, we could as well blame Roman Empire for communism, because they did inspired Enlightement writers, that did inspired Jacobins, that did inspired some part of Communards, whom another part was close enough from Marxism, which itself inspired Lenin.
Accumulation of historical links doesn't makes a continuity. For what matter the topic, it means that the absence of one revolutionnary historical influence (and I'd want to stress that french socialism before the latter decade of the XIXth, tended to be anti-Jacobine) doesn't imply that it makes socialism as a revolutionary and anti-bourgeois ensemble going anywhere (which is not the same as arguing radical socialism wouldn't go different ways, tough : as said elsewhere, I'd lean towards a more libertarian approach)
Your accusation that I had called the revolutionaries "proto-commies" or something is particularly jarring. I did not do so.
It looked so : you stressed quite a lot on how revolutionaries were leaning on supressing property rights, equaling income, went trough a de sanguinis nationality conception, etc. and then made a parallel with communism and nazism. I tried to point how these parallels couldn't really hold because it was either marginal, or being a misinterpretation in first place.
It was marginal. (Which was why I wrote: "some flirted with"... but your partial quotation strangely omits that.)
I know I'm not supposed to be judgmental...But that's called a troll.
Everyone can see that I included "some" in the quotation.
Again, you seem to be very much about "let's discuss it seriously" but you can't help but lying there. How is this supposed to be courteous?
The Communards did play it up later on, though.
Even Communards didn't : proper communism (and generally limited to a national mutualism) was fairly marginal among Communards as well, while neo-Jacobinism or non-communist socialism dominated (and formed the two big political ensembles of the Commune. You'd be hard-pressed finding exemple of large nationalisations that wouldn't fit the aformentioned relation to civic forfeiture.
So it did become a relevant aspect of the revolutions legacy in OTL, even if it was marginal at the time, and the ATL absence of the revolution would have effects in that regard. Which was my point.
I think you're confusing two things : that French Revolution introduced the concept of popular sovereignty that, in turn, made the previously existing economical interventionism being politicized.
That's what became a feature of modern revolutionnary movements, rather the marginal revolutionary egalitarism which, as you said, was more bent on redistribution (at the exception of Babeuf) than mutualism or communalism that blossomed in french socialism.
Basically, XIXth is the mix, rather than the continuity, of two social traditions : popular revolution (jabobinism, carbonarism, blanquism) and socialisation (babouvism, saint-simonism, proudonhism) that knew different (if convering) ways.
ITTL, while the idea of popular sovereignity would be likely modified (even if I don't expect a radical change), the rise of socialism (mutualist or communist) would probably be still a thing even if possibly looking more like IOTL Proudhonism, meaning less politically revolutionary than it was, but still pretty much adressing and lower middle-class and lower classes (especially n a TL where bourgeoisie and upper middle-class are part of a same smooth evolution).
And it continues to be weird how you can so utterly misrespresent what I have written.
I'm hardly responsible of your posts containing exagerations, misinterpretations and strecthing facts in order to fit your points tough. See above where I disagree.
Again, you seem to take one particular view and consider it as being sacrosanct. All others must be wrong! A lot has been said about the Marseillaise, and while true that the hymn also explicitly refers to traitors, the line about blood in the meadows is almost directly preceded by the part about foreign enemies.
No, I come to actually have some basic knowledge of the era, and able to read contemporary documents.
Most mentions of "impurity" in revolutionnary litterature refers to aristocrats and traitors. If you're interested on some extracts
this part of the page isn't bad.
sang impur de l'hydre aristocrate
de verser quelques gouttes de sang impur pour éviter d’en verser de très-pur, c’est-à-dire d’écraser les principaux contre-révolutionnaires pour sauver la patrie
sang impur des prêtres et des aristocrates abreuve donc nos sillons dans les campagnes
quand leur sang impur sera versé, les aboyeurs de l'aristocratie rentreront dans leurs caves
la justice nationale a scellé la liberté française par le sang impur de ses tyrans
le sang a coulé mais presque partout cela a été le sang impur des ennemis de la Liberté,
That one exception on these extracts
le sang a coulé mais presque partout cela a été le sang impur des ennemis de la Liberté,
comes from Dumouriez that can't really be depicted as your typical revolutionary.
Now, either you provide some other sources to back your interpretation (and if it's valid, you'd have no real issue finding some), either you try making it personal.
In the first case, i'd be happy to discuss. If you continue implying I pull things out of my ass, you can consider me uninterested discussing with you.
Anyhow : the part about "impure blood" isn't directly preceded by the mention of foreign soldiers, not exactly so at least.
It's part of the chorus, each verse mentioning the invasion not as an existential threat from outer nations, but as "a horde of slaves, of traitors and conspiratorial kings". While bloody, it's clearly a political reference.
Does it means there wasn't a room for a quasi-racial interpretation? Of course not, and it was more or less to be expected. But, and that's the relevant part on this discussion, it wasn't the interpretation that transpired from revolutionary structures that remained largely based on the political, revolutionary vs. counter-revolutionary part.
I don't find that very wise or admirable, because it doesn't come across as very convincing, nor as particularly civilised. Perhaps you don't care for that, and that's your right.
Are you kidding? Your answer involved distortion (short extracts of your post being identified as concious editing; ) and outright sham ("you didn't quote that"). You're not really in position to take the high road..
Finally, let me assure you that I do not take my information from legitimist propaganda.
Never said that, even if the wording was wrong : just that some parts you pulled did made me think about this.