Absolutism Dbq

During the XVII century, most of the European countries were ruled by more or less absolute Monarchy. Born in 1638, Louis XIV will have the longest reign out of all French ruler ( 72 years). A few years later, while Louis XIV’s reign was at his apogee, another important ruler of this era get to the throne: Peter the Great. Both of these rulers, known for being an absolute monarch, have been influenced by the traumatic event of their childhood. For Louis XIV, it was the insurrection of the nobility against the royal power, known as the Fronde; Forced to flee Paris, he will hold a grudge against this feudal power . As for Peter The Great, it was the rebellion led by his step-sister, after the death of his brother with whom he ruled as Tsar, that will influence his way of ruling the kingdom.

It is often debated whether or not the reign of King Louis XIV had a positive or negative effect on France. Although there were improvements during his reign in transportation, culture, and national defense, there were far more negative aspects. He depleted the national treasury with his liberal spending on personal luxuries and massive monuments. His extreme fear of the loss of power led to poor decision making, which caused the court to be of lower quality. King Louis XIV’s disastrous rule brought about a series of effects that influenced the French Revolution in the following century.

Of all the absolute rulers in Europe, by far the best example of one, and the most powerful, was Louis XIV of France. Although Louis had some failures, he also had many successes. He controlled France’s money and had many different ways to get, as well as keep his power, and he knew how to delegate jobs to smart, but loyal people.

The seventeenth century saw the evolution of two new types of government mainly because of the instability that was caused by religious wars. One type of government was a constitutional monarchy in which rulers were confined to the laws of the state, giving the people some liberties, best exemplified by William and Mary during the Stuart monarchial rule. Constitutional monarchy was successful in mainly in England because of the Magna Carta, which kept the king’s power in check. The other type was absolute monarchy, in which the king has power over everything, shown by the French under Louis XIV. Although these two

Louis XIV’s excessive grandeur made the French economy weak. His palace at Versaille, his constant need to gain more territory, and the crumbling of France’s economic system and caused the greatest revolution the world has ever seen. His grandiose estate, the palace at Versailles, required half of Louis XIV’s revenues to maintain. Although this palace may have kept up appearances for the sake of foreign

Peter the Great led Russia to its modern and powerful time, at the same time Louis XIV also made his people see the rise of a stronger France which under the rule of him. They suffered their people but also bring them new life so that is hard to judge who is better, but as a leader, Louis XIV created the grandest court in history of France and made France became the leading cultural and military power of Europe. Peter the Great was successfully involved in every part of Russians’ life such as what people wore and read. Louis XIV made his country become much more powerful and respectful in the world stage so he was considered better than Peter the Great.

During the 16th century to the 18th century, Monarchs in Europe used absolutism. Monarchs such as King Louis and Peter The Great used absolute tactics because they wanted to consolidate power from the nobility. They wanted to consolidate power from the nobility because they wanted to take the power they lost during the middle ages. King Louis and Peter the Great used all multiple means to reclaim power. They used their power to glorify themselves and their country. The practice of absolutism can be argued to have both positive and negative effects.

In the late 17th century to the early 18th century, two powerful monarchs who ruled over their own magnificent empires. These monarchs were Peter the Great, the tsar of Russia, and the emperor of China, Kangxi. At the time of their rules, an economic system called mercantilism formed. This system allowed societies to benefit off of influx of goods from merchants trading. Using this system, in China, the Canton system was formed to open up ports to western societies. Even though, both Kangxi and Peter the Great shared similarities in the way they ruled, they had a variety of differences, which were caused by their background and their country’s interests. On the other hand, the diverse backgrounds and experiences of the empires caused them to also have differences in their ways of ruling. These differences could be categorized into two overarching topics, economy and education. Their economies had varied taxation systems and were structured differently. As far as education, the rulers differed in the ways they spread knowledge and the type of knowledge they taught.

Louis XIV 's France was an absolute monarchy, meaning the king had the power, control, finances and the nation in his hands more then ever before. In the 17th century, France was the strongest and wealthiest nation in Europe, and the head of the state, the king, was the most influential person of the time. In the ideas of the scientific revolution and the soon-coming changes of the enlightenment the country was developing. For a few decades France was not involved in any major wars or battles and the peace helped the population grow fast.

In 17th-18th century Europe, the age of absolutism, absolute monarchs ruled most of Europe. Absolute monarchs are rulers that have complete control over the government and its people. They claimed to rule by “divine right,” where their authority comes from God and they were above the law. The views of being a proper role as an absolute monarch differed very much between rulers and their subjects. Certain rulers had ideas that both the people and ruler should be united, some abused their power with no sympathy towards the people they rule, and the subjects that suffered from the rulings of the monarch had a completely different perspective than the rulers that were in power.

     In addition to his strengths, Louis XIV had weaknesses. After Colbert died, Louis made one mistake that undid all of his work. He revoked Edict of Nantes who protected the religious freedom of the Huguenots. Instead of being imprisoned, more than 200,000 Huguenots fled from France. The country lost many of its skilled workers and business leaders. Louis XIV also fought many costly wars that caused his people great suffering. Many of the wars left France on the brink of bankruptcy.

In 1661 Louis appointed Jean-Baptiste Colbert as controller general of finances. This proved to be very successful in adding to the increase of France’s economy, and it helped Louis achieve his second goal of having “one law.” Colbert’s ideas were similar to that of mercantilism. He insisted on having an economic system that would make France a self-sufficient powerful country where they exported more than they imported. He improved France’s economy through the invention of a merchant marine fleet, the support of industries, the control of tariffs on French goods, and the collection of taxes. All of these gained money for France, which led to the creation of a powerful army. Due to a powerful army, France was able to secure its natural frontiers, even in the North East, which was France’s weakest natural border. While Louis claimed a flaw of his was that, “I loved war too much,” he was able to make a strong French presence in Europe, adding to his idea of “one law.”

Louis hired Jean-Baptiste Colbert, a Swiss banker, to reform France's financial situation. By seeking out people who avoided their taxes (for example, people posing as nobles) and reorganizing the tax collection system (Before Colbert the majority of collected tax never even made it to the treasury), Colbert was able to reduce the loses of the treasury by 30,000,000 liras. This, in conjunction with stimulating the economy by reducing taxes, allowing monopolies, and encouraging immigration of skilled workers, boosted the worth of the French economy, and had a positive influence on the country as a whole.

During the late 17th and early 18th century, many European nations such as France and Russia were absolute monarchies. Even countries such as England had kings who at least attempted to implement absolutism. Indeed the concept of absolutism, where the monarch is the unquestionably highest authority and absolute ruler of every element in the realm, is certainly appealing to any sovereign. However, this unrestricted power was abused, and by the end of the 18th century, absolutism was gone. Absolutism failed because the monarchs' mistreatment of the population caused the people to revolt against their rule and policies. There are many factors which caused this discontent. For one, there was a great loss of human lives. Louis XIV of France

Also, during the renaissance stage, kings, dukes, earls and other nobles dominated the political field but as the feudal system began to collapse; these titles stared losing their influence. This shaped the beginning of varying unbalanced surroundings which promoted rapid development in all areas. This stage was subjugated by confrontations and wars not for the sake of winning territories but for the sake of protests, to satisfy the upper-class thirst for war. The downfall of the Roman Empire and the influence and authority of the papacy was consequential with the increase in independence and self reliance of city states in most of the Europe.