How did Hippolyte Taine explain the political instability of France?

Hippolyte Taine attributed the political instability of France primarily to the country's history of excessive centralization. In his monumental work, Les Origines de la France contemporaine ("The Origins of Contemporary France"), Taine argued that this centralization originated during the ancien régime and was subsequently intensified by the French Revolution.1

Taine held a critical view of the Revolution, sharing the perspective of Edmund Burke that the movement failed to promote true liberty. Instead, he asserted that the Revolution merely transferred absolute power into even more illiberal hands. Following the French defeat in the war of 1870–71, which he viewed as a symptom of a deep national sickness, Taine dedicated his later years to this historical analysis, seeking to identify the structural sources of the instability that he believed were responsible for his country's plight.1