1. The French Revolution
"Conservative" Phase:

2. Revolt of Prairial, Year III (1795)

3. 1795 Thermadorian Reaction Conservative victory..
Creates the Directory and institutionalized the Thermidorean Reaction.
* 5-man oligarchy. [avoid a dictatorship]

4. Characteristics of the Directory
People involved in the original Terror were now attacked.
Inflation continues.
Rule by rich bourgeois liberals.
frivolous culture; salons return; wild fashions.
Political corruption.
Revival of Catholicism.

5. 18 Brumaire (Nov. 9, 1799) Coup d’état by Napoleon.
Approved by a plebiscite in December.
Sieyes: Confidence from below; authority from above.