Commerce, capitalism and the political culture of the French Revolution

History o/European Ideas, Vol Printed in Great Britam

I I, pp 89-105. 1989

0191.6599189 $3 OO+O.OO Pergamon Press plc

COMMERCE, CAPITALISM AND THE POLITICAL CULTURE OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION WILLIAM SCOTT*

A common revisionist view holds that ‘no serious historian would now argue that any significant group set out to introduce capitalism into France in 1789’, this verdict being intended to refute the idea of the French Revolution as a ‘bourgeois revolution’, carried out consciously by and in the interests of the commercial classes.’ It is also, however, frequently stated that no one ‘intended’ to promote a revolurion in 1789, especially since the modern sense of the word ‘revolution’ largely derives from the French Revolution itself. Given that the term ‘capitalism’ dates from the 182Os, the risks involved in applying it anachronistically to the French Revolution are indeed acute. However, while neither words nor intentions are all-important, questions relating to the historical agents’ mastery over discourse, or the related problems concerning their motivations and purposes, are undoubtedly central to current debates on the significance of the French Revolution. Those whom we now call ‘the revolutionaries’ grappled with the bewildering newness of the events with which they were associated and struggled to master them by processes of naming, explanation, interpretation, in order to confer meaning on them-or extract it from them. Any mastery attained, like the multitude of interpretations hazarded, was precarious and problematic. To try to explain and to direct what they were doing, the revolutionaries drew on conflicting currents of thought and complex attitudes. Enlightenment values permeated the Revolution, at least its early years, but this was an already fragmented Enlightenment, as vital and fruitful in its divisions and contradictions as in any superficial or apparent unity based on reason or natural law. Intensely self-conscious, much less sure of themselves than is often even now asserted, philosophes gave a large place in history to conflict and contradiction. What progress had occurred was hard fought for. Victory was never decisive. Often harmony meant inertia, so struggle was a sign of vitality. Only under despotism did peace-or silence-prevail. Moreover, progress was often the unintended consequence of ‘rivalit&’-a ‘rivalitt’ certainly becoming less red in tooth and claw, no longer fought out just on the battlefield but, increasingly consciously, in scientific and artistic emulation (and cooperation) in the realms of discovery, invention, but also via economic competition. This competition was sometimes seen as a basis of rivalry in other spheres. Rivalry pitted nation against nation, but also social group against social group. Each group affirmed not only its interests but also its ideas and values.2 Economic rivalry, as a motor of progress, had brought impressive gains by *Department of History, University of Aberdeen, Taylor Building, Kings College, Old Aberdeen AB9 2UB, U.K. 89

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1789 for France and Europe. From the sixteenth century, so the conventional account had it, commercial growth had borne on its back enlightenment, with ideas exchanged as commodities. Moeurs had been civilised and ideas of liberty disseminated. This had been an historic struggle against obstacles (feudal, religious, intellectual-or unconscious mental blockages). Despite fatalistic and obscurantist opposition, progress had broadly prevailed. A fine, short exposition of the theme of progress despite obstacles, was given in February 1790 by the abbe Morellet before the Comite des contributions publiques of the Constituent Assembly.3 It was, he said, a consoling truth that, despite the faults of governments and their frequent dissipation of public wealth, this wealth had nevertheless been increased ‘insensiblement’, by the sole (but presumably unto-ordinated) effect of the application and hard work of individuals in those nations which had made some social progress. There was more thrift than luxury, more care than negligence. Despite waste in the upper ranks of society, the mass of the people had increased the general wealth. Travellers who had visited Britain, Spain, Italy, France, at an interval of fifteen or twenty years, could see this increase in prosperity. It was ‘sensible a l’observation’. Certainly it was a cliche to celebrate commerce, and sometimes even commer~ants (the distinction is important and was often made). Many eminent merchants, proud of their profession, praised its contribution to prosperity, liberty and civilisation. Such merchants played a major role in 1789 and were more influential in and around the National Assembly than their relatively small number might suggest. The Third Estate, far from creating absolute ‘newness’ in 1789, based their thrust for power effectively and consciously on a view of history, an anti-noble, anti-feudal view of history, in which economic growth played a major role. ‘Dans le siecle le plus Cclairi: qui ft?it jamais, il [the Third Estate, in the words of the merchants of Saint-Ma101 peut dire avec v&rite que ces lumieres sont sorties de son sein. Les decouvertes et la navigation, la communication que le commerce a etabli entre les hommes, les progrts des arts, les speculations des vrais savants, meme les r&veries des philosophes, tout est tmant du Tiers-Etat.‘4 Portrayed most optimistically, commerce might embody the ideas of ‘libertt, tgalitt, fraternitt’ and its values permeate the new political culture. For trade was practised freely between persons and peoples equally concerned with mutual benefit. Collectively, trade equalised social classes. It was a world-wide pacific force which encouraged fraternal feelings as it linked humanity. This optimistic view of history gave shape to the consciousness of the revolutionaries in 1789 and, up to a point, to the events ofthat year. And, in 1789 as before, obstacles to progress were seen as a stimulus to both thought and action. Risking anachronism, then, we would like to position ‘capitalism’ within this perspective. We do not propose to define this term, still less to select a limited number of factors deemed as essential to such a definition-or even its key. But we do suggest that, speaking of trade positively first, we can penetrate through this outer zone of generalised approval for commerce, to take note thereafter of the precise economic demands and indeed programmes which were formulated in 1789, often by men who were themselves traders or manufacturers or by writers who considered themselves-with justification, for a Roederer or Boislandrys-as

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political economists; that is, men who could give a comprehensive analysis of the workings of the economy_ Or they essayed such an analysis, using the events of the Revolution to refine their economic thought but also deploying its concepts to allow entry into the meaning and significance of events (including political ones), and thus gain the mastery which might help them ‘make’ history. Britain’s economic growth obsessed the French and provided a referencepoint, even a framework, for their thoughts. And, as Francois Crouzet has shown, virtually all modern explanations of ‘the superiority of Britain over France’ were then rehearsed.6 Writers put forward comprehensive programmes demand, to mechanise, to introduce industrial to ‘catch up’- to stimulate training schemes, to pursue policies which would release capital for industry, to change attitudes, to create a climate of opinion where enterprise would flourish. The optimum size of firms, the application of science to industry, the identification of pilot industries, the provision of infrastructural assistance, the supply of cheap credit to manufacturers, the creation of a free labour market-these, and other kindred problems, were incessantly discussed, not necessarily with agreement emerging, still less practical realisations. Above all, to rival Britain, comprehensive reform was needed, to remove all religious, feudal, fiscal and administrative restrictions which, despite the very real advance of commerce, still remained. Overwhelmingly the emphasis was placed on private endeavour, on rivalry and competition within and outwith France. Crucial was the raising of the general level of demand, by producing for a more prosperous peasantry. Above all, a class of inventive, small-scale entrepreneurs was to be formed, as allegedly existed in England, and a peasantry (as did not perhaps exist in England), a peasantry of middling proprietors. The two extremes which haunted eighteenth-century France, luxury and poverty, were to be excluded. * * * Let us document some of these assertions. We deliberately use disparate material, not attempting to give a comprehensive, or even narrowly coherent, account of ‘economic thought’ in this period. Instead, we wish to suggest that many of these problems are interlinked, often indeed circular, leading back into each other. Yet, cumulatively, the proposals which we note point forward to a society recognisably more modern and more ‘capitalist’ in form. It is clear, however, that much criticism of France’s government and society was already based on economic grounds. A Le Havre merchant, Stanislas Foache, lamented French weakness at the time of the American War and urged the need to ‘ranimer chez nous l’esprit national, d’ameliorer le sort des travailleurs, d’augmenter la masse du travail. Si le gouvernement ne s’en occupe pas eflicacement, on verra peu 2 peu la France s’appauvrir, sa population diminuer; s’affaissant tous les jours sous le poids de ses charges, elle sera rnalheureuse au-dedans et mtprisee au dehors’.’ In 1788, with the States General in mind, Foache wrote a pamphlet comprehensively criticising the existing state of affairs and pointing the way to a more prosperous future.’ France-British comparisons informed all his remarks, and often dominated them. As a Frenchman, he said, he deplored the fact that a rich Englishman coming to France would increase his ‘jouissances’, while a poor man from France would

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improve his lot in England. Nothing more clearly characterised the difference in outlook between the governments of the two countries. The French government was attentive only to the needs of the rich and powerful (‘on y appercoit encore les traces de la ftodalite’) whereas the British government attended to the happiness of the people. The French government should give a greater priority to economic questions. There was no ‘systeme commercial’ in France. The administration should not control trade but should encourage and guide it, with some unity of conception. The woeful neglect of France’s economic interests by the Foreign Ministry, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of the Marine, contrasted with the solicitude of their British counterparts. At Paris, trade was unappreciated. Paris was a centre of finance, of frenzied speculation in shares of dubious provenance. Even the banks of Paris did nothing for trade. Financial speculation bled trade and industry of capital by keeping interest rates high. Advocating protection for French industry, Foache called for mechanisation. New industries should be founded since ‘C’est la multiplication des fabriques qui conduit a la subdivision du travail, d’oh rtsulte le bon marche de la maind’oeuvre, m&me en payant la journte de l’homme plus cher’. For Foache favoured higher wages for the workers. This would come, he thought, from political and social reforms designed to give a greater measure of freedom to trade-for ‘c’est l’action du commerce qui met la concurrence en faveur du travailleur, qui force l’homme riche de payer plus cher sa journte, et qui repare, en quelque sorte, les inconvtnients de l’intgalitt’. Trade could not flourish where men-of the humble classes-were counted for so little. The government should try to improve the living standards of the majority of the population. The peasants, for example, would benefit if urban lower-class consumers were more prosperous. Finally, Foache tried to instill confidence into his compatriots: there was no reason why France could not overtake Britain. This, however, would require a conscious, well-directed effort. The re-education of men of power and influence was essential, leading to a general re-moulding of mentalitks. Many complained of the economic ignorance of the government and its employees and argued the need to consult merchants, and even to create a Ministry of Commerce.9 The power of the nobility would have to be reduced, for the purchase of offices giving nobility drained capital from commerce. French industries had always to ‘begin anew’ as experienced entrepreneurs disappeared into the nobility. ‘OJust when merchants got enough money to invest on a large scale, or lend at reasonable interest, they bought a title or a terre. According to Boislandry, this ‘degraded’ commerce, making traders anxious to leave it as soon as possible. Nobility should reward perseverance in not incite desertion.” However, another trade over several generations, pamphleteer argued that nobles should be encouraged to take to agriculture, trade or industry-‘un gentilhomme, ptre d’une nouvelle manufacture ou l’inventeur d’une nouvelle Ctoffe, peut devenir le bienfaiteur de la Nation’.12 According to some historians, who perhaps exaggerate the penetration of capitalist values, this exhortation was unnecessary.13 The Jacobite entrepreneur Holker regretted that in France manufacturers were so hard pressed: they had to sell goods to merchants, as soon as they were made, in order to get money to ‘begin again’ the process of production. Manufacturers aimed to get as much money as possible to escape merchant

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domination-but then immediately bought nobility. In Britain, Holker claimed, all fibriques were exploited by men of substance,who remained for generations in the business, re-investing their capital, They could therefore get low-interest loans and had the resources to export their own products abroad . Thus the superiority of British manufacturers and the British merchant navy.i4 In Holland and Britain, wrote a pamphleteer in 1789, merchants had abundant capital and so could be content with ‘un moindre benefice’, since the profit strictly necessary to carry on a venture was, like interest rates, in inverse proportion to the capital invested. A Dutch or British millionaire, likely to get three per cent from the public funds, would be delighted with five or six per cent from a commercial investment, whereas a Frenchman would not part with his money unless assured of ten per cent. On the other hand, the ‘small investor’, always worried about getting any return on his money, was often forced to cut his losses and never ventured again. I5 While there was allegedly a lack of an entrepreneurial, risk-taking spirit in France, important efforts were made to introduce new industries, J.R. Harris referring for example to ‘the almost feverish urge of the Controller General Calonne, to establish new industrial enterprises on the English model ‘. But Harris also shows the multiple reasons why, for instance, new coal-fuel technology could not easily be transferred from England to a country where attitudes and skills were not sufficiently orientated towards economic growth and innovation.16 For Marseille, an entrepreneur, Pierre Conte, proposed in 1780 an extensive programme of industrialisation, involving the use of steam engines for milling corn, in the iron, paper and pottery industries, for rolling copper (for doubling the hulls of ships), for saw mills and the coal mines of Provence-as well as suggesting the use of coal in local glass, Pottery, brick and tile, porcelaine, distilling (and other) industries. l7 Yet-though coal’s use was expanding-little of Conte’s programme was realised. Certainly the archives of Marseille’s Chamber of Commerce show numerous projects to establish new firms-in chemicals, glass, metallurgy especially-but also the great difficulties in a country beset with regulations and divided by internal customs, and where privileges and monopolies restricted new developments and ‘contaminated’ the spirit of those who wished to enter the field. I8Yet some entrepreneurs, as well as boasting of their new techniques, their proposed use of coal, their import substitution, their transformation of cheap raw materials, the low price of their products (bottles, acids, etc.), agreed to train workers and, after a time, to disseminate their knowledge more generally. Many would-be industrialists often emphasised the large workforce they would sustain, usually stressing the benefits of employing women and children. Firms were often seen in terms of poor relief. However the situation was ambivalent, ior welfare schemes were also commercially motivated-with the abbe Montlinot commenting sardonically in 1779 that ‘Tout le fracas de nos principes politiques, reduits aux moindres termes possibles, n’ont g&e port6 que sur Part d’employer a peu de frais les hommes au service des riches’.i9 The mixture of charity and profit-making can be seen in proposals of Charles Longuet of Caen to establish a large organisation, with branches throughout France, to give work to the unemployed (at less than the going rate) and to stock raw materials bought cheaply, to raise capital, to encourage inventions and to

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train workers. This company would be big enough to ‘faire des essais en grand’. It would do the first, elementary processes for individual fabricants, paying high enough wages to retain workers, aiming to ‘even out’ employment, rather than offer big wages momentarily, in moments of strong demand, only to throw workers onto the street in crises. Thus, by regular employment, would be inculcated a love of work and an exactitude in performing tasks. Large-scale production and the division of labour would simplify each process.20 The question of mechanisation was especially controversial. Some saw it as indispensable, to meet British competition. Boyetet, for example, championed the use of British machines in the Rouen cotton industry.2’ However, the cahier of the bailliage of Rouen called for their prohibition. This incensed one pamphleteer since the bailliage of Caudebec, with a flourishing cotton industry, wanted more. France needed spinning jennies desperately.22 Manufacturers had the right to use any means of industry they could. France’s high unemployment was not due to mkcaniques. If the Eden Treaty was to be maintained, France just had to mechanise. Costs would fall, quality (despite all allegations) would improve, and consumption rise. FiIeuses could adapt to flax, or could perhaps be compensated for disruption. However, others took a different position: machines would increase unemployment and Britain used them only because she lacked labour. Within the economic sector itself, debates about the mechanics of wealthcreation were intense. The different contributions of the various sectors of the economy-in process of formation and definition-were evaluated. One anonymous author saw the interests of the economy as very different from those of commerce, and, even more so, from those of merchants.24 More vital than nkgociants were ‘ceux qui produisent et creent les objets de P&change’, not only the Physiocrats’ landowners but also-or even more so-manufacturiers and fabricants. Merchants of the booming ports, opulent and arrogant, were actually only the ‘rouliers du commerce’, mere agents, concerned mainly with transport. They exploited the real producers, those engaged in manufacturing and farming. Manufacturers gave the real value to all things produced and sold. Merchants were often accused of dealing in foreign goods, even in preference to French. However the Chamber of Commerce of Marseille argued in I785 that it was more profitable for France to import certain cotton goods made in the Levant (especially since these were of lower quality and therefore boosted popular demand). Such imports enriched foreign countries, which would buy French 25Thus, if the principles of ‘la science goods, both agricultural and manufactured. tconomique’ were better understood, the interests of merchants, manufacturers, farmers and consumers would be recognised as complementary. At Metz, Roederer argued that the interests of landowners, traders and industrialists could be harmonised in a regime of liberty such as would be instituted by the States General. Taxes which hit trade and industry also harmed agriculture. Industry provided capital, as well as goods like implements; and demand for farm produce was increasingly coming from ‘capitalistes’ and ‘ouvriers’. The ‘classe industrieuse’, which brought ‘travail’ and ‘capital’ together, was the mainstay of the state and not, as the Physiocrats had argued, ‘sterile’. Land would be useless without their capital, accumulated by their savings. Roederer stressed the importance of ‘mobile wealth’, mostly owned by

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the Third Estate. France, he argued very prematurely-but also politically, polemically-was a country where ‘la richesse mobiliaire, les capitaux placits en travaux de l’industrie exckdent de beaucoup la valeur des fonds de la terre’.26 With regard to the complexly-organised silk industry of Lyon, interesting debates sponsored by the city’s Academy attempted to grapple with relationships between merchants and artisans, the latter seen by the magistrate Servan as exploited and oppressed by the former, to the extent that they could never win 27 Some praised the division of labour between independence as manufacturers. the professions which made up the Fabrique, arguing that this was natural and functional, not dependent on the outmoded guilds or on regulations. The relationship between manufacturing and marketing was explored, while the industry was urged to give more attention to the quality of its raw materials, including silk worms. The technical problems of mechanisation were also discussed. Some writers, notably the abbe Bertholon, who won the Academy’s essay competition, portrayed the terrible living conditions of the workers-their poverty, malnutrition, diseases, insanitary houses and, above all, the long hours, passed ‘nailed to the loom’, needed to gain an inadequate wage. The workers almost exploited themselves, eating so as not to die, rather than to live. BerthoIon hoped that a comprehensive State policy of tax reform, economic expansion, technical education, would help to bring them raisance’.2s However, his rival Mayet, runner-up in the competition and an industrialist in Berlin, wanted the ,workers to remain poor (though not destitute), to enforce upon them a discipline, it seems-agitating for higher wages. ‘to prevent them-from exhaustion, Workers should not be able to save money and rise to become marchands. Other writers, for example Boislandry, referring to industry in general, thought that the French government needed to encouragefabricantsand ouvriers to attain independence, rather than lavishing aid on merchants. Otherwise, said pamphleteers in 1789, most maitres-lacking credit, always exposed to bankruptcy, adulterating their wares, or selling them at the worst possible moment-were condemned to eke out a miserable, barely subsistence living. ‘Car, qui peut aggrandir sa fabrique, la changer, ou en &lever plusieurs, si ce n’est celui qui a des fonds et du crtdit?’ With access to cheap credit, buying supplies in quantity and therefore cheaply, such firmssustained a good level of stocks and so ironed out the peaks and troughs of demand. 3oThus one of France’s tasks was to create a stratum of middle-ranking entrepreneurs, not vulnerable to being plunged into destitution by taxes on their industries, by high interest rates, by bad harvests or by the monopolistic privileges of others. Naturally all forms of tax on industry-on paper, on leather-should be abolished since, keeping fabricants impecunious, they drove out men of capital, talent and ambition, leaving the industry in the hands of stragglers, the dishonest and the desperate.3’ Connected with taxes, the abolition of exemptions and privileges was often demanded (though, in the existing situation, most would-be entrepreneurs sought privileges for themselves). Some writers expressed interesting views regarding the expansion of share-holding, though my evidence here is particularly fragmentary. JirBme Pttion, future revolutionary mayor of Paris, urged that ‘dans les grandes entreprises, on multiplie les actionnaires et les int&ressts; les priviltges exclusifs, dangereux sous mille rapports, le sont encore parce qu’elles enrichissent trop ceux qui les obtiennent’. At Marseille, in 1789, the

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avocat Chtry wanted the privileged Royal Africa Company to divide its shares so that more capitalists could subscribe.32 Finally, though difficult to document, there was also perhaps a trend towards according the consumer, especially the lower-class consumer, more importance. For Roederer, ‘Ce qui donne au negoce sa direction et decide de ses entreprises, c’est l’inttr&t du consommateur’. He concluded: ‘C’est une fausse idte de sacritier la consommation a la production. C’est sacrifier le but au moyen’.33 Many argued that France should both develop its own consumer-goods industries (like Britain) or export its luxuries (to Britain). Projects for new firms naturally advertised the popular orientation of their products. Many publicists stressed the need to increase the purchasing power of the people: Anquetil Duperron deplored the self-defeating attitudes of employers concerned only with keeping their wage-bills down.34 The economist Charles de Casaux observed in February 1789 that in Britain, since the American War, while prices and taxes had increased, the workers had been able to push up their wages-but French workers were imprisoned for trying to get pay rises. France would never be rich till her workers were better off: and the people, if kept down, would bring the rich crashing down to their level. 35 Casaux also argued that money taken from the peasantry reduced the revenue of both landowners and manufacturers.36 But French workers, alternating between periods of unemployment and high wages (which they blew on drink) could never save, nor acquire work-discipline or perfect their skills, to make products which satisfied discriminating customers. Inherently more intelligent than their foreign rivals, economic circumstances ruined and demoralised them.37 * * * Reliance on self-interest, rather than on government, was encouraged. Casaux saw economic affairs as naturally, regardless of intentions, tending towards equilibrium if-a big if-the government removed obstacles to market forces. The market imposed rational actions unconsciously: ‘et le cultivateur parfaitement eclairi: par le medium des prix, de la necessite d’augmenter, de diminuer, de continuer, ou d’abandonner telle ou telle culture, n’a besoin que de son inter&t pour maintenir le plus parfait tquilibre entre les besoins du public, m&me ses fantaisies, et les objets qui doivent y satisfaire.’ Similarly, the manufacturer could not raise his prices excessively, or demand would fall, part of his capital would lie idle. All values, argued Casaux, were based on labour and this was tending to equilibrium throughout Europe.38 Yet the coming of the States General provided the opportunity to press for the legislation of greater economic freedom. Besides the cahiers, which have been studied from the economic point of view, 39individuals proposed comprehensive programmes embodying some of the ideas outlined above. Durand, of Picardy, pinpointed the weaknesses of his province’s economy, designated industries to be boosted and trades to be developed (the northern trade, following the recent commercial treaty with Russia). English coal should be freely imported for industrial use. Other vital reforms included the overhaul of the postal and transport services, the unification of weights and measures, the abolition of internal customs, a Navy no longer dominated by the nobility, a new regime for the colonies and more trade treaties.40

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In the Constituent Assembly, men from the commercial classes were not numerous, while its latest historian, Norman Hampson, argues that economic questions were given scant attention. 4’ However its Committee of Agriculture and Commerce, (C.A.C.), and the lobby of dkpurh extraordinaires from the commercial towns, were influential .42 While there were still complaints that businessmen were not consulted, others argued that vested interests (of colonists, manufacturers, slave traders) were too readily deferred to. Provincial Jacobin clubs lobbied for the economic benefit of their regions. A large measure of economic freedom was introduced-the ending of internal customs barriers, the freeing of the East Indies trade, the deregulation of industry and the privatisation of certain assets (notably those of the Church). Some observers lyrically celebrated the freeing of trade and the predominance of commercial values (as evidenced, for example, in religious toleration43). Yet absolute free trade was never a realistic option and the revolutionary bourgeoisie cannot be branded as ‘timid’ for rarely demanding it. The merchant Beguoen expressed the common-and reasonable-view that free trade was suitable only for a nation which, through protection, had already achieved an enviable hegemony.44 Not surprisingly, many modernising impulses grew in strength. The CAC saw the encouragement of mechanisation as one of its main tasks and its minutes are full of the proposals of hopeful ‘inventors’.45 At the Jacobin Club on 20 January 1791, Papion le jeune defended the mechanisation of the cotton industry, claiming that quality would be improved. 46In 1790 Begouen suggested, before any liberalisation of trade, a programme to attract British capitalists and technicians, especially in the iron and steel industry.47 Others championed the application of science to industry (a vast subject, demanding further exploration). J.J.C. Farcot, author of one of the best programmes of economic reform, published in 1790, regretted that the discoveries of Berthollet had hardly been used in the chemical industry, since the monopolistic Rkgie despoudres had opposed anything which harmed its interests. For Farcot, a keen proponent of free trade, inventions, if they did occur in countries with prohibitions, would be neither used nor improved. Hence the small number of steam engines and spinning jennies in France and the poor state of her machine-tool industry. Farcot even advocated the free export of machines. Importing British machines would help the French machine industry to innovate and France could then export its older models. Britain’s success could be emulated by France, as was shown by the progress of certain industries since the Eden Treaty. ‘La perfection des Ctrangers developpe la n6tre’.48 Others too, like Boislandry, who claimed that France had a big trade surplus in manufactured goods (imports 45 million livres, exports 120 million4’) and the former inspector of manufactures, Brisson, listed industries in which the French excelled the British-silks, linens, etc.-showing that France was not inherently condemned to backwardness.50 Her economic confidence, however, needed boosting. There was no question of the State itself taking on excessive responsibilities. As Jean-Baptiste Plaisant argued, the administration should remove obstacles but ‘jamais elle ne peut ni ne doit faire elle-m&me le commerce, Ctablir des manufactures, ni faire des speculations pour son propre compte’. Certainly the State should subsidise canals, too important to France’s infrastructure to be left

to ‘les speculations des capitalistes’, who often saw shares merely as objects of and hardly ever finished what should be public utilities capable of revitalising the whole of France. 5’ However, it was enacted that France’s mineral wealth should not be left to landowners, to exploit or not, as they saw fit. The State should take control and cede exploitation to ‘de riches capitalistes’ who, besides their financial resources, would have to prove technical competence.s2 Proposals for canals proliferated-including one from Rhbne to Rhines3while new industries were likewise championed. Some big firms were put forward as models. A tanning factory at Pont-Audemar (Eure) showed that a big investment could give an even greater increase in production and productivity, with more workers employed and greater profit for the entrepreneur.54 Honori: Blanc, director of three arms factories, maintained that only in big concerns (forming ‘une espece d’EncyclopCdie pratique’) could workers develop their skills.55 Yet the boosting of small businesses was the main purpose of the abolition of the guilds, seen as ‘anti-enterprise’ in their ethos, draining capital for non-economic purposes (lavish expenses, lawsuits etc.). At Marseille, many manufacturers argued that a regular succession of small profits was better than a few gigantic windfalls and favoured the multiplication of medium-ranking entrepreneurs. This view won favour with the city’s patriots, who acclaimed the abolition of the guilds as preparing the way for the emergence of just such dynamic enterprises. These ideas were less popular with the great merchants, who held many of the city’s industries in their dependence. The affirmation of a ‘manufacturing interest’ in the economic sphere paralleled the importance of fabricants and artisans in the political arena.56 The debate on luxury likewise developed a political edge with justtfications of ‘un luxe raisonnable et mod&t, tel qu’il convenient a un peuple libre, qui connait et qui sent le prix du travail, qui calcule ses depenses avec son gain legitime’.57 All such terms are. of course, debatable but the emphasis on thrift and hard work was inescapable. To start small businesses. and to come to the rescue of those in difficulties, the provision of cheap credit was advocated. The CAC saw thus as a key prtority. Papion le jeune, at the Jacobin Club. deplored the concentration of wealth, orientated towards luxury consumption rather than industrtal investment.‘8 But the demise of ‘la finance’ reassured Farcot that ‘les capitaux qu’elle employait ci-devant a opprimer l’industrie, seront employ& a la relever et j I’exciter, lorsque les millions de nos capitalistes. detournes de I’agiotage. seront employ&s en manufactures, en machines, en fabriques, en speculations commerciales’. In the old regime, there had been no real banks even at Paris.“’ Jean-Francois Gavoty, an entrepreneur-inventor in the esparto (sparterie) industry, related how, after the American War. he tried to create a firm with 800 shares, of 300 livres, but this was banned by the lieutenant depolice since it would harm ‘les emprunts ouverts par le Roi’.‘O In 1789, caisses de ressource for retail merchants, artisans and small-scale manufacturers were peasants, proposed, as well as banques rut-ales to provide capital for agricultural improvements, to regularise the supply of agricultural goods and to enable the peasantry. more secure and prosperous, more innovative and curious for ‘the new’, to purchase more manufactured goods. One such scheme proposed the mortgaging of property to finance the issue of shares in return for cash supplied by the bank, these shares to be traded as interest-bearing bonds. valid for five agiotage

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years only. This would greatly boost ‘circulation’, without producing the devastating inflation of the assignals. 61 Such schemes were often linked with political reforms-with the Provincial Assemblies and the States General-for political regeneration was itself to release abundant credit. Again, the interest of consumers was crucial. Papion declared ‘Nous voulons aider tous les hommes g devenir des consommateurs’. The abolition of the guilds would benefit consumers, giving them a wider choice of products, with competition for custom improving quality and reducing prices. Boislandry emphasised the need to boost the consumption of the rural masses6* FarGot. always aware of the multiple interconnections between sectors of the economy, argued that merchants should be allowed to export even those raw materials banned or restricted, as being essential to France’s own industries (such as wool, linen etc.). For this would encourage their production, or their cultivation, in new areas, bringing improved prosperity for the peasants. now themselves consumers. Moreover, these ‘new areas’ would attract fresh industries to exploit the new crops, leading to an increase in population and, with it, demand for all sorts of manufactured goods. Yet so great would the stimulus be that both industrial and agricultural goods would become more freely available for export. FarCot naturally argued the need to favour basic industries--to feed, clothe, house the people-rather than ‘luxury’ ones. But his vision was global. Free trade would benefit consumers everywhere, whereas, ‘dans le rtgime prohibitif, au contraire, on veut que l’ttranger nous achkte ce qu’il aime le moins g recevoir de nous, et on ne veut recevoir de lui que ce qu’il aime le moins g donner’. However the French, knowing no better, were used to the crude cutlery of the Forez, rather than the superior British variety. Porcelaine, bottles etc. were also of very inferior quality. All these should be imported to improve techniques and to force down therefore inadequate consumersprices. French workers were poor-and because the workers of [most] other nations were poor too. Faqot, at least, saw that industry was in its infancy and had vast potential. He described the possibilities of machines, the application of science, especially in the chemical industry, and envisaged the creation of vast industrial plants. All this was predicated on a Constitution which, enshrining freedom, would not only employ but be animated by men of talent. France would equal or excel1 Great Bntain, the country which had hitherto enjoyed the least bad government in the world, distinguished especially by the extensive civil liberty of its citizens. Concentrating on Britain, with its vast and diversified world markets, enabling British traders to produce a wide array of goods and to switch their efforts towards where most profit lay, FarCot’s optimistic outlook nevertheless indicated that not only France, but all other countries which embraced liberty, could expand their participation without harming their rivals in what was rapidly becoming a world economy. FarGot championed a generalised freedom of trade based on a division of labour-between town and country, (with the more scientific and skill-intensive industries in the towns); between regions and between nations (Ghent for linen, Lyon for silk). An advanced nation should not attempt to establish industries which a poorer, often remote, country was bound, thanks to low wages, to excel1 in. However, it could use its ships to import these goods and export or re-export them elsewhere. Thus, in turn, these poorer countries would prosper and become

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good markets for the goods of hitherto more developed countries. Farcot envisaged the rise and fall of nations in a world economy, some nations pricing themselves out of certain fields. Only free trade could exploit an international division of labour which was complex, multi-polar and in constant movement. Struggle, yes, but conscious, peaceful, sublimated. * * * It can, of course, be argued that most French politicians were more concerned with constitutions, with ideology a la Furet, than with ‘capitalism’ (though we would stress the inter-relationship of politics and economics). More interestingly, however, it could be pointed out that many Frenchmen were, a la Rousseau, fiercely anti-capitalist. The complacent self-image of the merchants as enlightened, forward-looking and benevolent. was combated. And merchants were themselves-despite their assiduous efforts-less confident than would outwardly appear, full of suspicion and anxiety, as their correspondence shows. Anti-capitalist, like pro-capitalist, attitudes varied in intensity and in the precision with which they identified and attained their targets. From a generalised current of traditional moralising about the sins of money-grubbing, criticisms were perhaps forming themselves into a critique of specifically bourgeois forms of alienation and a specifically capitalist ethos. Moreover, there were some who saw the advent of mechanisation, though very limited in France, as heralding, as Lidon, deputy of the Correze, put it in 1793, the transformation of men into ‘instruments of labour’. attached to one task, to one machine. becoming stunted not only in body but in mind, fit only for servitude.h3 Anti-capitalist views, prevalent in the Year II, hardly need documenting. But it is striking that ‘capitalist’ and ‘anti-capitalist’ attitudes often co-exist, in sometimes abruptly unmediated forms (Lidon wanted to counter the bad effects of ‘l’esprit manufacturier’ but he also wanted industrial progress). Certainly the turbulent, conflicting times may be adduced to explain contradictions, and also the fact that France was now fighting the world’s first capitalist power. Or the underdevelopment of capitalist forms of production in France may be cited. The fact would indeed seem to be that France atlas ambiguously placed, with some progress, but so often frustrated, so that it is easy for historians to emphasise either what had been achieved or how much remained to be done. Thus capitalist and anti-capitalist attitudes cannot be straight-forwardly consrrated. The complexities of revolutionary struggles were such that few pronouncements were obviously, in themselves, either wholly pro- or anttcapitalist. The Jacobins before 1792, full of economically progressive notions. and those after 1792, imposing a ‘dictatorship over needs’, a Spartan frugality-are these so clearly different, or even opposites?6’ Behind Spartan’ autarky still lay the competition with Great Britain and, perhaps, a poliqf of industrialisation, no doubt imposed by war-imperatives, and hostile to the enlightened universalistic aspirations of commerce, but hardly unintended or fortuitous. A Jacobin champion of the Navigation Act such as Ducher pronounced that ‘le commerce exterieur doit &tre notre grande, je dirais to develop his volontiers, notre seule affaire etrangttre’.05 Roederer continued ideas. defending the cause of ‘l’accumulation des capitaux’ against levellers who Private enterprise was defended in the arms preached absolute equality.”

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industry by Carnot, for he hoped that workers hitherto under the control oftheir masters would become ‘maitres a leur tou~‘.~’ The maximum could--no doubt speciously-be justified for curbing the harmful speculations, the hoarding of rich merchants, but allowing the small trader, with his ‘multiplicite de ventes’, to make a ‘legitimate’ profit. 68 Sometimes key topics surfaced, as when on 30 June 1794 the Convention’s Committee of Commerce discussed how to revive Lyon’s industry and debated whether a proposed limit to the number of looms and workers which the new patriotic entrepreneurs were to be allowed was not a violation of their liberty, a curbing of their ge’nie, and generally bad for industry and the Republic.@ Moreover, what tortuously ambivalent attitudes inform BarPre’s speech of 22 February 1794 on the maximum, usually seen, for obvious reasons, as the antithesis of capitalism? The tableau gPnPra/was praised by Bar&e as perfecting and generalising the limited and sectarian political economy of the Physiocrats, as being the text book of ‘l’economie politique pratique’, informing government, manufacturers, traders, and consumers of the workings of the economy and preparing the ground for further economic advance.‘O And the ‘communist’ movements of the Revolution were ambivalent too.” Certainly some aimed at a totaiiy rigid, controiied and regimented society-as with the Babouvists of Marseille, dispensing with books, cities, sciences (like the Khmer Rouge).‘* But others confined their levelling to landed property, encouraging the use of machines and the freedom of mobile wealth. One ‘communist’, Jacques Grenus, proposed a scheme whereby all participants in industrial associations, including the workers. would subscribe to shares and get rewards, adequate for all, but greater for those who contributed most or showed most skill. Was this a form of workers’ participation, a type of popular capttalism? Grenus championed industrialisation, the establishment of modern factories, the conversion of France into an ‘Ctat manufacturier’ and aimed to spread ‘l’esprit commercial dans toutes les &es’. Trying to reconcile collectivism and individualism-each worker could proudly say ‘Je prends moi-meme part a l’entrepnse’-Grenus outlined schemes which foreshadowed certain nineteenthcentury experiments, attempting to harmonise social justice and economic growth.73 It seems increasingly clear that there was no vvie royale to a capitalist future. Many reform plans of the eighteenth century proposed ‘radical’ changes which would have led to absolute stagnation (in ‘utopia’, for example). Conversely, revolutionary plans to freeze change, may well have unintentionally advanced it (but not necessarily in France). 74 At least the recognition of the complexity of problems is an advance from old dogmas and preconceptions. Revisionism, as long as it does not merely replace an old one-dimensional interpretation with a ‘new’ equally unsophisticated one, is always to be welcomed. At a time when the debate on the transition from feudalism to capitalism shows signs of renewed life,” when Braudel and Wallerstein, among others, have provided new interpretations of the rise of capitalism, when the very concept of a late eighteenth-century industrial revolution in Britain is called in question, the place of the French Revolution (and of France) in the history of capitalism needs rigorous re-assessment. William Scott University of Aberdeen

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NOTES Abbreviations:

AN, ArchIves nationales,

Pans; BN, Bibliothkque

natlonale,

Paris.

1. This view, encountered most explicitly in a book review-which I did not note at the time-seems the theme of much revisionist thought, following in the footsteps of Alfred Cobban. 2. This approach to ‘the Enlightenment’ is greatly mfluenced by the essays submitted, in 1784, for a contours held by the Academy of Besan9on, asking ‘Comment la nvalite des nations peut-elle devenir un principe de leur grandeur respectif?’ The answers went beyond the ‘rivalry’ of nations. Bibliotheque municipale, Besancon, Fonds de I’Academie, Vol. 44. 3. AN, Papers of Pierre-Louts Roederer, 29 AP 84: draft, among papers which show, among other things, how much intellectual argument went on prior to the legislation of the Constituent Assembly. 4. Archives dtpartementales de l’Ille-et-Vilaine, Rennes,fonds of town archtves of SamtMalo, BB 59, Juges consuls of Saint-Malo, to colleagues at Nantes, 29 July 1788. Many of these comments on trade and traders stem from my researches on the commercial milieu at Marseille, ca 1785-1792. 5. For Roederer, Kenneth Margerison, ‘Pierre-Louis Roederer: Political Thought and Practice during the French Revolutton’, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 73 (1983). pt. 1. But, especially, hts papers, AN, Serie 29 AP. For FranqoisLouis Legrand de Boislandry, his pamphlets m British Library and Bibliotheque nationale. 6. Franpois Crouzet, De la superiorire de I’dngleterre sur la France, (Paris, 1985). 7. Maurice Begouen Demeaux, Memorial dune famille du Havre, vol. 2, Stanislas Foache, 1737-1806 (Paris, 1951) p. 84. 8. Stanislas Foache, Reflexions sur le commerce. lanavigattonet lescolonies(N.p., 1788). BN, V 17002. 9. Reformes dans I’ordre social et partrculierement dans te commerce (1788 or 1789), British Library, R 510(6). 10. A.H. Anquetil Duperron, Dignite du commerce et de l’etat de commer$ant (Paris, 1789) British Library, 282 d 2. 11. F.L.L. de Boislandry, in Un Pconomiste versatllats, memoire de Boislandry sur les manufactures. . (1787), by J.F. Thtnard, BN, 8”R Piece 3977, (pp. 14-15). 12. Reponse aux observations dun citoyen d’Amiens, (1789), British Library FR 587(l). 13. Notably, of course, Guy Chaussinand-Nogaret, who vastly exaggerates the role of nobles in the development of capitalism. See, for example, The NobiliryinEighteenthCentury France (London, 1985). 14. John Holker, Lettre de M Holkerh M. de Reyneval(29 Dec. 1785) quoted in Boyetet, Recueil de divers memoires relattfs au trarte de commerce avec I’Angleterre ( 1789?), BN. v 33043. 15. Reformes dans I’ordre social et particulierement dans le commerce (1788 or 1789) British Library, R 510(6). 16. John R. Harris, ‘Michael Alcock and the Transference of Birmingham Technology to France before the Revolution’, Journal of European Economic History 15 (Spring 1986), no. 1, pp. 7-57; quote, p.47. 17. Pierre Conte, Vues utiles a I’economiepublique (Marseille, 1780), Brittsh Library, 8207 e 2(l). 18. Archives of the Chamber of Commerce, Marseille, B20, etc. (passim), for proposals for the establishment of new industries.

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and Political Culture

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19. C.A.J.L. de Monthnot, Discours qui a remporte leprixa la Sock% royaled’agriculture h Soissons (Lille, 1779), BN, F 25592. 20. Charles Longuet, Plan d’e’tablissements tendants a I’extinction de la mendicite (Paris, 1779), BN, 8” R Piece 6692. 21. Boyetet, Recueil de divers memoires relattfs au traite de commerce avec l’dngleterre (1789), BN, V 33043. 22. Reflexions dun citoyen sur les mecaniques afiler le coton (1789), British Library, FR 425(6). 23. Mecaniques. Lettre adressee a M. le lieutenant-gtWral du bailliage de Rouen (8 April 1789), FR 425(7)-positive to mechanisation. For the opposite view, Le voeudessix sergenteries (1789), British Library, FR 587(4). 24. Lettres critiques et politiques sur les colonies et le commerce (Geneva, 1785), British Library, R 320(l). 25. Archives of the Chamber of Commerce, Marseille, 51562, draft Memoire pour la Chambre du commerce.. ., against law of 10 July 1785. 26. AN, Fonds Roederer, especially 29 AP 79 and 29 AP 90. In the former liasse, Roederer’s De la deputation aux Etats GPnPraux (1788), contains the exaggerated evaluation of the power of ‘mobile property’. 27. A.J.M. Servan, Discours sur le progres des connaissances humaines (Lyon, 1781), British Library, R 184(4). 28. Abbe Pierre Bertholon, Du commerce et des manufactures distinctives de la ville de Lyon (Montpellier, 1787) British Library, 8235 ee 9. 29. Mayet, Memoire sur les manufactures de Lyon (London, 1786), Bibliothtque municipale, Lyon, 3530689, 30. Lettre a Mr. R auteur des RPf7exions sur les fabriques nationales (1789?), British Library, FR 587(3). 31. Rapport sur l’ttat de la tannerie (1789?), British Library, FR 587(23). 32. Jerome Petion, Essai sur le mariage (Geneva, 1785), BN, Rz 3509; Chtry, avocat, Observations pour servir de supplement au cahier general des doleances (1789), Bibliothtque municipale, Marseille, Fonds de Provence, 5013. 33. Pierre-Louis Roederer, Question d’economie publique (1788). AN, 29 AP 86. 34. Anquetil Duperron, opcit. 35. AN, 29 AP 10, letter from Charles de Casaux to Roederer, 15 Feb. 1789. 36. Charles de Casaux, Questions aexaminer avant I’AssemblPe des Etats Generaux (1789), BN, Lb39 737. 37, Lettre a M.R. auteur des ReJtexions sur le commerce national (1789?), British Library, FR 587(3). 38. Charles de Casaux, Considerations sur quelques parties du mecanisme des societes, 5 vols (London, 1785-88), in Seconde Suite des Considerations (1787) p. 38. 39. P. Bonnassieux, Examen des cahiers de 1789 au point de vue commercial et industriel (Paris, 1884), and R. Picard, Les cahiers de 1789 au point de vue industriel et commercial (Paris, 1910). 40. Durand, (no initials given), Observations et Refi’exions politiques sur le commerce (Paris, 1789), British Library, F 219(2). 41. Norman Hampson, Prelude to Terror, The Constituent Assembly and the Failure of Consensus, 1789-1791 (Oxford, 1988). 42. Consult F. Gerbaux and Ch. Schmidt, Pro&s-verbaux des Comites d’agriculture et du commerce, 4 vols (Paris, 1906-10). 43. For example, at Marseille, the author of Rdf7exions adressees le 25 mai 1790 a M. de Mirabeau, British Ltbrary, F 290(7). 44. J.F. Begouen, Discours.. sur le commerce de I’Inde(Paris, 1789?), British Library, F 530(5).

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45.

See the Plan de travaux of the CAC (8 May 1790). J.F. Papion le jeune, Adresse sur les moyens deprosperite du commerce (Paris, 1791), British Library, R 51 l(9). 47. Begouen, Opznion de M. Begouen.. (Paris, 1790), British Library, 284 k8 (vol. 38 of

46.

Pro&s-verbal 48.

49. 50. 51. 52. 53.

54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64.

65. 66. 67. 68.

de I’dssemblee

constituante).

J.J.C. Farcot, Questions constitutionnelles sur le commerce et l’mdustrie (Paris, 1790). Farcot was a merchant, and suppleant to the National Assembly (for Paris). British Library, FR 581(l). Boislandry, Opinion de Louis Boislandry sur le projet de tartf( 1790), BN, Lez9 1136. Brisson, Memoire de quelques inspecteurs des manufactures (Beauvais, 1790), BN, Vp 13412. Jean-Baptiste-Edme Plaisant, Memoire sur les travauxpubltcs (Paris, 1791), BN, Vp 2095. AN, AD XI 74, Regnaud d’Epercy,Rapport des comitks reunis de Constitution (etc.) 30 Jan. 1791). See, for example, the enthusiastic endorsement of one such project, by the merchants of Marseille, Avis des negociants de la villedeMarseille(8 Feb. 1790), British library. R 633(2). Rapport sur l’etat de la tannerte (1790?), British Library, FR 587(23). AN, AD XI 74, Honor6 Blanc, Memoire important sur la fabrication des armes de guerre (Paris, 1790). These conclusions derive from my researches at Marseille, notably in the Archives of the Chamber of Commerce. Jean-Baptiste-Edme Plaisant, Memoire sur les travauxpublics (Paris, 1791). BN, Vp 2095. J.F. Papion, op. ctt. J.J.C. Farcot, op. cit. AN, AD XI 73, Jean-Francois Gavoty, Memoire a MM les deputes a I’Assemblee nationale (Paris, 179 1). Schemes suggested by Le Blanc de I’Arbreaupre, at AN. AD XI 61. Boislandry, Opmion de LOUIS Botslandry, sur le projet de tartf( 1790). BN, Lez9 1136. Bernard-Francois Lidon, Projet d’orgamsatton de laforce armie(Paris, 1793), British Library, R 264(33). See Michael L. Kennedy, The Jacobin Clubs in the French Revolution. The First Years (Prmceton. 1982) and, in a different world, Ferenc FehCr, The Frozen Revolutton: An Essay on Jacobinism (Cambridge, 1987). AN, AD XI 63. G.J.A. Ducher, Acte de navigatron avec ses rapports au commerce (1793-Year II). AN, 29 AP 90, Roederer’s lessons on ‘la science sociale’, to Paris LycCe(Spring 1793). AN, AD XI 74, Lazare Carnot, Rapport sur la manufacture extraordmatred’armes, 13 brumarre II (3 November 1793). AN, AD XI 75, Claude Boyer, Observations importantes sur le decret du 29 septembre 1793.

69.

70. 71. 72.

73.

F. Gerbaux and C. Schmidt, Proces-verbaux des Comttes dagriculture et de commerce (4 vols, Paris, 1906-1910), vol. 4, pp. 394ff.. 12 messidor II. AN, AD XI 75. B. Bartre, Rapportfatt au nom du Comite de salutpublic. 4 vent&e II. Les idles commumstes pendant la Revolutton See, for example, A. Ioannissian, francaise (Moscow. 1984). Mentioned in W. Scott, Terror and Repression in Revoluttonary Marsetlle (London, 1973), p. 334. Jacques Grenus, Essai sur les ressources de la France (Paris, Year IV), BN 8OV 5772; Faisons nos montres cher nous (Sacconnex, n.d.), BN, V 46463; etc.

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74. The ‘progress’ of capitalism being an international phenomenon, what may have hindered accumulation in France-proceeding from either indigenous or foreign developments-may have boosted it elsewhere. 75. Most recently, R.J. Holton, The Transition from Feudalism to Capitalism (London, 1985).