french rev.

Many factors led to the revolution; to some extent the old order succumbed to its own rigidity in the face of a changing world; to some extent, it fell to the ambitions of a rising bourgeoisie, allied with aggrieved peasants and wage-earners and with individuals of all classes who had come under the influence of the ideas of the Enlightenment.
As the revolution proceeded and as power devolved from the monarchy to legislative bodies, the conflicting interests of these initially allied groups would become the source of conflict and bloodshed.Certainly, causes of the revolution must include all of the following:
Resentment of royal absolutism.
Resentment of the seigneurial system by peasants, wage-earners, and a rising bourgeoisie.
The rise of enlightenment ideals.
An unmanageable national debt, both caused by and exacerbating the burden of a grossly inequitable system of taxation.
Food scarcity in the years immediately before the revolution