ABSTRACT
The French Revolution has proven so complex that even now after an extraordinary torrent of scholarship that began almost simultaneously with the revolution itself, scholars disagree on important issues-a disagreement that also involves the extent to which a social history approach suffices. Still the basic outline may be told. The crisis that would change France forever, though one may locate deep roots, began with the calling of the Assembly of the Notables early in 1787. At that moment the government had outstripped its ability to borrow and hoped to raise taxes and reduce expenses. To legislate such would require structural change and concurrence by the Parlement of Paris, the chief court in the land. The government believed it impossible to get this type of compliance; consequently the king, Louis XVI, tried to put together an alternate elite to ratify these changes.
