Numbers

The Five Republics of France

1. The First Republic (1792-1804)
2. The Second Republic (1848-1852)
3. The Third Republic (1870-1940)
4. The Fourth Republic (1946-1958)
5. The Fifth Republic (1958-present)

How It's Used

"Contrary to the Anglo-Saxon penchant for efficiency and stability, the French do not quake at the prospect of rupture and regeneration. France, after all, is a country that in only two centuries has lived through three monarchies, two empires, the Paris Commune, a fascist interlude, and no fewer than five republics."

"Nonetheless, on a sunny Tuesday last month, nearly 3m public-sector workers went on strike for a day to protest at the government's cruel and unfeeling policies. According to the opinion polls, some 57% of the public supported them. It all seemed to confirm the view that the French simply will not put up with change. That, after all, is why the country is so prone to revolution (1789, 1830, 1848) and other upheavals (two empires, five republics, the Paris commune of 1871 and what amounted to a civil war in the 1940s). Change, when eventually it has to come, can only come cataclysmically."

"The unification of France into a nation-state created a strong centralised absolute monarchy, notably in the long reign of Louis XIV, which diminished the rival powers of the aristocracy and commanded all the arts, including architecture, to serve the country"s prestige and express its values. To a remarkable extent, two monarchies, two empires and five republics later, this policy continues; much of French cultural life is still funded by the government and les grands projets ordered by President Mitterrand - the Pyramid in the Louvre, the Bastille Opera, the Biblioteque Nationale - follow the path from Versailles and the creation there of the Sun King."

"By the summer of 1792, the head of state, King Louis XVI, was completely discredited, and the country had blundered into a disastrous war with Austria and Prussia that soon saw the capital itself under threat. Faced with this doomsday scenario, the Parisian radicals took decisive and brutal action: the monarchy was overthrown on August 10, a massive drive to enrol volunteers for the army was launched, the enemy invasion was halted at Valmy on September 20, and the next day the first of France's five republics to date was proclaimed."

"The French Revolution produced only what Margaret Thatcher tartly described as 'a pile of corpses and a tyrant.' Since 1789 France -- still trying to make theory work in practice -- has been through three kingdoms, two empires and five republics."

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