It's always like this before a revolution...

There's a widespread belief that revolutions are caused by worsening economic conditions , but that's actually not true . In the decades before the outbreak of a revolution, the overall economy is paradoxically improving . Consider Tsarist Russia, for example, where the per capita industrial output rose steadily year after year , almost right up until 1917 . This economic growth, which is caused by the emergence of a new economic sector or the expansion of an old one , makes certain members of the population newly rich . And because of the policy needs of the rising class do not align with those of the established order , the two come into conflict . In France, for example, the influx of colonial trade increased the wealth of the country and made a class of newly rich merchants . [music] Fearing their position would fall with the influx of cheaper English goods into French markets , [music] they objected to the 1786 treaty liberalizing trade between France and England . But although the overall wealth of the country is increasing , the gap between rich and poor is widening . In England, the relative prosperity of the peasantry in the 16th century disappeared after the enclosures of common lands became more widespread . The first half of the 17th century was, in the words of one economic historian , quote, "Probably the most terrible years to which the country has ever passed." Almost half the population required government relief to survive . Evicted peasants found their way into cities where they sought employment that did not exist . Many of them were desperate enough to emigrate