Revolutions: How They Changed History and What They Mean Today

Revolutions from 1688 to the Arab Spring continue to shape the political landscape, and Peter Furtado, as editor of this collection of essays, helps guide the reader through the last four hundred years of revolutionary change.

A revolution is not the same as a rebellion in that a revolution is successful. They push change, geographical boundaries, and may be bloodless or indescribably violent, often tied in some way to a moral component. Revolutions: How They Changed History and What They Mean Today examines revolutions around the world, looking at their causes, crises, and outcomes, along with their long-term legacies and contested meanings. Each essay is well written and thought-provoking, working together to form a whole picture. Revolutions works through the essential causes, the narratives, the events, and ideologies of revolutions, as well as how revolutions evolve. One of the strengths of this book is its not telling the reader what to think but instead introducing the landscape of discourse on these broad historical tableaux. Each revolution has its own legacy, though as to what that legacy is, it may be, as the Chinese revolutionary Zhou Enlai said, “too soon to tell.”