Revolutions - peaceful or violent, radical or reactionary - have shaped the political landscape of the world we live in today. But what led revolutionaries to action? What were they fighting against and what were they seeking to achieve? Each revolution is a product of its time, its society, its people - and the outcomes vary dramatically, from liberal reform to brutal dictatorship. This is an essential primer on twenty-four of the most significant revolutions in modern history, from England's Glorious Revolution of 1688 to the Arab Spring. It is narrated by contributors from around the world, each bringing their unique perspective and reflecting on the changing, sometimes contested, meaning of each revolution in its country of origin and how national identity can be shaped by memories of dissent. Whether as inspiration or warning, the legacies of these revolutions are not only important to those interested in protest, political change and the power of the people, but also impact on virtually every one of us today. With 24 illustrations

London, 1716. Revenge is a dish best served ice-cold...The city is caught in the vice-like grip of a savage winter. Even the Thames has frozen over. But for Jonas Flynt - thief, gambler, killer - the chilling elements are the least of his worries... Justice Geoffrey Dumont has been found dead at the base of St Paul's cathedral, and a young male sex-worker, Sam Yates, has been taken into custody for the murder. Yates denies all charges, claiming he had received a message to meet the judge at the exact time of death. The young man is a friend of courtesan Belle St Clair, and she asks Flynt to investigate. As Sam endures the horrors of Newgate prison, they must do everything in their power to uncover the truth and save an innocent life, before the bodies begin to pile up. But time is running out. And the gallows are beckoning... A totally enrapturing portrayal of eighteenth-century London, and a rapier-like crime thriller, perfect for fans of Laura Shepherd-Robinson, Antonia Hodgson and Ambrose Parry.

This book consists of a series of interrelated chapters analyzing why Iran, among all countries, has seen so many revolutionary movements in the past century; the degree to which its religion, Shi'ism, is revolutionary; and the history of revolutionary and resistance movements in the modern Muslim world. The author stresses historical change, such as the change of Twelver Shi'ism from political quietism to revolutionary opposition, and also previously unnoticed factors in revolution, such as the multi-urban character of all Iran's modern revolutions.

This volume consists of nine chapters which deal with many of the crucial issues of the Russian Revolution, introduced and contextualized particularly for students. The material, all written by prominent specialists, represents some of the most influential work of the last two decades.

The book covers the immediate background to the Revolutions of 1917-- the parties, movements, and personalities as well as issues of social class, gender and ethnicity. It opens with an introduction that presents a number of the main problems embedded in the study of the Revolution, and concludes with an examination of the writing of Russian history after the fall of communism. There is an explanatory introduction by the editor prior to each essay, which provides a framework for understanding the material.

"The Russian Revolution: The Essential Readings" is not only an indispensable guide to the key recent scholarly debates but also an important aid in understanding the themes and arguments around this major turning-point in modern history.

This volume offers a full account of the December 1989 revolution that toppled the Communist dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu in Romania. Based on the author's personal investigation and interviews, extensive screening of the Romanian and international press, and critical examination of sources and interpretations, it offers a full and objective analysis of a complex, often puzzling series of events. Nestor Ratesh explores the economic, social, and human disaster that led to the uprising, and then chronicles the seven days of the revolution from its inception in the western city of Timisoara to its climax in Bucharest on December 22, 1989, when Ceausescu fled the city. The bloody and confused aftermath is examined from different angles, with surprising details and telling portraits of the main players, some of whom the author knows personally. Ratesh skeptically scrutinizes the revelations, hints, and rumors of conspiracies that reportedly either caused the revolution--or hijacked it. Evidence available so far points toward a genuinely spontaneous popular uprising during which large segments of the army and secret police slowly realized that the fall of the regime was imminent. They first blinked, then searched for ways to save themselves--forcing Ceausescu to flee and bringing into power both new and old politicians who represented change to the masses but maintained relative stability in the power structure. The paradox that an essentially anti-Communist revolution would produce a regime controlled by former Communists has dominated most of the developments since then. The book concludes by examining the ensuing months of dislocation and commotion. Clearly the December revolution remains unfulfilled, entangled in a myriad of contradictions, obstacles, intrigues, lies, rivalries, ineptitude, and plain wrongdoing.

This book offers a thematic analysis of the phenomenon of revolution. The twentieth century has been witness to a number of historic revolutions, beginning with the Mexican and the Russian revolutions at the turn of the century and leading up to the Iranian and Nicaragua revolutions in the 1970s and 1980s. Despite their fundamental differences, these and the revolutions before them are characterized by parallel developments and processes. The focus of this book is to discern those social and political dynamics that bring about revolutions, determine their nature and overall direction, and in turn facilitate the emergence and success of revolutionary leaders and their attempts at institutionalizing their newly-won powers.

Kamrava adds valuable insights into prevalent notions and theories concerning revolutions. There are, the author argues, several conditions necessary for the appearance and success of revolutionary movements. They include a weak state structure, a mobilizable society, and specific groups whose aim it is to overthrow the political system. Once the leaders of the revolution have been determined, they try to institutionalize their powers, in both the post-revolutionary state and society.

Wanneer volksgenote met die geweer in die hand teen mekaar uittrek, ontstaan ’n gevoel van bitterheid wat in geen jare verwyder kan word nie. So skryf GD Scholtz in sy omvattende oorsig oor die Rebellie van 1914–1915. Die oorsake van die Rebellie kan teruggevoer word na die Anglo-Boereoorlog en die meeste Afrikaners se ongemaklike verhouding met die Britse ryk. Milliter gesproke was die Rebellie ’n mislukking, maar op die lang duur, betoog Scholtz, het die Rebellie ’n groot rol gespeel in die herlewing van die republikeinse ideaal onder Afrikaners.

The problem of the Terror lies at the heart of any reflection upon the French Revolution and its implications for modern political culture. Contemporaries sought to grasp its meaning immediately after the fact as they struggled to explain an experience which seemed to defy the Revolution's fundamental assumption: that rational human intentions could erase the arbitrariness of history and institute a transparent social order. Since then, historians and philosophers have not ceased to ponder what Benjamin Constant called "that inexplicable delirium known as the reign of the Terror." For some, the Terror deviated from the rights of man only to preserve them: it was a system of revolutionary government dictated by circumstances that threatened the very existence of the infant French Republic. For others, it revealed a dynamic inherent in the Revolution from the start: a dynamic unleashed by the very effort to refashion society in the light of human reason. For still others, it was a symptom of the fact that the promised transformation of society was still incomplete - and a model for any future revolution that would complete it.

This volume has been designed to bring together contributions by representatives of a wide range of historiographical approaches to the French Revolution. It seeks, in the wake of the heated historical debates of recent years, to reopen old questions and to formulate new ones, to suggest how the problem of understanding the Terror is being approached, or might be approached, two hundred years after the event. In a century more than ever aware of the fragility of the boundaries between citizenship and victimization, the topic reatains its challenge forhistorical comprehension - and its profound relevance to the enduring question of the nature and conditions of democracy.

Now volume 4 is published. Drawing clear inspiration from the earlier highly acclaimed volumes, Professor Baker has now edited a supplementary volume. It has as its aim to advance, by focusing more precisely on the period of the Terror, the explanation of the nature and implications of the political culture of the French Revolution the early volumes initiated.

This volume represents the first book-length study of attitudes toward women in revolutionary France. Based on extensive research in the libraries and archives of Paris, the book examines the impact of the Revolution's ideology of liberty and equality. When the men of 1789 wrote the Declaration of the Rights of Man, they were thinking in terms of man the male, not man the species. But there were some men and women who interpreted it in terms of all humanity. The outrage of these individuals over what they perceived as a discrepancy between the principles and the practice of the Revolution motivated them to produce some of the most unhesitating declarations of sexual equality that had ever been seen in history. Dr. Proctor demonstrates, however, these claims of equality were not simply ignored; they were categorically rejected by the mainstream revolutionaries. The book examines the typical 18th-century concept of women as alien and in some ways inferior beings and traces the striking continuity between pre-Revolutionary and Revolutionary thought on the subject. Against this background, Proctor addresses a number of important questions: How widespread was the support for a movement in favor of sexual equality? What was the response of the Revolution itself to demands for equal rights for women? How did the men of the French Revolution justify the contradiction between their suppression of women and the ideologies for which they claimed to be fighting? To arrive at the answers, an abundance of material produced in France in the 18th century is identified and analyzed, and cited in an extensive bibliography of original sources. What finally emerges is not only a clearer picture of theFrench Revolution and its attitude toward women, but a deeper understanding of the ambivalent attitudes toward women that still affect our society today. This book will be an important resource for courses in European history, the French Revolution, and women's studies, as well as a valuable reference for college, university, and public libraries.

Now available again, this pioneering work examines one of the most controversial periods in Chinese history: the relationship between the Chinese civil and military authorities and the British trading community in Guangdong province on the eve of the Taiping Rebellion, one the most calamitous events in Chinese history. Wakeman shows how prevailing rural discontent, urban riots, secret society activity, and the imbalance of class and clan affected the mechanisms of regional power and gentry control, demonstrating the progression of rebellion and the historical inevitability of revolution.

Egypt's film industry is the largest in the Middle East, with an output that spreads across the region and the world. In the run-up to and throughout the 2011 Revolution, a complex relationship formed between the industry and the people's uprising. Both a form of political expression and a documentation of historical events, 'revolutionary' film techniques have contributed to the cultural memory of 2011. At the same time, these films and their makers have been the target of increasing state control and intervention. Ahmed Ghazal, drawing upon his own background in film-making, looks at the way in which Egyptian film has shaped, and been shaped by, the events leading up to and beyond Egypt's 2011 revolution. Drawing on interviews with protagonists in the industry, analysis of films, and archival research, he analyses the critical issues affecting the political economy of the industry. He also explores the technological developments of independent productions and the cinematic themes of dictatorship, poverty, corruption and police brutality that have accompanied the people's calls for freedom - and the counterrevolution that has tried to suppress them.

This study offers a new interpretation of the debates over education and politics in the early years of the French Revolution. Following these debates from the 1760s to the Terror (1793-94) and putting well-known works in dialogue with previously neglected sources, it situates education at the centre of revolutionary contests over citizenship, participatory politics and representative government. The book takes up education's role in a dramatic period of uncertainty and upheaval, anxiety and ambition. It traces the convergence of philosophical, political, ideological and practical concerns in Ancien Regime debates and revolutionary attempts to reform education and remake society. In doing so, it provides new insight into the relationship between the Enlightenment and the French Revolution and sheds light on how revolutionary legislators and ordinary citizens worked to make a new sort of politics possible in eighteenth-century France. -- .

This book treats two basic subjects: (1) royalist explanations of the causes of the French Revolution, and (2) royalist defenses of royalist political positions. The royalists began with a simplistic conspiracy theory of history--the Old Regime was right. But then they came up with increasingly sophisticated explanations, thereby making an important contribution to historical explanation. In political thought, they eventually offered a tempered defense of the Old Regime, a call for political elitism in the face of the chaos unleashed by the Revolution, and an early explanation of the organic theory of history, a true contribution to political thought.

A comprehensive analysis of political violence in Weimar Germany with particular emphasis on the political culture from which it emerged. "Today's readers, living in what Charles Maier calls 'a new epoch of vanished reassurance', will find this book absorbing and troubling."-The Historian The Prussian province of Saxony-where the Communist uprising of March 1921 took place and two Combat Leagues (Wehrverbande) were founded (the right-wing Stahlhelm and the Social Democratic Reichsbanner)-is widely recognized as a politically important region in this period of German history. Using a case study of this socially diverse province, this book refutes both the claim that the Bolshevik revolution was the prime cause of violence and the argument that the First World War's all-encompassing "brutalization" doomed post-1918 German political life from the very beginning. The study thus contributes to a view of the Weimar Republic as a state in severe crisis but with alternatives to the Nazi takeover. From the introduction: After the phase of civil war, political violence assumed a distinctly limited form. It was no longer aimed at killing or wounding as many opponents as possible; instead, it served political parties and organizations as an instrument for exerting pressure in the struggle over control of the street. This development was driven by the Combat Leagues (Wehrverbande) of all political camps, who, with their uniforms and marches, injected militaristic elements into the political culture. However, since the violence they perpetrated followed a political and not a military logic, it was, as I will show, in principle controllable and did not pose a fundamental threat to the political order, not even in 1932, that particularly turbulent year before Hitler's assumption of power.

Told for the first time, the riveting story of how common people-miners, cooks, former soldiers-shook off the intimidation of Serbian strongman Slobadan Milosevic and overthrew, peacefully, his tyrannical regime. Based on numerous interviews with participants, from the man in the street to top officials in the Serbian regime, The Fall of Milosevicrecounts the exhilaration, fear and chaos of a population rising in opposition to a tyrant, the “Butcher of the Balkans.” As the people gather in protest, behind the scenes the pillars of Milosevic’s regime crumble as politicians, military officers, and the police desert a leader no longer legitimate in the eyes of the people. This is the story of individuals facing down fear and rising up for democracy.

This is a study of the formulation of British policy towards the American colonies during the crucial period between the Boston Tea Party of December 1773 and the American Declaration of Independence in July 1776. It is set against the background both of British public opinion and of the developing resistance movement in America. Peter Thomas examines the constraints on British policy-making, and analyses the failure of the colonists either to respond to British overtures or to produce positive proposals of their own. He shows how the crisis escalated as the Americans moved from constitutional demands to a military response, and finally took the decision to separate from Britain. Tea Party to Independence is a scholarly and comprehensive exploration of one of the most important phases of American history. It completes Professor Thomas's acclaimed study of British relations with the American colonies, begun in British Politics and the Stamp Act Crisis 1763-1767 (Clarendon Press, 1975) and The Townshend Duties Crisis 1767-1773 (Clarendon Press, 1987).

Makes available twenty-two protest songs of the period up to and including the 1848 Revolution in Germany along with a reception history of the songs through their revival after 1945. The socially volatile period of the Vormarz (1830-1848) and the 1848 Revolution in Germany produced a wealth of political protest song. Songs for a Revolution makes available twenty-two prominent protest songs from that time, both lyrics (in German and English) and melodies. It also chronicles the songs' reception: suppressed after the revolution, they fell into obscurity, despite intermittent revivals by the workers' movement and later in the Weimar Republic, until they were appropriated as democratic cultural heritage by the folk and political song movements of East and West Germany after 1945. The songs reflect the new, oppositional political consciousness that emerged during the post-1830 period of restoration and led to the revolution. The book makes use of broadsides, songbooks, newspaper reports, and manuscripts to document the songs' transmission and shed light on the milieus in which they circulated. It also demonstrates how the appropriation of these songs by the German Liedermacher and folk scene shaped today's cultural memory of the 1848 period. It illuminates the functioning of political ideology in these reception processes, which in turn have given rise to myths that have influenced the discourse on the 1848 songs.

The primary objective of this book is to understand the nature of the Boko Haram insurgency in northeast Nigeria. Boko Haram's goal of an Islamic Caliphate, starting in the Borno State in the North East that will eventually cover the areas of the former Kanem-Borno Empire, is a rejection of the modern state system forced on it by the West. The central theme of this volume examines the relationship between the failure of the state-building project in Nigeria and the outbreak and nature of insurgency. At the heart of the Boko Haram phenomenon is a country racked with cleavages, making it hard for Nigeria to cohere as a modern state. Part I introduces this theme and places the Boko Haram insurgency in a historical context. There are, however, multiple cleavages in Nigeria ethnic, regional, cultural, and religious and Part II examines the different state-society dynamics fuelling the conflict. Political grievances are common to every society; however, what gives Boko Haram the space to express such grievances through violence? Importantly, this volume demonstrates that the insurgency is, in fact, a reflection of the hollowness within Nigeria's overall security. Part III looks at the responses to Boko Haram by Nigeria, neighbouring states, and external actors. For Western actors, Boko Haram is seen as part of the "global war on terror" and the fact that it has pledged allegiance to ISIS encourages this framing. However, as the chapters here discuss, this is an over-simplification of Boko Haram and the West needs to address the multiple dimension of Boko Haram. This book will be of much interest to students of terrorism and political violence, insurgencies, African politics, war and conflict studies, and IR in general.

The essays in this collection, drawn from a Hofstra University bicentennial conference on the French Revolution, seek to come to terms, often from conflicting points of view, with the complex relationship between events and their representations. The question 'How did the lived experience that eventually became known as the French Revolution come to be organized?' provides a common thread for the collection. Individual chapters examine the Revolution from the vantage points of theology and philosophy, theater and literature, as well as politics and history.

As the contributors show, the French Revolution was more than a series of political events that took place in one European country at the end of the 18th century. Instead, it was a trans-historical, multi-national, and multi-cultural discourse. It served as a point of reference by which and through which a complex of cultural values and styles could be defined, and as a model (even a negative model) for the elaboration of ideologies, and of political and administrative strategies for bureaucracies around the world. An invaluable collection for all students of the Revolution and its impact.

Sendero Luminoso or the "Shining Path" ranks among the most elusive, secretive, and brutal guerrilla organizations in the world. Once a radical uprising limited to the Andean highlands of Ayacucho, it is now a movement of national proportions that has woven itself into the fabric of Peruvian society. Unlike many other terrorists groups, Sendero Luminoso is founded upon an intellectual infrastructure crafted by the now legendary Abimael Guzman, a former philosophy professor. The body of the movement, however, is drawn from Peru's long-neglected Indian and mestizo populations. Peru's already fragile democracy is further weakened as the rural and urban underclasses become attached to Sendero Luminoso ideologically and emotionally. This book provides a comprehensive overview of this guerrilla organization and the Peruvian government's dilemma in dealing with it and the emergence of "narcoterrorism," a mutually beneficial relationship between the cocaine syndicate and Sendero Luminoso. The Peruvian cocaine syndicate and Sendero Luminoso have different objectives and ideologies, but share a mutual enemy--the Peruvian government and its armed services. Hence they have combined forces to form a powerful and destructive alliance. Gabriela Tarazona-Sevillano assesses the impact of the Sendero Luminoso on Peruvian society, a new democratic government already besieged by complex and far-reaching problems. The book presents a detailed understanding of the peculiar and very personal nature of Peru's affliction as well as its possible international repercussions.

The Revolutionary War was not a polite conflict between orderly troops and gentlemanly officers. Civilians on the home front suffered considerably. This account depicts the ugly side of the War for Independence, where roving bands of robbers, known as banditti, plagued the countryside in areas not fully under the control of either army.

Regardless of their political sympathies, American civilians lived in terror of these well-armed gangs of looters, who frequently engaged in torture, arson, and murder. The players in this sordid tale, chiefly motivated by greed, chose their victims indiscriminately and then returned to sanctuary. Many civilians fled their homes, leaving large sections of New York, Georgia, and the Carolinas as no-man's-land, where near anarchy and the complete disruption of civilian justice only abetted the success of the marauders.

Ward details the activities of the most prominent banditti and looks at the horrors and devastation of their actions. His account challenges readers to look beyond the set-piece battles and even past the guerrilla activities, to examine what life was like for those caught between the lines.

The Grenada Revolution in the Caribbean Present: Operation Urgent Memory is the first scholarly book from the humanities on the subject of the Grenada Revolution and the US intervention. It is simultaneously a critique, tribute, and memorial. It argues that in both its making and its fall, the 1979-1983 Revolution was a transnational event that deeply impacted politics and culture across the Caribbean and its diaspora during its life and in the decades since its fall. Drawing together studies of landscape, memorials, literature, music, painting, photographs, film and TV, cartoons, memorabilia traded on e-bay, interviews, everyday life, and government, journalistic, and scholarly accounts, the book assembles and analyzes an archive of divergent memories. In an analysis that is relevant to all micro-states, the book reflects on how Grenada's small size shapes memory, political and poetic practice, and efforts at reconciliation.