Born into a noble family, he became inspector of manufactures at Amiens. Roland's fondness for travel led him to visit Italy in 1776, in search of places left out of the itineraries of earlier travelers. Out of this experience came the Lettres écrites de Suisse, d'Italie, de Sicilie et de Malthe (Merkus, Amsterdam 1780). The work bears witness to Roland's desire to discover new places without relying on the judgment of notables and rulers but dealing directly with the local population instead. A few years after his return from Italy, he married Jeanne-Marie Phlipon , whose byname was Manon Phlipon but who was better known in the years of the French Revolution as Madame Roland.

Roland's expertise in the commercial sector led him to write articles for the Encyclopédie Nouvelle, in which, as in all his literary output, he was assisted by his wife. On the outbreak of the French Revolution he was sent as a special representative to the Constituent Assembly and espoused the ideas of the Jacobins, while his wife's salon became the meeting place for figures like Brisson, Pétion and Robespierre. Over the following years his position changed and he found himself in disagreement with many exponents of the Revolution; for this reason he took refuge in Rouen, where he committed suicide in 1793.