Week 9: Political Revolutions

Question 1

What are the advantages and dangers of cities for revolutionary contention?

Answer 1

• Cities are where the coercive capacity of the state is the strongest
  BUT revolutionary oppositions are most vulnerable to repression in cities
• Cities are where the nerve centers of government are concentrated
  BUT regimes are most vulnerable to disruption and overthrow in cities

Question 2

What does the proximity to government have to do with the revolution?

Answer 2

Proximity to government centers of power magnifies the stakes and risks involve in revolution for both oppositions and regimes

A spatial trade-off exists between a revolutionary opposition’s exposure to government repression and its ability to disrupt government directly that is associated with proximity to or distance from government centers of power

Question 3

What is the proximity dilemma in revolution?

Answer 3

1. spatial relocation
2. learning behavior (tactical choice and innovation)
3. structural changes in the environment

Question 4

Cities vs the countryside in the power of numbers?

Answer 4

In the countryside, the ability to deploy numbers matters less affecting outcomes than the ability to deploy violence

In cities, numbers are strongly related to outcomes, but only at extremely high numbers do the odds truly tip in favor of oppositions

Question 5

Who authored the 3rd generation of scholarship on revolutions?

Answer 5

Skocpol – Structuralist approach

Question 6

What is the 3rd generation on scholarship about revolutions?

Answer 6

• revolutions are the product of broader social and political conditions that make revolutionary outcomes inevitable
• revolutionaries and revolutionary movements are not necessary for the outcome
• revolutionary leaderships, the participants in revolutions, and incumbent regimes act out a drama already put in place by larger structural forces
• success or failure of revolution is determined before the events even begin

Question 7

Who authored the 4th generation of theories of revolution?

Answer 7

Goldstone

Question 8

What is the 4th generation of theories of revolution?

Answer 8

• revolutions unfold out of interactions between oppositions and incumbent regime, with multiple critical junctures
• focus on agency, contingency, and interactions, as well as on the roles played by networks, organizations and culture
• do not see revolution as a completely distinct process from other mobilizational phenomena, but involve many of the same processes
• broadened the number of cases analyzed
• greater attention to other sorts of divisions in society besides class (ethnicity, gender, race, region, etc.)

Question 9

What is the with the contingency and 4th generation of theories of revolution?

Answer 9

• 4th generation sees fundamental similarities between what happens within mobilizational waves and cycles and what happens within revolutions, and the main difference being that revolutions involve the development of efforts at regime-change
• iterated and intensified interactions between incumbent regimes and oppositions
• revolutionary movements sometimes begin as social movements aimed at achieving certain reforms or policy goals, but evolve into revolutionary movements to overthrow the incumbent regime out of the interactions between the state and opposition
• a situation becomes revolutionary when the elites in power reject all competing claims yet fail to repress the opposition, leading oppositions to contest sovereignty

Question 10

What is preference falsification?

Answer 10

When individuals have 2 sets of preferences – a public set of preferences and a private set of preferences; incentives exist to lie anytime people fear expression of their private (genuine) preferences
- some with strong ‘expressive needs’ will express their private preferences irrespective of the costs, but most people are subject to some degree of fear of retaliation and/or ‘repetitional incentive’

Question 11

Who authored preference falsification

Answer 11

Kuran (1995)

Question 12

What does Kuran think about the unpredictability of revolutions?

Answer 12

Small changes in the structure of preferences can have huge consequences

Question 13

What does Kuran think the role is of the revolution’s organization?

Answer 13

1. expose the regime’s vulnerability in order to raise the perceived probability of revolutionary uprising, helping to foster belief that a vast majority privately want change
2. mold private preferences: find and expose the wrongs of the current regime in an attempt to convince people that the regime needs to be changed, or at least hold this belief privately
3. enhance the advantages of joining public opposition by lessening the repetitional costs of dissent and serve as a support network for those who would revolt

*basically: revolutions can only be explained by hindsight, and there are a wide variety of factors that could lower the thresholds at which individuals would rebel – he is not interested in identifying these or developing a theory about them vs. structural theories of revolt

Question 14

4 generation of theories of revolution basically see what:

Answer 14

similarities between what happens within mobiliztional waves and cycles
- distinguish between revolutionary situations and revolutionary outcomes (Tilly)
- point to the intensified interactions between incumbent regimes and oppositions and the contingencies that these introduce

Question 15

What are those intensified interactions between incumbent regimes & oppositions?

Answer 15

• thickened history (Beissinger) – the heightened pace of interactions exercises effects on decision-makers and the public
• eventful approach to the study of mobilization – a focus on transformative moments that emerge out of these interactions (Sewell)
• critical role of emotion and information in shaping events.

Question 16

What is the revolution game?

Answer 16

• each side enters competition with well-known strengths and weaknesses and a post record of accomplishment (so one team - incumbent - is typically favored over the other)
• as they engaged with each other, each sides strengths and weaknesses manifest in a pattern of outcomes
• these outcomes have little to do with prior expectations, plans, or past actions
• outcomes are what the players do with the assets they have (agency)

Question 17

What are the difference between the risks and stakes for the regime vs the opposition?

Answer 17

For the opposition:
- extremely high stakes: potentially face death, injury, imprisonment, harm to family or friends, or unemployment should they lose – they are risk-takers
- requires multiple attempts before achieving success
For the regime:
- usually a one-and-out contest, without a second chance to ‘play’
- stakes are somewhat lower: death and imprisonment are rare, but risking losing power, status, and sometimes access to sources of wealth, as well s those of friends, relatives, and collaborators – they are risk-averse

Question 18

What is the difference between revolutions occurring in rural vs urban areas?

Answer 18

Rural
- revolution stretches over years, and revolves around the eventfulness of the battle, which ruptures an otherwise monotonous daily routine
Urban
- highly compressed – measured in days, weeks, and months

Question 19

How can mistakes in rural revolutions end up rectified?

Answer 19

• the process of revolution unfolds over a protracted period of time
• the effect of a mistake may be confined to a particular locality and have an impact on relatively small numbers of people
• mistakes can occur where the state is weakest and at a distance from the seat of national power, affording rebels and regimes opportunities to recover (only in rare instances do they exert a direct effect on final outcomes)

Question 20

How can mistakes in urban revolutions end up rectified?

Answer 20

mistakes often exert a more direct impact on outcomes
- the speed of events means decision-making often occurs on the basis of low or incomplete information (can be magnified by the character of the regime)
- events involve simultaneous action by large numbers of highly networked individuals, increasing the possibility for error or chance
- events occur in close proximity to nerve centers of the state, where mistakes or chance exert immediate effects on outcomes – no place to hide or recover

Question 21

So basically, according to the 4th generation perspectives, why are “revolutions made, and do not simply come”

Answer 21

• they depend upon the actions and interactions of regimes and oppositions
• these actions and interactions are shaped in significant part by the urban or rural context in which the unfold