HIS 557/SOC 514: Revolutions and Revolutionary Movements. Fall 2017

Transcription

1 HIS 557/SOC 514: Revolutions and Revolutionary Movements Thursdays 10:00 1:00 SBS N403 Fall 2017 Ian Roxborough Revolutions are dramatic events that at least in some ways shatter the existing fabric of social order. Besides being interesting in themselves, they enable us to look at large issues of social change and stability, legitimation, ideology, inequality, authority, and the role of ideas, interests and force in politics. If you are interested in social movements, political sociology, social change, or historical sociology, this course should meet your needs. This will be a course designed to introduce you to various theoretical approaches to the study of revolutions and insurgencies. I will select readings which will introduce you to a wide range of methods for analyzing revolutions. At the same time, I will focus on a few cases so that we can look at them in some depth. The cases we will discuss are the Russian revolution of 1917 and the subsequent struggle for state power, the Chinese revolution(s) of the period , including a millennial movement in the 19 th century (the Taiping Rebellion); the Mau Mau revolt in colonial Kenya in the 1950s; the Irish struggle for independence at the beginning of the twentieth century; and the Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) Maoist insurgency in Peru in the 1980s. We will look at the causes of revolutions, attempting to synthesize elements of global causation with more national-level specifics; at the process of the seizure of state power, examining the contest between various actors for control; and at the outcomes of revolutions, the processes of social transformation and state-building that are triggered by revolutions. We will also look at efforts to thwart or reverse revolutions: counterrevolutionary movements. Throughout the semester we will also look at the connections between revolutionary movements and revolutions. What sorts of social movements are involved in revolutionary activity? What makes a social movement revolutionary? Do revolutionary movements cause revolutions? Revolutions are notoriously difficult to define. Some writers only look at big, successful revolutions, such as the paradigmatic cases of France, Russia and China. Others think that we should also look at small revolutions, failed revolutions, and also-rans. I think this latter group of social scientists is right and, as a consequence, I have organized the course to include Russia (1917) and China (1949) unambiguous, great revolutions and Ireland (1923) a more problematic case of a lesser revolution which provides a useful and interesting contrast. I have also included revolutionary movements that did not succeed in seizing state power (Mau Mau and Sendero Luminoso). This broader scope will better help us address questions such as: What makes for success and failure? Do revolutions really change society? Why were there such 1

2 different outcomes in terms of social transformation and state-building between the various cases? Evaluation: Students can treat this as a reading course, aimed at surveying the literature in the field, in which case they will write five short reaction papers, or they can explore an issue in depth and write a term paper. History students may take this course either as a theme seminar or as a research seminar. The reading will be the same, but the requirements are different. In addition, each week I will ask someone to briefly introduce the discussion by posing one or a few major questions to get us started. If you wish to do this as a reading course, then I would like you to give me five short reaction papers on different topics. Please give these to me within a week of our discussion of that author or topic. If you would prefer to write a substantial paper instead, then please talk to me about this early in the semester. Week 1 Thursday 31 August concepts and theories Schedule How do we define a revolution? Are revolutions caused, or do they happen? Can we have a causal and predictive theory of revolution? Do revolutionary movements cause revolutions? How are internal and external factors linked in the causes of revolution? We will focus on the defining statement of the modern sociological theory of revolution by Theda Skocpol. How adequate is Theda Skocpol s theory as an explanation of revolutions? Some theories of revolution begin with the process of political mobilization; others, such as Skocpol s focus on the collapse of the state. Are these rival approaches, or can they be integrated? What exactly are the causal pathways between war and revolution? Is there more than one causal pathway? Does Skocpol specify these adequately? Does Skocpol define revolution in such a way that her sample and her universe are identical? How would one attempt to disprove Skocpol s theory? Theda Skocpol, France, Russia, China: a structural analysis of social revolutions Comparative Studies in Society and History, vol 18, No.2, 1976 (JSTOR) (pdf on BlackBoard.) James Mahoney, Nominal, Ordinal, and Narrative Appraisal in Macroanalysis, American Journal of Sociology, vol 104, #4, January 1999 (JSTOR) (pdf on BlackBoard.) This is a long article about methods. I only want you to read pp When we meet I want to talk about the diagram on p The following two articles, though continuing the discussion of Skocpol, discuss the structure action/culture issues. William Sewell, Ideologies and social revolutions: reflections on the French case, in Theda Skocpol, Social Revolutions in the Modern World, 1994 (pdf on BlackBoard.) 2

3 Theda Skocpol, Cultural idioms and political ideologies in the revolutionary reconstruction of state power: a rejoinder to Sewell, in Theda Skocpol, Social Revolutions in the Modern World, 1994 (pdf on BlackBoard.) Week 2. Thursday 7 September The Russian revolution of 1917: origins This week and next we look at a classical case of revolution. This raises general questions about structure, action, and culture; and questions about which groups made the revolution: workers, soldiers and/or peasants. We need to understand the roles of autocracy, war, and late development in the genesis of the revolution. Sheila Fitzpatrick, The Russian Revolution, 2008 The following two readings argue for a bottom-up view of the revolution. Steve Smith, Petrograd in 1917: the view from below in Daniel Kaiser (ed), The Workers Revolution in Russia, 1917, 1987 (BlackBoard) Alexander Rabinowitch, The Bolsheviks Come to Power, 1976, pp. xvii xxi and (BlackBoard) Week 3. Thursday 14 September The Russian revolution of 1917: consequences This week we follow the revolution from the Bolshevik seizure of power through the civil war, the debates about economic growth (markets versus planning) and the rise of the Stalinist dictatorship. Sheila Fitzpatrick, The Russian Revolution, 2008 Week 4. Thursday 21 September The other revolution: Wilsonianism and responses to Wilsonianism Erez Manela, The Wilsonian Moment: Self-Determination and the International Origins of Anticolonial Nationalism, 2007 We tend to think of revolutions as being Communist or Socialist. Manela describes a number of revolutions that were liberal or nationalist in content. His book gives us a chance to explore the complex ways that the First World War generated revolutionary movements. Next week we explore right-wing variants. Together, these two weeks are designed to raise the question of whether revolutions are exclusively progressive phenomena. [Please excuse the excess of quotation marks: they indicate that basic terms cannot be taken for granted.] 3

4 Week 5. Thursday 28 September Varieties of counter-revolution, paramilitary violence Robert Gerwarth and John Horne, Bolshevism as Fantasy: Fear of Revolution and Counter- Revolutionary Violence, in Robert Gerwarth and John Horne (eds) War in Peace: Paramilitary Violence in Europe after the Great War, 2012 Robert Gerwarth, Fighting the Red Beast: Counter-Revolutionary Violence in the Defeated States of Central Europe, in Robert Gerwarth and John Horne (eds) War in Peace: Paramilitary Violence in Europe after the Great War, 2012 Emilio Gentile, Paramilitary Violence in Italy: the Rationale of Fascism and the Origins of Totalitarianism in Robert Gerwarth and John Horne (eds) War in Peace: Paramilitary Violence in Europe after the Great War, 2012 These are available as an electronic resource from the library. Although these chapters focus on the years immediately following the First World War, the argument can be developed that both Italian Fascism and Naziism in Germany were, in some sense, revolutionary movements and regimes. This week also gives us an opportunity to think about the role of paramilitary organizations and militias, and to explore the notion of popular counterrevolution. Week 6. Thursday 5 Oct Irish independence The Irish war of independence is a good case to study a nationalist (separatist) movement which was riven by sectarian conflict. Why did (some) Irish seek independence? Why in 1916? Why as an urban rebellion? What were the social structures that underpinned guerrilla struggle in Ireland? Why were the Irish revolutionaries unable to prevent partition of the island? What role did religious identity and sectarian conflict play in determining the course of the rebellion? Why was the British state unable to suppress the rebellion? Peter Hart, Mick: the Real Michael Collins, 2005 [note: I have assigned this book for a large undergraduate course, so you should, if you want to purchase a copy, make sure you get one early. There may be a limited number of copies available from Amazon.] Peter Hart, Definition: Defining the Revolution in Joost Augusteijn (ed) The Irish Revolution, (BlackBoard) (I also request that you watch the movie, The Wind That Shakes the Barley, 2007) Week 7. Thursday 12 Oct Irish independence Peter Hart, Mick: the Real Michael Collins,

5 Week 8. Thursday 19 Oct China: The Taiping revolt This week we look at the Western impact on China, primarily through what seems at first sight to be a religious (millenarian) movement, the Taiping revolt ( ). This was one of the largest revolts of the twentieth century. Was it a revolutionary movement? Why did it fail? What are the connections between revolution and religion? To what extent is it useful to think of this event as a response to a global impact? Jonathan Spence, God s Chinese Son, 1996 Week 9. Thursday 26 Oct China: revolution and counterrevolution John Taylor, The Generalissimo, 2009 [pp only] In these two weeks we look at the Chinese revolution through the eyes of Chiang Kai-Shek. An anti-communist, Chiang also saw himself as a revolutionary. What does this case tell us about rival revolutionary currents and about counter-revolution.? This is also a good place to examine the causal impact of war and other forms of great power intervention. The obvious question here is the impact of the Japanese expansion into China on the outcome of the revolution. However, you might also ask whether the United States efforts in the Second World War and immediately after had any impact on the outcome of the revolution. Week 10. Thursday 2 November China: revolution and counterrevolution John Taylor, The Generalissimo, 2009 Week 11. Thursday 9 Nov The Mau-Mau revolt in Kenya In this section we look at a complicated colonial revolt which pitted one of Kenya s many ethnic groups, the Kikuyu, against the colonial state, but which rapidly developed into a civil war among the Kikuyu. What were the causes of this revolt? What was the revolt about? What was the connection, if any, between the Mau Mau revolt and independence in Kenya? Why was the revolt defeated? David Anderson, Histories of the Hanged, 2005 Week 12. Thursday 16 Nov The Mau-Mau revolt in Kenya David Anderson, Histories of the Hanged, 2005 Thursday 23 November: THANKSGIVING 5

6 Week 13. Thursday 30 November Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) in Peru This week we look at the Maoist insurgency in Peru in the 1980s. Sendero Luminoso had been preceded by decades of peasant agitation over land, and there had been other guerrilla movements in Peru. Was there anything special about Sendero Luminoso? (Hint: many observers believed that there were considerable millenarian elements in this movement. Others think that it is best understood in terms of detailed interactions between the revolutionaries and the peasant communities where they operated.) This week is also an opportunity to briefly look at some of the many unsuccessful guerrilla insurgencies in Latin America. What factors generate guerrilla movements? What social groups are involved? What leads to success or failure? For a general sociological analysis of small-scale insurgencies, see Timothy Wickham-Crowley, Winners, Losers and Also-rans, in Susan Eckstein, Power and Popular Protest, 1989 [Also as chapter 12 of his Guerrillas and Revolutions in Latin America, 1992] (BlackBoard) A quick introductory overview of Sendero Luminoso is Carlos Ivan Degregori The Years We Lived in Danger: the Armed Conflict, in Carlos Ivan Degregori, How Difficult it is to be God, 2012 (BlackBoard) On the intellectual and social origins of Sendero Luminoso, see Marisol de la Cadena, From Race to Class: Insurgent Intellectuals de provincia in Peru, in Steve Stern (ed) Shining and Other Paths, 1998 (BlackBoard) The mechanics of the insurgency and some possible explanations for its failure are discussed in the next two articles: Carlos Ivan de Gregori, Harvesting Storms: Peasant Rondas and the Defeat of Sendero Luminoso in Ayacucho in Steve Stern (ed) Shining and Other Paths, 1998 [Also in Degregori, How Difficult it is to be God, 2012] (BlackBoard) Orin Starn, To Revolt against the Revolution: War and Resistance in Peru s Andes, Cultural Anthropology, Nov 1995 (BlackBoard) Week 14. Thursday 7 December Modernization theory as counterrevolution Michael Latham, The Right Kind of Revolution, 2011 Latham looks at U.S. foreign policy in the post-war period in terms of its confrontation with Third World revolutionary movements and its own attempts to promote a revolution of modernization. This returns us to very broad notions of revolution and counterrevolution, to the role of the global conjuncture in the genesis of revolution and counterrevolution, and to a discussion of deliberate policies to promote, prevent or influence revolutions. 6