Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Wiktionary
n. (context historical English) The aristocratic social and political system established in France under the Valois and Bourbon dynasties, overthrown by the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French%20Revolution of 1789.
WordNet
n. a political and social system that no longer governs (especially the system that existed in France before the French Revolution)
Wikipedia
The Ancien Régime (, Old Regime or Former Regime) was the monarchic, aristocratic, social and political system established in the Kingdom of France from approximately the 15th century until the latter part of the 18th century (" early modern France") under the late Valois and Bourbon dynasties. The term is occasionally used to refer to the similar feudal social and political order of the time elsewhere in Europe. The administrative and social structures of the Ancien Régime were the result of years of state-building, legislative acts (like the Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts), internal conflicts and civil wars, but they remained a patchwork of local privilege and historic differences until the French Revolution ended the system.
Much of the medieval political centralization of France had been lost in the Hundred Years' War, and the Valois Dynasty's attempts at re-establishing control over the scattered political centres of the country were hindered by the Wars of Religion. Much of the reigns of Henry IV, Louis XIII and the early years of Louis XIV were focused on administrative centralisation. Despite, however, the notion of " absolute monarchy" (typified by the king's right to issue lettres de cachet) and the efforts by the kings to create a centralized state, Ancien Régime France remained a country of systemic irregularities: administrative (including taxation), legal, judicial, and ecclesiastic divisions and prerogatives frequently overlapped, while the French nobility struggled to maintain their own rights in the matters of local government and justice, and powerful internal conflicts (like the Fronde) protested against this centralization.
The need for centralization in this period was directly linked to the question of royal finances and the ability to wage war. The internal conflicts and dynastic crises of the 16th and 17th centuries (the Wars of Religion, the conflict with the Habsburgs) and the territorial expansion of France in the 17th century demanded great sums which needed to be raised through taxes, such as the taille and the gabelle and by contributions of men and service from the nobility.
One key to this centralization was the replacing of personal " clientele" systems organized around the king and other nobles by institutional systems around the state. The creation of the Intendants—representatives of royal power in the provinces—did much to undermine local control by regional nobles. The same was true of the greater reliance shown by the royal court on the "noblesse de robe" as judges and royal counselors. The creation of regional parlements had initially the same goal of facilitating the introduction of royal power into newly assimilated territories, but as the parlements gained in self-assurance, they began to be sources of disunity.
Usage examples of "ancien regime".
Even so, and even though Mayor Amalfi, the principal hero and leading cultural morphologist of CITIES IN FLIGHT, believes that the Okies have been completely defeated [ECH, 421-422], I can see no reason to believe that the restoration of the Ancien Regime in 3976 would have been any more permanent than it was in 1815.
LOYALIST This is the general term for those elements loyal to the ancien regime of the Ming dynasty, during the early years of the Manchu conquest.
The survivors, led by Saint-Just, found a Theban society on the threshold of the Second Industrial Revolution, but whose ancien regime was still in political control, and which had retained an unhealthy predilection for religious mania.
Mizz Liz Probert is a young radical who sees me alternately as a hero of the class war and as a contemptible puppet of the ancien regime, her views entirely depending on the poverty or wealth of the client I happen to be defending at the time.
The treacherous moonlight flit of the Firvulag contingent, who absconded with the bulk of the survival gear just as the worst of the rainy season came upon them The struggles with sick and injured and defeated and exploitative refugees The headlong flight from Celadeyr of Afaliah and his gang of ancien regime fanatics- The dreadful tnp across the Catalan Wilderness, following a littleused track that degenerated into a quagmire alive with venomous snakes, giant mosquitoes, and biting leeches- - And then sanctuary The foothills of the eastern Pyrenees, rich in mines and plantations, and the dangerously depleted cities of Tarasiah and Geroniah eager to welcome new citizens (By then news of the Firvulag seizure of Burask in the distant north had seeped southward, and there were hints that other inadequately defended cities .
Here the supreme leaders were on their feet, applauding, set in a sumptuous frame--ancien regime caryatids, supporting a magnificent gilded frieze which bore the emblem of the Soviet Union.
The officers were Frenchmen loyal to the ancien regime, while its men were deserters from the French Army and all unmitigated scoundrels.