14,176 men from the former Duchy of Luxembourg were conscripted into the French Revolutionary Army and the Grande Armée in these years, of whom 9,809 died on the battlefields of Europe.

Under the Austrian Netherlands, civil registrations (births, deaths, marriages) were left to the parishes, and linked to sacraments administered by the Church.

This discontent culminated in the Peasants' War that same year, a revolt in the northern part of the department that was limited to the peasantry.

[5]: 20–21 At the same time, a fundamental characteristic of the French Revolutionary government, administrative centralisation, collided with Luxembourgish traditions: each department received a central commissioner.

[5]: 21 In the city of Luxembourg, due to the abolition of the corporations, a commercial and artisanal revolution took place, allowing a middle class to emerge, whose members could for the first time participate in political life under the French regime.

[5]: 22 Another development linked to the disappearance of the corporations occurred in the countryside: small artisanal business sprang up, often with only one employee.

The overarching objective of the livret d'ouvrier was to keep under surveillance a social class judged seen as dangerous, and to prevent poaching of labourers amongst competing enterprises, in this period of manpower shortages.