Old Regime
Bourbon-era social order
The Old Regime (French: *Ancien Régime*) refers to the political and social system in France before the Revolution of 1789—characterized by absolute monarchy, aristocratic privilege, and rigid class hierarchy.
By extension, any entrenched traditional order that has been or might be overthrown: The reforms swept away the old regime.
The term typically implies outdated institutions resistant to change.
- Catholic ChurchPope-led Christian denomination
- monarchyRule by crowned sovereign
- nobilityTitled ruling class
- French RevolutionLate-1700s republican upheaval
- feudalismLand-for-service social structure
manorialism · absolutism · Enlightenment · tax farmers · aristocracy · landed gentry · clergy · ancien régime · Louis XVI · Marie Antoinette · privilege · social hierarchy · centralization · Estates-General · sovereignty · divine right · inequality · mercantilism
Old Regimethe Republic
Plato's treatise on justice
French Republic · republican government · constitutional republic · constitutional government · democracy
Old Regimeegalitarian society
Group with equal status
classless society · civil equality · meritocracy · bourgeois society · secular state
old, older, oldest, olden, elder, eldest, regime, regimen, regimens