French Revolution of 1848 in the context of "The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte"

The revolutions of 1848, also known as the springtime of the peoples, were a series of revolutions throughout Europe over the course of over a year, from 1848 to 1849. It remains the most widespread revolutionary wave in European history to date.

The revolutions varied widely in their aims but generally opposed conservative systems, such as absolute monarchy and feudalism, and sought to establish nation states, founded on constitutionalism and popular sovereignty. The revolutionary wave began with the Sicilian revolution in January and spread across Europe after the French revolution in February 1848. Over 50 countries were affected, but with no significant coordination or cooperation among their respective revolutionaries. Some of the major political contributing factors were widespread dissatisfaction with political leadership, demands for more participation in government and democracy, for freedom of the press, and by the working class for economic rights, and the rise of nationalism. Other economic factors, such as the European potato failure, triggered mass starvation, migration, and civil unrest.

Alexis Charles Henri Clérel, comte de Tocqueville (29 July 1805 – 16 April 1859), was a French diplomat, political philosopher and historian. He is best known for his works Democracy in America (appearing in two volumes, 1835 and 1840) and The Old Regime and the Revolution (1856). In both, he analyzed the living standards and social conditions of individuals as well as their relationship to the market and state in Western societies. Democracy in America was published after Tocqueville's travels in the United States and is today considered an early work of sociology and political science.

Tocqueville was active in French politics, first under the July Monarchy (1830–1848) and then during the Second Republic (1849–1851) which succeeded the February 1848 Revolution. He retired from political life after Louis Napoléon Bonaparte's 2 December 1851 coup and thereafter began work on The Old Regime and the Revolution. Tocqueville argued the importance of the French Revolution was to continue the process of modernizing and centralizing the French state which had begun under King Louis XIV. He believed the failure of the Revolution came from the inexperience of the deputies who were too wedded to abstract Enlightenment ideals.

The July Monarchy (French: Monarchie de Juillet), officially the Kingdom of France (French: Royaume de France), was a liberal constitutional monarchy in France under Louis Philippe I, starting on 9 August 1830, with the revolutionary victory in the July Revolution of 1830, and ending on 24 February 1848, with the Revolution of 1848. It marks the end of the Bourbon Restoration (1814–1830). It began with the overthrow of the conservative government of Charles X, the last king of the main line House of Bourbon.

Louis Philippe I, a member of the more liberal Orléans branch of the House of Bourbon, proclaimed himself as Roi des Français ("King of the French") rather than "King of France", emphasizing the popular origins of his reign. The king promised to follow the juste milieu, or the middle-of-the-road, avoiding the extremes of both the conservative supporters of Charles X and radicals on the left.

In art, realism is generally the attempt to represent subject-matter truthfully, without artificiality, exaggeration, or speculative or supernatural elements. The term is often used interchangeably with naturalism, although these terms are not necessarily synonymous. Naturalism, as an idea relating to visual representation in Western art, seeks to depict objects with the least possible amount of distortion and is tied to the development of linear perspective and illusionism in Renaissance Europe. Realism, while predicated upon naturalistic representation and a departure from the idealization of earlier academic art, often refers to a specific art historical movement that originated in France in the aftermath of the French Revolution of 1848. With artists like Gustave Courbet capitalizing on the mundane, ugly or sordid, realism was motivated by the renewed interest in the commoner and the rise of leftist politics. The realist painters rejected Romanticism, which had come to dominate French literature and art, with roots in the late 18th century.

In 19th-century Europe, "Naturalism" or the "Naturalist school" was somewhat artificially erected as a term representing a breakaway sub-movement of realism, that attempted (not wholly successfully) to distinguish itself from its parent by its avoidance of politics and social issues, and liked to proclaim a quasi-scientific basis, playing on the sense of "naturalist" as a student of natural history, as the biological sciences were then generally known.

Feminism in France is the history of feminist thought and movements in France. Feminism in France can be roughly divided into three waves: First-wave feminism from the French Revolution through the Third Republic which was concerned chiefly with suffrage and civic rights for women. Significant contributions came from revolutionary movements of the French Revolution of 1848 and Paris Commune, culminating in 1944 when women gained the right to vote.

Second-wave feminism began in the 1940s as a reevaluation of women's role in society, reconciling the inferior treatment of women in society despite their ostensibly equal political status to men. Pioneered by theorists such as Simone de Beauvoir, second wave feminism was an important current within the social turmoil leading up to and following the May 1968 events in France. Political goals included the guarantee of increased bodily autonomy for women via increased access to abortion and birth control.

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (/ˈpruːdɒ̃/, also US: /pruːˈdoʊn/; French: [pjɛʁ ʒozɛf pʁudɔ̃]; 15 January 1809 – 19 January 1865) was a French anarchist, socialist, philosopher, and economist who founded mutualist philosophy and is considered by many to be the "father of anarchism". He was the first person to call himself an anarchist, and is widely regarded as one of anarchism's most influential theorists. Proudhon became a member of the French Parliament after the Revolution of 1848, whereafter he referred to himself as a federalist. Proudhon described the liberty he pursued as the synthesis of community and individualism. Some consider his mutualism to be part of individualist anarchism while others regard it to be part of social anarchism.

Proudhon, who was born in Besançon, was a printer who taught himself Latin in order to better print books in the language. His best-known assertion is that "property is theft!", contained in his first major work, What Is Property? Or, an Inquiry into the Principle of Right and Government (Qu'est-ce que la propriété? Recherche sur le principe du droit et du gouvernement), published in 1840. The book's publication attracted the attention of the French authorities. It also attracted the scrutiny of Karl Marx, who started a correspondence with its author. The two influenced each other and they met in Paris while Marx was exiled there. Their friendship finally ended when Marx responded to Proudhon's The System of Economic Contradictions, or The Philosophy of Poverty with the provocatively titled The Poverty of Philosophy. The dispute became one of the sources of the split between the anarchist and Marxist wings of the International Working Men's Association. Some such as Edmund Wilson have contended that Marx's attack on Proudhon had its origin in the latter's defense of Karl Grün, whom Marx bitterly disliked, but who had been preparing translations of Proudhon's work.

Louis Philippe I (6 October 1773 – 26 August 1850), nicknamed the Citizen King, was King of the French from 1830 to 1848, the penultimate monarch of France, and the last French monarch to bear the title "King". He abdicated from his throne during the French Revolution of 1848, which led to the foundation of the French Second Republic.

Louis Philippe was the eldest son of Louis Philippe II, Duke of Orléans (later known as Philippe Égalité). As Duke of Chartres, the younger Louis Philippe distinguished himself commanding troops during the French Revolutionary Wars and was promoted to lieutenant general by the age of 19 but broke with the First French Republic over its decision to execute King Louis XVI. He fled to Switzerland in 1793 after being connected with a plot to restore France's monarchy. His father fell under suspicion and was executed during the Reign of Terror.