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The French Revolution set the stage for significant changes in the construction sector. Instead of corporate monopolies and the strict divorce of architecture and entrepreneurship, the building trades would now be regulated by supply and demand, by market forces, and by the protection of the “sacred and inalienable right” of property enshrined in the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen of August 1789. However, this only applied in theory. In practice, the restructuring of the building trades during the Revolution reclaimed the methods, personnel, and organization of the corporations des arts et métiers (guilds). These played critical roles in stabilizing local political authority, credit networks, and the quality controls of construction. The revival of corporate institutions was particularly important to the construction revival in 1791–92 following the sale of many Parisian properties as biens nationaux (national assets).