Chapter 463: Industrial Development and Charting Statistics
Fouché was momentarily stunned by the words, then his eyes gleamed with excitement. He clapped his hands and declared, "Your Highness's method is simply brilliant! I request that it be included in the spies' training curriculum."
Joseph smiled and waved his hand. "What I just described is merely the basic mode of 'moral attack'. You can expand on it further."
In later generations, countless celebrities and influential figures had their reputations ruined by such simple and low-cost methods. Many even proved their innocence in the end, but still suffered immense consequences.
"A basic mode?" Fouché's eyes widened. "Are you saying it can get even more ruthless than this?"
"Indeed," Joseph said casually. "You need to broaden your perspective.
"For example, have a handsome man dress up as a noblewoman to seduce Paoli, then find a way to get Paoli drunk. The rest is the same as before. Once he cries out for help, attracting the police and onlookers, the 'noblewoman' would 'accidentally' reveal his chest hair..."
Fouché was petrified. For the first time, he felt as pure as a young girl, and this sinister and perverse world made him tremble.
Joseph noticed his expression and realized these methods might severely damage his own image. He quickly cleared his throat and said, "Ahem, well, actually, I heard these rustic tales from Austrian soldiers and was inspired by them."
Without waiting for the Director of Intelligence to react, he quickly continued, "Also, what I wanted to say is that you can't just attack that separatist from a moral standpoint.
Fouché pondered, "You mean?"
"Interest." Joseph made a fist. "If everyone believes Paoli will erode their interests, coupled with his deplorable morals, then he will surely face complete 'Social Death'!"
"Social Death?" Fouché heard an unfamiliar term.
"Oh, it's short for 'Social Death'," Joseph explained. "Some people, while still alive, are already considered dead within their social circles."
Fouché nodded thoughtfully. "I'll have to include this in the spy training curriculum as well."
He looked at Joseph again. "Your Highness, then we'll devise some interest traps between Paoli and his organization members..."
Joseph listened to his plan and immediately offered suggestions for improvement, incorporating some 'dirty tricks' from later generations.
The two discussed for nearly an hour, provisionally finalizing the plan to deal with the leader of the Corsican Restoration Organization. Fouché then returned to the Intelligence Bureau to make specific arrangements, muttering to himself, 'I can offend anyone in the future, but never the Crown Prince.'
The door to the reception room was pushed open again, and the Minister of Industry and the Minister of Commerce then entered.
The two bowed to Joseph, and Mirabeau first handed over the document he was carrying with both hands.
Joseph glanced at the document's title—"National Industrial Development Overview for 1789"—and immediately smiled and praised, "You managed to compile last year's industrial development situation in just over three months. Your work efficiency is truly outstanding."
In this era without Excel, or even telegraphs, compiling national industrial data was absolutely an extremely arduous task.
Given that industrial data had never been compiled before, they could only analogize the situation with agricultural data collection. The national agricultural overview for 1788 took a full nine months to complete.
As a new noble familiar with capitalist production models, Mirabeau was far more efficient than the old noble bureaucrats of the past. Of course, this was also thanks to his usual diligence in collecting and organizing archives, which allowed him to complete last year's industrial report in such a short time.
"Thank you for Your Highness's praise. It's merely my duty."
Mirabeau, seeing the Crown Prince begin to review the document, then offered a brief overview. "Under Your Highness's wise leadership, our nation's industrial scale expanded by over 140% last year.
"Notably, the papermaking and machinery industries grew by 3.5 times and 2.3 times, respectively."
Joseph nodded.
With the support of wood pulp technology, such significant growth in papermaking was not surprising. However, it was quite astonishing that the United Steam Engine Company alone had boosted the machinery industry as a whole by so much.
He also knew that this was the wild explosion typical of new industries in their initial expansion phase. As the industries matured, the growth rate would gradually flatten out.
Mirabeau glanced at the section Joseph was reading and continued:
"Ah, the brewing industry. Yes, although the brewing industry's scale only increased to 115% of its previous size, its profits rose by 2.3 times, thanks to your new brewing techniques."
Joseph was quite satisfied with this figure.
It was important to remember that winemaking was a pillar industry in France and already operated on a very large scale. A 15% increase was already quite substantial.
Moreover, with the aid of Pasteurization, French wine had virtually monopolized the entire high-end market, significantly boosting its profitability. This single factor alone contributed nearly 10 million francs in additional tax revenue to the French treasury each year.
Meanwhile, Joseph noted in the report that, spurred by wine, French beer was also gaining momentum. Since the latter half of last year, Normandy beer had gradually expanded into Germany and Italy, markets that were previously dominated by Dortmund and Bavaria.
Mirabeau followed Joseph's page turn and continued his explanation. "Several other industries, such as textiles, steel, and coal, also showed good growth. Especially this year, we've invested heavily in these industries. Although we will face competition from countries like Britain and Austria, I remain optimistic about this year's development prospects..."
Joseph finished reading through the "Industrial Development Overview" and felt a great sense of accomplishment—under his continuous efforts, French industry was developing rapidly, at least far better than in historical records.
If this trend continued, it wouldn't be long before France's industrial production capacity could rival that of the British.
Of course, the British still held a significant advantage in terms of markets and raw materials, as they possessed the most colonies worldwide.
Therefore, France's next main objective was to use the Rhine-Seine Treaty to penetrate the German market as much as possible, while also developing the North African market swiftly.
After all, for industrial development, the sales market was even more crucial than technology and scale.
Joseph looked at the dense data in the report and couldn't help but feel a little dizzy.
He rubbed the bridge of his nose and turned to the Minister of Industry, saying, "Count Mirabeau, for documents presented with this type of data, I have a more effective and intuitive way of presenting them."
"Oh?" Mirabeau leaned forward eagerly. "I hope Your Highness can teach me."
Joseph took out paper, a pen, and a ruler, and began drawing based on the data in the document, explaining as he went, "The vertical axis represents output or monetary value, and the horizontal axis represents months. Mark each month's output on the corresponding points on both axes, and then connect all the points with a line."
He handed the completed papermaking industry output chart to Mirabeau. "This is called a line graph."
He allowed Mirabeau a moment to absorb it, then drew a circle on another piece of paper, marking it with data. "This is a pie chart."
"This is a bar chart..."
"This is a scatter plot..."
"And a spider web chart..."
Joseph silently apologized to Laplace in his mind: 'To improve government efficiency, I had to 'spoil' your charting statistics method in advance. You're French too, so you should understand, right?'
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