Which of these three Revolutions do you think is more important/influential?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I’m a big fan of general histories, especially general world histories, and I’m currently reading the 7th edition of A History of the Modern World by R. R. Palmer and Joel Colton (Alfred A. Knopf, 1992) which was originally published in 1950. I reached chapter 11 and found the following sentence:

I’ll go on with my thoughts later, but wanted to see what others thought.

For the purposes of this thread, we’re going to focus on the three great Revolutions that occurred in Western Civ in the 45-year period between 1770-1815: The American Revolution, the French Revolution, and the Industrial Revolution. Please vote for the order of Revolutions that you think have been most influential, in decreasing order. For example, if you think that the French Revolution is more important than the American Revolution which is more important than the Industrial Revolution, then you would vote “French, American, Industrial.”

It would be appreciated if you wrote something to explain your vote!

Here are some ground rules:

  1. The voting is public. Why? Because.
  2. You define “importance” or “influential”, not me. If you want to look at it on a global scale, that’s fine. If you’re concerned with how it affected just your neck of the woods, that’s fine too. See rule #5 :slight_smile:
  3. Don’t worry about other Revolutions that you may think are more important (Russian Revolution, Scientific Revolution, etc) - that’s another thread.
  4. You may think that Napoleon is completely separate from the French Revolution, you may think they’re part and parcel of the same Revolution. For this discussion, I’m going to lump them both together.
  5. Again, please spend a few minutes explaining your vote.
    Thanks! And, of course, poll to follow.
2

Didn’t vote because although I would say the Industrial Revolution was the most important I don’t know enough about the French or American revolutions to weigh them.

It did make me look up the famous (but apparently misinterpreted) quote by Zhou Enlai when asked in the 1970’s about the impact of the French Revolution, “It is too early too tell”

A pity, because I always liked that one!

3

The French Revolution drew a large amount of influence from the American no? Not saying it wouldn’t have happened if America lost, but that and the fact that the French led to a brief, bloody, Republic, and shifted to, at various times, two Empires, two Kingdoms, another Republic before settling into a (relatively) stable Third Republic suggests that its influence or effect was smaller. Never mind the head chopping.

4

Industrial > American > French

I can look around my house and see all kinds of objects whose origins are in the industrial revolution: clothing, electric lights, anything made of steel, air conditioner, etc… Every day throughout our lives, we are surrounded by the products of the industrial revolution. Add on the reshaping of society that resulted from it and the industrial revolution clearly wins.

The American revolution is more important than the French revolution because the USA has had a much larger impact on the world than France during the past 240 years. Obviously the influence of the French revolution traveled outside France during the Napoleonic wars, but the influence of the American revolution spread outside the USA as well.

5

The Industrial Revolution is, I think, clearly more of an influence on the whole world than politics in any one country.

The American Revolution established the first modern republic. The French Revolution established, or at least wound up with, Napolean Bonaparte. The consequences were therefore much delayed, and so less immediately influential.

Regards,
Shodan

6

You missed out the English Civil War {and perhaps even more importantly its sequel, The Glorious Revolution of 1688} precisely because it avoided another civil war}, which I’d argue was the most important of all. Constitutionally it laid the framework for the British parliamentary system - and thus the American one - for the next 300 years. The relative political stability of the 18th Century and the shift of power from the King to the Commons enabled an increase in prosperity and a transition from the domestic to the international sphere, laying down modern systems of banking which funded the Industrial Revolution. Meanwhile the French had “tyranny tempered by epigram”, and a monrachy which raised money by tax farming until it all ended in tears.

7

The thing about the American Revolution is that it was not really a revolution at all, it was a colonial war of independence. It did not do much to change the economic or power structure of the lands in which it took place, it simply separated them from the overlordship of the colonial power.

Real revolutions turn their society upside down. That is where the metaphor comes from.

Do any oterh countries apart from America itself natively (i.e., without having imported it via translation of American usage) even use the expression “American Revolution”? In Britain, we refer to it as the “American War of Independence”. In any case, whatever you call it, it is, for obvious reasons, far more important to Americans than to the rest of the world, and has only long after become significant to the rest of the world because America happens to have grown (for reasons that have little to do with its particular political system) into a much larger and more important country than it was at the time. If it were not for that, its “Revolution” wold be no more significant than the struggles by which, for instance, Peru became free from Spain.

The French Revolution, by contrast, was a real revolution that did completely overturn the power structure of what was then one of the most powerful countries in the world (and, even now, if far more important in world terms than America was in the decades following independence), and had a deep and ongoing effect of the politics and societies of the other wealthy and powerful countries of the time.

8

I once saw a demonstration of weaving by hand. It was incredibly slow and tedious. I had known in an intellectual sense that the Industrial Revolution was really important, but seeing that demonstration helped bring the point home.

9

I voted American, French, Industrial.

American 1st for establishing the fact that colonies could separate from the empires, French 2nd to establish that suppressed people could remove established governments that not serve their needs, and the Industrial for the raised standard of living that brought about.

The only alternative I considered was placing the industrial 1st, but decided against that as I value the material goods less than the independence of people. I also feel the historical importance is in the same order.

10

Industrial, French, American.

Industrial is most important for obvious reasons. I’d say the French Revolution was more important than the American because it was more of a genuine revolution. It overturned an entire existing order- feudal, monarchical, Catholic- and replaced it with a new order, down to changing the names of the months. And most importantly of course, it was a key step in the process of replacing feudalism with capitalism. In a sense you could say it accomplished both what the 1640s and 1688 revolutions, and the American war of independence, accomplished, all rolled into one. But then went even further.

It had a tremendous influence on political and ideological thought, too: Marxism grew largely out of attempts to understand the French Revolution and why it failed, and 19th-20th century right-wing thought (including most obviously Fascism) was largely borne out of the reaction to the Revolution.

11

This was already addressed in the OP, rule #3. :slight_smile:

Don’t argue the hypothesis! :stuck_out_tongue:

12

Like I said, I enjoy reading general histories - not one to read 500 pages on the Treaty of Utrecht without tossing the book aside in boredom, but 500 pages of the history of risk management or salt or just “World History Explained by a Brit” sits fine with me.

Having read a fair number of these books, one of the things I’ve noticed is that earlier histories place a lot of importance on the French Revolution, while later histories don’t place the same level of import on it.

For example, the book I’m reading (and referenced in the OP) is the sort of history that drove me crazy when I was being taught it in high school - that the only thing that really mattered was the government, the forms of government, and the changes within those governments. The development of Prussia earned half a chapter, while the invention of the printing press earned half(!) a sentence. I got to page 250 before a single mention was made of general cultural changes - so far the book has covered from 1400-1763 and not a single mention of Copernicus, Newton, Galileo, etc (they have their own chapter, as if they were apart from the overall development of real (i.e., political) history).

So, the idea that it is “arguable” that the IR might be more important than the FR is, imho, frankly laughable. Of course the Industrial Revolution is more important than either one - it is the great barrier that prevents us moderns from truly understanding how our forebears lived. Imagine living in a world in which everything is hand-made - it’s pretty much impossible for us, and were we thrust into a world like that, we would just hate it.

So when I read the above quote, I wanted to see if things had changed (though, admittedly, none of us are paid historians (I assume)). The polling is going about how I thought it would, but I would not be surprised if, 50-100 years ago, it would have gone “French, …”

I chose “Industrial, French, American” myself, because the French Revolution was such a game-changer among the world’s leading civilization for so long - one can even argue that without the FR, America wouldn’t be the power we are today as our national development might still be checked by a French border along the Mississippi. The American Revolution, while an inspiration to those who came here, was muted in its effect on the overall development of modern civilization until, say, 1914, while the French Revolution was immediate in its impact. ETA: Also what Hector said.

Enjoying the conversation and the votes - I appreciate your comments, and feel free to keep them up.

13

Industrial, by a mile (comparing technology with Politics is an interesting idea, and not all that good of a one).
It affected the way we live - the damned alarm clock is universal because we have to be one time for our shift - especially in the days machines did NOT run themselves.

The American revolution established that a bunch of hot heads in a wealthy (relatively) colony could rebel and get away with it, if the Mother country didn’t put up a fight. (give it up - if determined, GB could have drawn and quartered every signer of the Declaration Of Independence, and leveled any home suspected of harboring a rebel - see Israel and Palestine).
The effect was largely whose pockets were lined, not what developments came about. For every invention claimed by the US, there were others doing the same thing at the same time. The the Wrights really beat the French team putting an engine on a glider? The Cotton Gin was a purely American device - we were the place to go for cotton. That is caused a huge boom in the importation of African slaves was also an strictly American thing.

The French were (and are) Catholic. Catholics say their Our Fathers and Hail Marys for every impure thought they have. Or so thought the Royals. For Catholics to rebel on that order (and with that zeal - damn! they went at it!) was unthinkable.
Industrial - Worldwide, changed everything about how we live, to this day. Some office workers get flex time and telecommuting - but only a few, and this is now a new, radical idea.

French - a major European Monarchy for hundreds of years - done in by CATHOLIC peons.

American - a colony slips away and enriches its Rich instead of the British Crown.

14

I said IFA. I said that because they were immediately world altering. The American revolution needed us to become a military power to stick. We barely won the War of 1812, and you could argue we didn’t actually win.

15

You can’t compare [del]apples to oranges[/del] political revolutions to technological ones.

Well, yeah, you can, but they’re not really meaningful comparisons.

Anyway, as stated above, the Glorious Revolution is more important than the French or American, and I’d say that the Magna Carta is right up there too.

16

I voted Industrial, French, American.

Industrial because the results of that flowed to the power balance between classes that has led to pretty much every revolution since.

The American revolution was, as others have said, not revolutionary. The same folk remained in charge in America as far as I can tell - it’s just shrugged over a set of extra colonial masters who had very little influence by then.

The French revolution was the chief influence on what happened later in much of Europe and did indeed change the whole cast of the country. Napoleon Bonaparte, let alone Napoleon III or the brief Louis XVIII period, did not bring a revision to monarchical systems really - so much had changed in local government and society.

The English Civil Wars were more revolutionary but chiefly religious and the power base reverted to the monarchy after a short time. The move to bring in William of Orange, on our constitutional terms, was the truly revolutionary act.

17

Like most people, I put industrial first, by a long way. For me it was a bit of a toss up between French and American, but as has been pointed out, the American was just overthrowing the colonials, whereas the French upturned the whole power structure. So I went for French as a distant second, American third. I suspect those putting these last two the other way round may be voting based on how both personally affect them as Americans, though there are neutral arguments you can put forward in favour of American.

So basically, what njtt said.

18

I voted IAF, but after reading the replies, I might have reversed the last two. I downrated the French largely because of the Terror and multiple instabilities that resulted. What are they up, is it the fifth republic? Not to mention a few monarchies.

What would have happened without the American rebellion (as my wife’s English friend terms it)? Well, Canada got de facto independence in 1867, only 91 years later and with no battles. They only got de jure independence in 1982 (IIRC), but there was no meaningful change. Of course they are saddled with a parlaiment and a queen, but them’s the breaks.

But the industrial revolution wins hands down.

19

I don’t find that many people argue that we did win.

ETA: pretty much the dictionary picture for “stalemate.”

20

The American and French revolutions both owe a lot to the general Enlightenment ideals. Certainly that movement is more important than either revolution.

However, if I have to rate one revolution as more important than the other, I’d give it to the American. By virtue of being first, it was an inspiration to apply Enlightenment ideas elsewhere and thus any importance you ascribe to the French revolution should also be ascribed to the American revolution.

For those who say that not much changed in America after the revolution… Essentially, the only thing that changed were ideas. Ideas, of course, are totally irrelevant in the course of history. :rolleyes: