Origins of the French Welfare State

Poor Relief in the Third Republic, 1871-1914

Dados Bibliográficos

ID8940931
AutoresJohn Weiss (autor correspondente), John H Weiss (0000-0001-9323-7813)
Ano1983
Volume13
Fascículo1
Páginas47-47
Data de publicação1983-01-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoFrench Historical Studies (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0016-1071 • E-ISSN: 1527-5493
EditoraJSTOR (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/286593
OpenAlexW2317132501
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas22

Nowhere did Revolutionary France better reflect the generosity and optimism of the Enlightenment than in its social policies. If in some fields (such as education) these policies produced a limited number of real accomplishments, however, the First Republic's hopes for a new system of poor relief met almost complete frustration. Alan Forrest's recent study of the Revolution's impact upon the poor concludes that the implementation of a shift from Church-based charite to state-directed bienfaisance was an impossible goal. The economy of the 1790s could not produce the wealth required to support such a program; wars diverted available resources while further impoverishing families too poor to purchase substitutes for conscripted sons; the intensely localistic communities in the South and West remained impervious to appeals for national cooperation; and the Jacobin approach based on legislating in Paris surrendered the effectiveness of local flexibility for the ideological purity of uniformity. Revolutionary policy on poor relief assumed the administrative trappings of a modern state, a habit of national legislation, and a steady bureaucratic rhythm which were unknown in the eighteenth century and which were impossible to conjure up in the political turmoil of the Revolutionary decade.' Between 1871 and 1914, on the other hand, such obstacles were absent or disappearing. Warfare was confined to episodes in the colonies. The generations from Napoleon I to Napoleon III had accustomed France to a steady bureaucratic rhythm, pulsing from

Economic history · Political science · Poor relief · State (computer science · The Republic · Theology · Welfare · Welfare state · Computer Science · European Political History Analysis · French Historical and Cultural Studies · History · Law · Philosophy