The French: Myths of Revolution

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The French
Myths of Revolution

Yehuda Cohen

Yehuda Cohen is a Jerusalem advocate whose post-doctoral work at the Political Science Department of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem focused on nationalism and the European Union. He is the author of two previous works – Who’s Afraid of a Jewish State? Constitutional and Ideological Aspects (2001), and Why Religion? (2003), a study of the role of religion and nationality.

In the Series: Heritage, Society and National Identity in the European

The series comprises six books: The Germans, French, Spanish, and British are currently detailed on the website; the Italians, and Dutch will be presented on the website in due course

This series sets out the historical national and religious characteristics of the Germans, French, Italians, Spanish, Dutch and British as they impact on the integration of the respective groups within the European Union.
… With respect to the French their key characteristic is a tendency to riot, which emerged from the trauma associated with the Hundred Years’ War and the Black Death, in which France lost about 70 percent of its population. The French Revolution was such a riot. Later the French built myths about the ideals which supposedly drove them in the Revolution, although in fact the main driving force was a struggle over prestige and power. The French used these myths to lead Europe conceptually (and strategically for a brief historical moment under Napoleon Bonaparte).
… In 1871 a democratic system of government was instituted in France, but it was not due to a desire for such a system on the part of the masses; rather, it was imposed on them by Bismarck, who wanted to weaken France. The national identity which evolved in France was lost with the outbreak of World War II, and the solution to this collapse of national identity was found in the establishment of the European Union.

Acknowledgments
Foreword
Preface

Part I: Causes of the French Revolution
Introduction

Chapter One: Factor A: The Protestants
Introduction
Persecution vs. Freedom of Faith
The Unique Position of the Huguenots

Chapter Two: Factor B: The Judiciary
Introduction
The Parlements
Constitutional Issues
Turning Legal Imagination into Political Reality
Judges or Vested Interests?

Chapter Three: Factor C: Tax Farming
Introduction
Tax Farming and Lifestyle
Criticism and Reform

Chapter Four: Factor D: The Monarchy & the Church
Introduction
French Particularism vs. Pan-Europeanism
Gaullism, Jansenists, and Jesuits

Chapter Five: Factor E: The Language of Rioting
Introduction
The Social Dimension
The Political Dimension

Chapter Six: Factor F: The Third Estate
Anatomy of the Third Estate
A Chronicle of Cascading Events

Chapter Seven: Factor G: Ideas on Nationality & Sovereignty
Introduction
Sieyès’s What is the Third Estate?
Reexamining Sieyès’s Political Doctrine
Reexamining Sieyès’s Legacy

Chapter Eight: Factor H: The King of France
Introduction
Henri IV
Louis XIII
Louis XIV
Louis XV
Louis XVI
Recognizing France's Autocratic Streak
Why Louis XVI?

PART II: Governing the French after the Revolution
Chapter Nine: From Napoleon Bonaparte to Napoleon III
Introduction
France under Napoleon Bonaparte
France under Louis XVIII
Napoleon's Short Return
France under Charles X
France under Louis Philippe
France's Fleeting Second Republic
France under Napoleon III

PART III: France in the Modern Era
Chapter Ten: From the Third Republic Onward
The Third Republic until 1914
The First World War
The Interbellum Period (1919–1939)
The Second World War
The Post-War Years

Chapter Eleven: The Nature of French Self-Ascription in Retrospect
The French Collective in Historical Context
French Historical Scholarship Reexamined

PART IV: France in the Era of European Unity
Chapter Twelve: Society and the State in Modern Times
Introduction
The Citizen and the State in France: An Uneasy Relationship
A Comparison of Contemporary French and German Society
Four Key Questions about European Selfhood
Fractured Naturalization Policy and the EU Anomaly

Chapter Thirteen: Re-examining the Coalescence of the French as a Nation
Introduction
Natural Laws vs. God’s Dominion
French Provincialism and German Heimat
Ethnicity and Citizenship Trends: Diluting Differences

Chapter Fourteen: The French and Immigration
Introduction
Muslims vs. Other Newcomers
Early Immigration to Gaul Revisited
The French and the American Models Compared
Demographics and French Policy
The Future of the French Melting Pot

Chapter Fifteen: Quo Vadis, Europa?
The Nature of Member-States' Ties with the EU
Ties to and Attitudes towards the EU
The Germans
The French
Quo vadis, Europa?

Notes
Bibliography
Index

“Dr Cohen argues that the myth of the French Revolution has served the French nation as a means to maintain dominance in Europe at a time in which demographically, economically, and politically France was losing its power. But the appropriation and cultivation of the democratic myths of equality, liberty, and fraternity have not weaned the French of their inclination to favor a strong state and paternalistic rulers. Equally, the contradiction between the French state’s tendency toward centralization and its people’s rebelliousness – the conflict between national pride and an alleged universal message of liberty to all peoples – has never been solved.”Prof. Moshe Sluhovski, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, author of Patroness of Paris: Rituals of Devotion in Late Medieval and Early Modern France (E. J. Brill)

Publication Details

	Hardback ISBN:		978-1-84519-390-4
	Paperback ISBN:		978-1-84519-537-3
	Page Extent / Format:		224 pp. / 229 x 152 mm
	Release Date:		Hardback, February 2011; paperback, March 2012
	Illustrated:		No
	Hardback Price:		£49.95 / $74.95
	Paperback Price:		£19.95 / $34.95


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