Abstract
"Great revolutions which succeed make the causes which produced them disappear, and thus become incomprehensible because of their own success" (1), wrote Alexis de Tocqueville one hundred and fifty years ago. Yet, we will try all the same to understand what the origins of the French Revolution were: economically, politically, socially and also ideologically. Many historians explain the Revolution by the economic and financial crisis which the Old Regime faced during its last years. Let us remember that, in Louis XVI's time, French economy was based above all on agriculture; more than eighty-one percent of France's global population of twenty-eight million being peasants in 1789. Therefore, it is not surprising at all that an agricultural crisis would have repercussions on every other branch of the whole economy. That's what happens in 1788. A very cold winter, in addition to the archaism of the French agricultural system, provokes a quite bad harvest. So the price of grain reaches heights. Consequences? The peasant class gets poorer, buys less industrial goods and both agriculture and industry becomes the victim of this subsistence crisis, which causes a drop in wages, an increase in prices and general unemployment and leads therefore to popular discontent.
