ascending class (the bourgeoisie) not yet quite strong enough. Napoleon
held the ring, so to speak, by a trans-class coalition of peasantry and
bourgeoisie based ultimately on the sale of national property. Napoleon
was not a man of the Revolution, but it was the economic upheaval of the
Revolution that made his autocracy possible.
By 1794 the feudal yoke had been thrown off and more than a third of
all peasants in the north and east of France had acquired enough
confiscated real estate to assuage the worst land-hunger. Overwhelmingly
the 'national' property seized from emigres, aristocrats and the clergy had
been bought up by peasants. One survey shows over 70% of such lands
being transferred to the peasantry between 1789-1799, with another ro%
acquired by dealers and merchants, ro% by lawyers and 7-8% by former
noblemen and returning emigres. Upper peasants (those who owned their
own land and employed others to work it) were major beneficiaries from
the Napoleonic era: in time of famine, particularly in r8or, they grew rich
thanks to capital investment and the productivity of their lands; and in
time of war they benefited from increased trade outlets following
Bonaparte's victories.
The lower peasants or rural proletariat - those who owned no land and
worked as journeyman labourers for others - profited from the shortage
of farm hands following conscription. There was a zo% rise in their
wages between 1798-r8rs, enabling some of them to buy small amounts
of national property, such as individual fields, and thus become middle
peasants, working their own land. By becoming conscious of their scarcity
value, and hence power, as a result of conscription, these journeymen
workers annoyed the upper peasants, especially �hen the hitherto pliable
rural proletariat acquired their own servants - a kind of 'sub-proletariat'
of cowherds, shepherds, carters, etc. Under pressure from the upper
peasants, Napoleon was forced to head off excessive pay rises by
forbidding servants and seasonal labourers and harvesters to form unions
or associations.
Yet unquestionably the greatest beneficiaries of the Napoleonic period
were the moneyed elite, or upper bourgeoisie, who enjoyed continuous
good fortunes from before 1789 to r8r5. The big business people and
bankers of the ancien regime were also the plutocrats of the Napoleonic
empire. Behind them in economic fortunes, but still doing well, were the
middle bourgeoisie from politics and administration and the new breed of
post-Thermidor entrepreneurs, speculators in national property, colonial
produce, assignats and military supplies; men from this stratum often
ascended to the upper bourgeoisie through conspicuous success or
intermarriage. In Napoleon's time the foundations for a true bourgeois
marcin
(Marcin)
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