History 333: Never-Ending Revolution? The French Experiment, 1789-2002

Liberté, fraternité, égalité were the watchwords of the Revolution of 1789.  Revolutionaries believed that equality and liberty were universal values, applicable to all people and societies. Yet it took at least three more revolutions and substantial bloodshed to even begin to implement this vision. This course explores the ongoing struggle in France and its colonies over who could claim the supposedly universal rights of equality and why -- peasants? workers? women? colonial subjects? immigrants? We will also ask how French visions of human rights were woven into the history of Europe as whole and have helped determine our contemporary definitions of democracy. Topics include social and cultural struggles as well as political ones, acknowledging the breadth of what liberty, fraternity, and equality meant to historical actors.