Any revolution and revolutionary change will cause a considerable amount of deaths during the power struggle. Do this mean that post-revolutionary France is orders of magnitude worse than pre-revolutionary France?
Russia during the czarist era suffered severe famines about one each 11 years, and the death toll was on the order of millions, all happening while Russia exported grains [1]. It could be argued that the modernization happened in the post-revolutionary Russia prevented new famines after some time, despite the initial drawbacks caused by revolutionary changes. It would be very difficult to do a proper land reform with a regime backed by a rural nobility.
> Any revolution and revolutionary change will cause a considerable amount of deaths during the power struggle. Do this mean that post-revolutionary France is orders of magnitude worse than pre-revolutionary France?
Post-revolutionary France was Napoleon causing somewhere between 3.25 million and 6.5 million deaths across Europe. Then back to the monarchy, so very little net change from pre-revolutionary France, except for all the dead bodies.
But I agree with your first sentence. Any real revolution will cause a great deal of death. Can you build back something enough better to be worth all that? For many revolutions, the answer is no.
Russia during the czarist era suffered severe famines about one each 11 years, and the death toll was on the order of millions, all happening while Russia exported grains [1]. It could be argued that the modernization happened in the post-revolutionary Russia prevented new famines after some time, despite the initial drawbacks caused by revolutionary changes. It would be very difficult to do a proper land reform with a regime backed by a rural nobility.
[1] http://www.domarchive.ru/history/part-1-empire/61