The Anatomy of Revolution Revisited

This study aims to update a classic of comparative revolutionary analysis, Crane Brinton's 1938 study The Anatomy of Revolution. It invokes the latest research and theoretical writing in history, political science and political sociology to compare and contrast, in their successive phases, the English Revolution of 1640-60, the French Revolution of 1789-99 and the Russian Revolution of 1917-29. This book intends to do what no other comparative analysis of revolutionary change has yet adequately done. It not only progresses beyond Marxian socioeconomic 'class' analysis and early 'revisionist' stresses on short-term, accidental factors involved in revolutionary causation and process; it also finds ways to reconcile 'state-centered' structuralist accounts of the three major European revolutions with postmodernist explanations of those upheavals that play up the centrality of human agency, revolutionary discourse, mentalities, ideology and political culture. 'Despite covering an enormous and highly contentious historiography for these revolutions, and covering hundreds of years of history, this book is deft, clear, and a good read. Bailey Stone is particularly good at working with the international, religious/nationalist, and social forces behind every twist and turn of the detailed events. There is nothing else quite like it for telling the story of these three major revolutions in a comparative framework. This is an outstanding book, a worthy sequel to Crane Brinton.' Jack A. Goldstone, Virginia E. and John T. Hazel, Jr, Professor of Public Policy and Eminent Scholar, George Mason University 'The Anatomy of Revolution Revisited is an ambitious effort to chart and analyze three major revolutions that defined the meaning of 'revolution' in the European political tradition. However, the purpose of the book is not to evince a standard model for the revolutionary process, nor is it to apply a ready-made one to the three upheavals under examination. Rather, as a work of comparative history, the book tells the 'story' of each revolution largely on its own terms. A thoughtful, sophisticated, and illuminating comparative study of three European revolutions that helped form the modern world, this book is a worthy successor to Crane Brinton's classic, Anatomy of Revolution.' Thomas Kaiser, University of Arkansas, Little RockIntroduction: from revolutionary theory to revolutionary historiography: England, France, and Russia; 1. Anciens regimes; 2. Transitions: breakthroughs to revolution; 3. Revolutionary 'honeymoons'?; 4. The 'revolutionizing' of the revolutions; 5. Revolutionary climacterics; 6. Thermidor?; Conclusion: 'revolutions from below' and 'revolutions from above'.