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Revolution

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Politics and government

   The storming of the Bastille, 14 July 1789 during the French
   Revolution.
   Enlarge
   The storming of the Bastille, 14 July 1789 during the French
   Revolution.

   A revolution (from Late Latin revolutio which means "a turn around") is
   a significant change that usually occurs in a relatively short period
   of time. Variously defined revolutions have been happening throughout
   human history. They vary in terms of numbers of their participants (
   revolutionaries), means employed by them, duration, ideology and many
   other aspects. They may result in a socio- political change in the
   socio- political institutions, or a major change in a culture or
   economy.

   Scholarly debates about what is and what is not a revolution centre
   around several issues. Early study of revolutions primarily analyzed
   events in European history from psychological perspective, soon however
   new theories where offered using explanations for more global events
   and using works from other social sciences such as sociology and
   political sciences. Several generations of scholarly thought have
   generated many competing theories on revolutions, gradually increasing
   our understanding of this complex phenomenon.

Etymology

   The word derives from Late Latin revolutio- "a revolving," from Latin
   revolvere "turn, roll back". It entered English, from Old French
   révolution, in 1390, originally only applied to celestial bodies. Only
   circa 1450 was it being used to mean " [an] instance of great change in
   affairs". The new sense of the word came in connection with the
   publication of Copernicus' On the Revolution of the Celestial Spheres,
   which overthrew the official cosmology decreed by the Catholic Church.
   From that point on, the word "revolution" acquired its subversive
   political connotation. The presently dominant political meaning is
   first recorded 1600, again following French, and was especially applied
   to the expulsion of the Stuart king James II of England in 1688 and
   transfer of sovereignty in Britain to William III and Mary.
   Revolutionary as a noun is first attested 1850, from the adjective.

Political and socioeconomic revolutions

   George Washington was a leader in the American Revolution.
   Enlarge
   George Washington was a leader in the American Revolution.

   Perhaps most often, the word 'revolution' is employed to denote a
   socio- political change in the socio- political institutions. Jeff
   Goodwin gives two definitions of a revolution. A broad one, where
   revolution is "any and all instances in which a state or a political
   regime is overthrown and thereby transformed by a popular movement in
   an irregular, extraconstitutional and/or violent fashion"; and a narrow
   one, in which "revolutions entail not only mass mobilization and regime
   change, but also more or less rapid and fundamental social, economic
   and/or cultural change, during or soon after the struggle for state
   power." Jack Goldstone defines them as "an effort to transform the
   political institutions and the justifications for political authority
   in society, accompanied by formal or informal mass mobilization and
   noninstitutionalized actions that undermine authorities."

   Political and socioeconomic revolutions have been studied in many
   social sciences, particularly sociology, political sciences and
   history. Among the leading scholars in that area have been or are Crane
   Brinton, Charles Brockett, Farideh Farhi, John Foran, John Mason Hart,
   Samuel Huntington, Jack Goldstone, Jeff Goodwin, Ted Roberts Gurr, Fred
   Halliday, Chalmers Johnson, Tim McDaniel, Barrington Moore, Jeffery
   Paige, Vilfredo Pareto, Terence Ranger, Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy, Theda
   Skocpol, James Scott, Eric Selbin, Charles Tilly, Ellen Kay
   Trimbringer, Carlos Vistas, John Walton, Timothy Wickham-Crowley and
   Eric Wolf, to name just a few.
   Vladimir Lenin was a leader in the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917.
   Enlarge
   Vladimir Lenin was a leader in the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917.

   Jack Goldstone differentiates four 'generations' of scholarly research
   dealing with revolutions. The scholars of the first generation such as
   Gustave Le Bon, Charles A. Ellwood or Pitirim Sorokin, were mainly
   descriptive in their approach, and their explanations of the phenomena
   of revolutions was usually related to social psychology, such as Le
   Bon's crowd psychology theory.

   Second generation theorists sought to develop detailed theories of why
   and when revolutions arise, grounded in more complex social behaviour
   theories. They can be divided into three major approaches:
   psychological, sociological and political. The works of Ted R. Gurr,
   Ivo K. Feierbrand, Rosalind L. Feierbrand, James A. Geschwender, David
   C. Schwartz and Denton E. Morrison fall into the first category. They
   followed theories of cognitive psychology and frustration-aggression
   theory and saw the cause of revolution in the state of mind of the
   masses, and while they varied in their approach as to what exactly
   caused the people to revolt (ex. modernization, recession or
   discrimination), they agreed that the primary cause for revolution was
   the widespread frustration with socio-political situation. The second
   group, composed of academics such as Chalmers Johnson, Neil Smelser,
   Bob Jessop, Mark Hart, Edward A. Tiryakian, Mark Hagopian, followed in
   the footsteps of Talcott Parsons and the structural-functionalist
   theory in sociology; they saw society as a system in equilibrium
   between various resources, demands and subsystems (political, cultural,
   etc.). As in the psychological school, they differed in their
   definitions of what causes disequilibrium, but agreed that it is a
   state of a severe disequilibrium that is responsible for revolutions.
   Finally, the third group, which included writers such as Charles Tilly,
   Samuel P. Huntington, Peter Ammann and Arthur L. Stinchcombe followed
   the path of political sciences and looked at pluralist theory and
   interest group conflict theory. Those theories see events as outcomes
   of a power struggle between competing interest groups. In such a model,
   revolution happen when two or more groups cannot come to terms within a
   normal decision making process traditional for a given political
   system, and simultaneously possess enough resources to employ force in
   pursuing their goals. The second generation theorists saw the
   development of the revolutions as a two-step process; first, some
   change results in the present situation being different from the past;
   second, the new situation creates an opportunity for a revolution to
   occur. In that situation, an event that in the past would not be
   sufficient to cause a revolution (ex. a war, a riot, a bad harvest),
   now is sufficient — however if authorities are aware of the danger,
   they can still prevent a revolution (through reform or repression).
   Revolutions differ in many aspects. Soldiers of the victorious People's
   Liberation Army entered Beijing in June 1949 after many years of armed
   struggle...
   Enlarge
   Revolutions differ in many aspects. Soldiers of the victorious People's
   Liberation Army entered Beijing in June 1949 after many years of armed
   struggle...

   Many of such early studies of revolutions usually concentrated on the
   four classic "Great Revolutions", seen as famous and uncontroversial
   examples fitting virtually all definitions of revolutions: the Glorious
   Revolution (1688), the French Revolution (1789–1799), the Russian
   Revolution of 1917 and the Chinese Revolution (1927-1949). In time,
   scholars began to analyze hundreds of other events as revolutions (see
   list of revolutions and rebellions), and differences in definitions and
   approaches gave rise to new definitions and explanations. The theories
   of the second generation have been criticized for their limited
   geographical scope, difficulty in empirical verification, as well as
   that while they may explain some particular revolutions, they did not
   explain why revolutions did not occur in other societies in very
   similar situations.

   The criticism of the second generation led to the raise of a third
   generation of theories, with writers such as Theda Skocpol, Barrington
   Moore, Jeffrey Paige and others expanded on the old Marxist class
   conflict approach, turning attention to rural agrarian-state conflicts,
   state conflicts with autonomous elites and the impact of interstate
   economic and military competition on domestic political change.
   Particularly Skocpol's States and Social Revolutions became one of the
   most widely recognized works of the third generation; Skocpol defined
   revolution as "rapid, basic transformations of society's state and
   class structures...accompanied and in part carried through by
   class-based revolts from below", attributing revolutions to a
   conjunction of multiple conflicts involving state, elites and the lower
   classes.
   ...but the fall of the Berlin Wall and most of the events of the Autumn
   of Nations in Europe, 1989, were sudden and peaceful.
   Enlarge
   ...but the fall of the Berlin Wall and most of the events of the Autumn
   of Nations in Europe, 1989, were sudden and peaceful.

   From the late 1980s a new body of scholarly work begun questioning the
   dominance of the third generation's theories. The old theories were
   also dealt a significant blow by new revolutionary events that could
   not be easily explain by them. The Iranian and Nicaraguan Revolutions
   of 1979, the 1986 EDSA Revolution in the Philippines and the 1989
   Autumn of Nations in Europe saw multi-class coalitions topple seemingly
   powerful regimes amidst popular demonstrations and mass strikes in
   nonviolent revolutions. Defining revolutions as mostly European violent
   state versus people and class struggles conflicts was no longer
   sufficient. The study of revolutions thus evolved in three directions.
   Firstly, some researchers were applying previous or updated
   structuralist theories of revolutions to events beyond the previously
   analyzed, mostly European conflicts. Secondly, scholars called for
   greater attention to conscious agency in the form of ideology and
   culture in shaping revolutionary mobilization and objectives. Third,
   analysts of both revolutions and social movements realized that those
   phenomena have much in common, and a new 'fourth generation' literature
   on contentious politics has developed that attempts to combine insights
   from the study of social movements and revolutions in hopes of
   understanding both phenomena.

   While revolutions encompass events ranging from the relatively peaceful
   revolutions that overthrew communist regimes to the violent Islamic
   revolution in Afghanistan, they exclude coups d'états, civil wars,
   revolts and rebellions that make no effort to transform institutions or
   the justification for authority (such as Józef Piłsudski's May Coup of
   1926 or the American Civil War), as well as peaceful transitions to
   democracy through institutional arrangements such as plebiscites and
   free elections, as in Spain after the death of Francisco Franco.

Types of political and socioeconomic revolutions

   Some popular types of revolutions as discussed in social science
   literature include:
     * Great revolutions - revolutions that transform economic and social
       structures as well as political institutions, such as the French
       Revolution of 1789 or Russian Revolution of 1917
     * Political revolutions - revolutions that change only state
       institutions
     * Social revolutions - revolutions that involve autonomous
       lower-class revolts,
     * Elite revolutions or revolutions from above - sweeping reforms
       carried out by elites who directly control mass mobilization
     * Proletarian or communist revolutions - revolutions inspired by the
       ideas of Marxism that aims to replace capitalism with communism
     * Failed or abortive revolutions - revolutions that fail to secure
       power after temporary victories or large-scale mobilization
     * non-violent revolutions (popularly known as colour revolutions in
       the post-Cold War period) - relatively recent phenomena where
       revolutionary political change is combined with very low level of
       violence

Cultural, intellectual, philosophical and technological revolutions

   A Watt steam engine in Madrid. The development of the steam engine
   propelled the Industrial Revolution in Britain and the world. The steam
   engine was created to pump water from coal mines, enabling them to be
   deepened beyond groundwater levels.
   Enlarge
   A Watt steam engine in Madrid. The development of the steam engine
   propelled the Industrial Revolution in Britain and the world. The steam
   engine was created to pump water from coal mines, enabling them to be
   deepened beyond groundwater levels.

   The term revolution has been used to denote great changes outside the
   political sphere. They are usually recognized as having transformed in
   society, culture, philosophy and technology much more than political
   systems. Such revolutions include, in alphabetical order:
     * Agricultural Revolutions, which include:
          + Neolithic Revolution (perhaps 10000 years ago), which formed
            the basis for human civilization to develop. It is commonly
            referred to as the 'First Agricultural Revolution'.
          + Green Revolution (1945- ), the use of industrial fertilizers
            and new crops greatly increased the world's agricultural
            output. It is commonly referred to as the 'Second Agricultural
            Revolution'.
          + Biogenetic Revolution (1990s-), the use of genetically
            modified plants and animals. It is sometimes referred to as
            the 'Third Agricultural Revolution'.
          + British Agricultural Revolution (18th century), which spurred
            urbanisation and consequently helped launch the Industrial
            Revolution.
          + Scottish Agricultural Revolution (18th century), which led to
            the Lowland Clearances.

     * Cultural Revolution - a struggle for power within the Communist
       Party of China, which grew to include large sections of Chinese
       society and eventually brought the People's Republic of China to
       the brink of civil war, and which lasted from 1966 to 1976
     * Digital Revolution - the sweeping changes brought about by
       computing and communication technology during the later half of the
       20th Century
     * Industrial Revolution - the major shift of technological,
       socioeconomic and cultural conditions in the late 18th and early
       19th century that began in Britain and spread throughout the world
          + Second Industrial Revolution (1871–1914)
     * Price revolution - a series of economic events from the second half
       of the 15th century to the first half of the 17th, the price
       revolution refers most specifically to the high rate of inflation
       that characterized the period across Western Europe
     * Quiet Revolution - a period of rapid change in Quebec, Canada, in
       the 1960s
     * Scientific revolution - a fundamental transformation in scientific
       ideas around the 16th century
     * Sexual revolution - a change in sexual morality and sexual
       behaviour throughout the Western world, from 1960s till today

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