Why do you think the Parisian crowds invaded the Bastille on July 14, 1789? Was it because of food prices?, the dismissal of Necker?, the layout of the city?, something else? Give evidence to support your answer.

FRENCH REVOLUTION

Storming of the Bastille

Why do you think the Parisian crowds invaded the Bastille on July 14, 1789? Was it because of food prices?, the dismissal of Necker?, the layout of the city?, something else? Give evidence to support your answer.

Although Louis XIV France was the envy of other European countries, it became an extremely fragile country during the reign of Louis XVI. Finally, on July 14, 1789 the conflicts and problems within the country lead to the invasion of Bastille. The fall of the Bastille (“the symbol of despotism”) also connotes to the fall of the monarch’s power. Therefore, it would be nothing but oversimplification to make this historically salient event depend on only one reason. It was an outcome of the combination of political, social, intellectual and economic motives that caused a general intolerance in the country. However the most significant and critical factor that made Parisians invade Bastille was the economic crisis.

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France was separated into different socio-economic classes; the First Estate, which was composed of clergy, the Second Estate, which was consisted of nobility and landowners, and everyone else (the bourgeoisie, the peasants and the urban poor of Paris) belonged to the Third Estate. Every section of the nation was displeased. They had tensions within themselves. For example as the nobles were wanting the power that had been taken away from them by the king, the bourgeoisie was complaining about the nobles’ privileges and the Third Estate was resenting the unfair tax system. Discontentment in classes of the country reduced the respect and loyalty shown for the king. Weakening of the Old Regime of absolute monarchy (‘power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely’) and the king’s inability to manage his responsibilities led to political stability. In addition to these, Age of Enlightenment gave birth to new revolutionary ideas such as equality and liberty, which encouraged political agitations.

However, none of these reasons, by themselves, are capable of bringing thousands of passionate people together for such a fervent act.

Economic reasons were the ones that most effectively and most apparently touched the lives of the majority of the population. Therefore they had a greater effect on moving the crowds that produced the Bastille attack. The government’s immense budget deficit that rose as the outcome of wrong political decision-making (Seven Year Wars), inefficient, unfair taxation system and extravagant spending for luxury in the court was enough to create a fiscal crisis. Most important of all was the taxation system that severely taxed the low-income-earner commoners, but kept the richest states exempt from paying taxes. This added onto the large government debts.

In order to understand why Parisians invaded Bastille, it is essential to look at the economic backgrounds of the Vainqueurs de la Bastille. Most of this group belonged to the Third State, which generated the least income but had to bear the burden of heavy taxation. They were mostly wage earners. In addition to those, as the bad harvests during the years of 1787-1789 increased the wheat prices by more than 40% in only 24 months, an average wage earner’s expenditure on bread as percentage of income became 60%, as their incomes remained the same. To make matters worse, on July 11 Louis XVI dismissed Monsieur Jaques Necker the Minister of State and Director General of Finances, who could “keep the government solvent, stabilize financial markets, and keep Paris supplied with food” in spite of the financial ruin that the monarch had created. Thus the crowds took action first to make demonstrations around Paris starting from July 12 and then invade Bastille on July 14.

Parisians were already brought to the edge of starvation by the economic crisis and they were made intolerant and fuming enough to storm Bastille. However, it is another fact that the dismissal of Necker only accelerated their realization of the need to take action.