When I was at the New York Public Library, I found a book that looked interesting--although I didn't really have time to look at it--that seems relevant to mention here: Robespierre: Une politique de la philosophie by Georges Labica.

I know this is the same tired old response, but honestly, I don't think that the fact that they were caught up by pragmatism to the extent they were has anything inevitable about it; we have to remember the circumstances, after all. I think in even slightly less trying circumstances they would have done much better--concerning the "freezing" of the Revolution (to use Saint-Just's term), if not as far as "lead[ing] the People to Freedom" (to use yours) goes.

As to forums, activity is relative. I don't know of any French forums that can compare to LJ for activity, but there's a difference between, say, the royet.org forum which has occasion activity and the forum of les Amis de Robespierre, which is pretty much dead.

...Oh, and Rousseau did say that, by the way, about "forcing people to be free," but it's often misinterpreted. I'm afraid I won't be of much help on that score though, since I've read mostly what one might call "Rousseau-lite" (ie, Emile and his Confessions, though Emile has more philosophic content than one might think). The only serious philosophical work of his I've finished is the Contrat Social although--before I misplaced it--I was reading his Discours sur l'origine de l'inégalité. *facepalm* And, I'm slightly embarrassed to admit, apart from that I've only read a little bit of Diderot and Voltaire, and much more about them than their actual writings at that. >__