Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-mlc7c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-03T02:58:36.932Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The French Revolution and the Politics of Government Finance, 1770–1815

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2009

Eugene Nelson White
Affiliation:
Professor of Economics at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ 08903 and a Research Associate of the NBER.

Abstract

Although largely neglected in most histories of the French Revolution, the central government’s persistent budget deficit was a factor of paramount importance. The fiscal crisis inherited from the monarchy defied solution because of the war of attrition fought by economic interest groups. The struggle produced radical changes in macroeconomic policy to shift the burden of adjustment, altering the course of and prolonging the Revolution.

Type
Papers Presented at the Forty-Fourth Annual Meeting of the Economic History Association
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1995

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Aftalion, Florin, The French Revolution: An Economic Interpretation (Cambridge, 1990).Google Scholar
Alesina, Alberto, and Drazen, Allan, “Why are Stabilizations Delayed?American Economic Review, 81 (12. 1991), pp. 1170–88.Google Scholar
Ancien moniteur, various dates.Google Scholar
Aubin, Christian, “Les assignats sous la Révolution française: un exemple d’hyperin-flation,” Revue économique, 4 (07. 1991), pp. 745–62.Google Scholar
Bailleul, Antoine, Tableau complet de la valeur des Assignats, des Rescriptions et des Mandats (Paris, 1797).Google Scholar
Bailly, M. A.Histoire financiére de la France (France, 1830).Google Scholar
Bigo, Robert, La Caisse d’escompte (1776–1793) et les Origines de la Banque de France (Paris, 1927).Google Scholar
Blanning, T. C. W., The Origins of the French Revolutionary Wars (New York, 1986).Google Scholar
Bloch, Camille, La monnaie et le papier-monnaie (Paris, 1912).Google Scholar
Bordo, Michael D., and White, Eugene N., “British and French Finance During the Napoleonic Wars,” in Bordo, Michael D. and Capie, Forrest, eds., Monetary Regimes in Transition (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 241–73.Google Scholar
Bosher, J. F., The French Revolution (New York, 1988).Google Scholar
Bouchary, , Marché des changes de Paris à la fin du XVIIIe side (1788–1800) (Paris, 1937).Google Scholar
Brewer, John, The Sinews of Power: War, Money and the English State, 1688–1783 (Cambridge, 1990).Google Scholar
Caisso, René, La vente des biens nationaux de première origine dans le district de Tours (1790–1822) (Paris, 1963).Google Scholar
Calomiris, Charles W., “Institutional Failure, Monetary Scarcity, and the Depreciation of the Continental,” this Journal, 48 (03. 1988), pp. 4768.Google Scholar
Caron, Pierre, Tableaux des depreciation du papier-monnaie (Paris, 1909).Google Scholar
Clamageran, J.-J., Histoire de l’impôt en France (Paris, 1876).Google Scholar
Cobb, Richard, The People’s Armies (New Haven, 1987).Google Scholar
Coiffard, Aimé, La vente des biens nationaux dans le district de Grasse (1790–1815) (Paris, 1973).Google Scholar
Courtois fils Alphonse, Tableaux des cours des principales valeurs (Paris, 1877).Google Scholar
Crouzet, François, La grande inflation: la monnaie en France de Louis XVI à Napoléon (Paris, 1993).Google Scholar
Doyle, William, The Oxford History of the French Revolution (Oxford, 1989).Google Scholar
Fritschy, Wantje, “Taxation in Britain, France and the Netherlands in the Eighteenth Century,” Economic and Social History in the Netherlands, 1 (1989), pp. 5780.Google Scholar
Furet, François and Richet, Denis, La Révolution française (Paris, 1965).Google Scholar
Furet, François, Revolutionary France 1770–1880 (Oxford, 1992).Google Scholar
Gabillard, Jean, “Le Financement des Guerres Napoleonniennes et la Conjoncture du Premier Empire,” Revue économique, 4 (07. 1953), pp. 548–72.Google Scholar
Gazette de France, various dates.Google Scholar
Godechot, Jacques, La Grande Nation (2nd edn., Paris, 1983).Google Scholar
Goldstone, Jack A., Revolution and Rebellion in the Early Modern World (Berkeley, 1991).Google Scholar
Grossman, Herschel I., and van Huyck, J. B., “Sovereign Debt as a Contingent Claim: Excusable Default, Repudiation, and Reputation,” American Economic Review, 78 (12. 1988), pp. 1088–97.Google Scholar
Harris, Robert D., “French Finances and the American War, 1777–1783,” Journal of Modern History, 48 (06. 1976), pp. 233–58.Google Scholar
Harris, Seymour E., The Assignats (Cambridge, 1930).Google Scholar
Hamilton, James D., and Flavin, Majorie A., “On the Limitations of Government Borrowing: A Framework for Empirical Testing,” American Economic Review, 76 (09. 1986), pp. 808–19.Google Scholar
Jones, P. M., The Peasantry in the French Revolution (Cambridge, 1988).Google Scholar
Kaiser, David, Politics and War: European Conflict from Philip II to Hitler (Cambridge, 1990).Google Scholar
Lefebvre, Georges, “La vente des biens nationaux,” in Lefebvre, Georges, Études sur la Révolution française (Paris, 1954), pp. 223245.Google Scholar
Lefebvre, Georges, The French Revolution (New York, 1962), 2 vols.Google Scholar
Marczewski, Jean, “Le produit physique de l’économie françcaise de 1789 à 1913 (comparison avec la Grande Bretagne),” Cahiers de I’institut de science economique appliquée AF4 (Paris, 1965).Google Scholar
Marczewski, Jean, “The Take-Off Hypothesis and French Experience,” in Rostow, Walt W., ed., The Stages of Economic Growth (Cambridge, 1971).Google Scholar
Marion, Marcel, La vente des biens nationaux pendant la Révolution avec étude spéciales des ventes dans les départements de la Gironde et du Cher (Paris, 1908).Google Scholar
Marion, Marcel, Histoire financière de la France depuis 1715 (Paris, 1921), vols. 3–5.Google Scholar
Mathias, Peter, and O’brien, Patrick K., “Taxation in England and France, 1715–1810,” Journal of European Economic History, 5 (1976), pp. 601650.Google Scholar
Montesquiou-Fezensac, Anne-Pierre, “Rapport,” Moniteur Universel, (09. 11, 1791), pp. 628–32 and (09. 19, 1791), pp. 704707 and (09. 30, 1791), pp. 809831.Google Scholar
O’brien, Patrick K., “The Political Economy of British Taxation, 1660–1815,” Economic History Review, 2nd ser., 41 (02. 1988), pp. 132.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Priouret, Roger, La Caisse des Dépôts, cent cinquante ans d’histoire Financière (Paris, 1966).Google Scholar
Riley, James C., “French Finances, 1727–1768,” Journal of Modern History, 59 (06. 1987), pp. 209–43.Google Scholar
Rose, R. B., “Tax Revolt and Popular Organization in Picardy, 1789–1791,” Past and Present 43 (05 1969), pp. 92108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rudé, George E., “Prices, Wages and Popular Movements in Paris during the French Revolution, ”Economic History Review, 2nd ser., 6 (1953), pp. 246–67.Google Scholar
Rudé, George E., Europe in the Eighteenth Century: Aristocracy and the Bourgeois Challenge (Cambridge, 1972).Google Scholar
Schama, Simon, Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution (New York, 1989).Google Scholar
Sée, Henri, Histoire économique de la France: Les temps modernes (1789–1914) (Paris, 1951).Google Scholar
Shepard, William Finley, Price Control and the Reign of Terror: France, 1793–1795 (Berkeley, 1953).Google Scholar
Smith, Adam, The Wealth of Nations, Canaan, Edwin, ed. (New York, 1937).Google Scholar
Stone, Bailey, The Parlement de Paris (Chapel Hill, 1981).Google Scholar
Sutherland, D. M. G., France 1789–1815: Revolution and Counterrevolution (London, 1985).Google Scholar
Thornton, Henry, An Enquiry into the Nature and Effects of the Paper Credit of Great Britain (Fairfield [1802], 1987).Google Scholar
Velde, François R., and Sargent, Thomas J., “The Macro-Economic Causes and Consequences of the French Revolution,” Mimeo, (11. 1991).Google Scholar
Velde, François R., and Weir, David, “The Financial Market and Government Debt Policy in France,” this Journal, 52 (03. 1992), pp. 140.Google Scholar
Vickers, Douglas, Studies in the Theory of Money 1690–1776 (Philadelphia, 1959).Google Scholar
Vickers, John and Yarrow, George, “Economic Perspectives on Privatization,” Journal of Economic Perspectives, 5 (Spring 1991), pp. 111–32.Google Scholar
Vührer, Alphonse, Histoire de la dette publique en France (Paris, 1886).Google Scholar
Weir, David R., “Tontines, Public Finance, and Revolution in France and England, 1688–1789,” this Journal, 49 (03. 1989), pp. 95124.Google Scholar
Weir, David R., “Les crises économiques et les origines de la Révolution française,” Annales E.S.C., 46 (1991), pp. 917–49.Google Scholar
White, Eugene N., “Financing the French Revolution: A New Look at the Assignat Inflation,” (Rutgers University, mimeo, 1985).Google Scholar
White, Eugene N., “The Stock of Paper Money During the French Revolution,” (Rutgers University, mimeo, 1987).Google Scholar
White, Eugene N., “Was There a Solution to the Ancien Régime’s Financial Dilemma?” this Journal, 49 (09. 1989), pp. 545–68.Google Scholar
White, Eugene N., “Measuring the French Revolution’s Inflation: The Tableau de dépréciation,” Histoire et mesure 6 (1991), pp. 245–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilcox, David W., “The Sustainability of Government Deficits: Implications of the Present-Value Borrowing Constraint,” Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, 21 (08. 1989), pp. 291306.Google Scholar
Woloch, Isser, The New Regime: Transformations of the French Civic Order, 1789–1820s (New York, 1994).Google Scholar