Socio-Economic Aspects of the French Revolution (1789–1799) in Modern Anglo-American Historiography

Modern Anglo-American historiography of the French revolution is a successor of the preceding historiographical period in which historians - adherents of the critical approach reviewed the classic interpretation of the French Revolution, based on the class theory of Karl Marks. As a result, historians of the critical approach with Francois Furet as a leader established the “new revisionist orthodoxy”. Accents of researches were shifted: more and more seldom historians turned to studying social aspects of the French Revolution, focusing instead on political and cultural aspects. Modern Anglo-American historians, who are more inclined to use new approaches and to accept new concepts, reimagined basic positions of orthodox and revisionist challenge. They concluded that the rejection of basic positions of classic interpretation made by revisionist was too categorical and hasty. While considering the potential ways of modern historiography development, Anglo-American historians found out that the main challenge for modern historiography was to create a new concept of the French revolution, but it was impossible without studying its socio-economic aspects. In this work, achievements of modern Anglo-American historians in studying socio-economic aspects of the French revolution are analyzed on the basis of comparing them to the views of the historians of preceding historiographical periods on these matters. Based on the analysis conducted, the main development trends of modern Anglo-American historiography in studying socio-economic aspects of revolution were determined, as well as the degree of conceptualization of their knowledge about the French revolution was assessed.