Politics 211
Political Movements and Revolutions
Stephen Crowley
MWF 11-12:20
King 235
Office: Rice 211
Office Hours: MWF 3:30-4:30; or by appointment
Phone: (office) x8286; (home) (216) 321-6564
e-mail: <steve.crowley@oberlin.edu>
The twentieth century has been called the "century of revolutions." With the end of the century, critical questions arise about revolution as a means of social and political change. We will examine a number of revolutions of the past century, particularly those in Latin America and Russia/eastern Europe. The questions we will explore include: What brings about revolution? Why do some revolutions succeed, and others fail? Are revolutions effective means of social change, or do they merely reproduce the problems inherited from the past? Have recent global changes rendered revolutions obsolete, or will they likely persist as a means of social and political transformation?
We will address these and other questions initially by examining theories of revolutionary change. We will then see how these different theories stand up by investigating concrete cases of revolutionary movements. In particular, we will examine revolutions that have taken place this century in the "south" and the "east": Latin America and Russia/eastern Europe (though we will look at other examples as well). The goal of this theoretical and historical knowledge will be not only to understand revolutions throughout the world, but to deepen our understanding generally of how political and change comes about.
Course Requirements
Most class sessions will consist of both lectures and discussion. You are expected to attend each session, and complete the reading before class. Lectures will assume knowledge of the reading; discussions will be based almost entirely on the materials and cases we have read in common.
Graded assignments will consist of the following:
-- weekly postings to the Alta Vista Forum. Once or twice a week (I will inform you in class as to the specific days) you are to briefly respond to questions I have posed on the forum or in class about the reading, and/or post critical comments directly related to the reading. (Your grade will not be based on the content of the contributions, but on whether or not you have posted a response.)
-- two short (5-6 pages) analytical essays [due Oct. 6 and Nov. 10]
-- an 8-10 page case study of a revolutionary movement. The paper can either be an application of a particular theory (or theories) we have discussed, or a comparison of your chosen case with another we have examined. You will be asked to hand in a one-page paper proposal and preliminary bibliography (due Oct. 13).
-- a final take-home exam
Grades will be determined as follows:
2 short essays: 2 x 15%
case study/research paper: 20%
final take-home exam: 30%
Alta Vista Form participation: 20%
[I reserve the right to deduct from your grade based on excessive absence from class]
Reading:
All the assigned readings will be on reserve. In addition the following books have been ordered for purchase at the Co-op:
Michael Kimmel Revolution: A Sociological Interpretation (Temple University Press, 1990)
John Gaventa, Power and Powerless: Quiescence and Rebellion in an Appalachian Valley (Univ. of Illinois Press, 1982)
James DeFronzo, Revolutions and Revolutionary Movements (Westview Press, 1996)
Class Schedule
Sept. 6: Introduction to Course
no assigned reading
September 8: Some central concepts
Kimmel, Revolution, chap. 1
DeFronzo, Revolutions and Revolutionary Movements, chapt. 1
September 11: Peasants/resistance/ moral economy
James Scott, "Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance," in Forrest Colburn, ed., Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance (M. E. Sharpe, 1989)
Eric Wolf, "Peasant Rebellion and Revolution," in Jack Goldstone, ed., Revolutions (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1986)
Kimmel, Revolution, chap. 3, esp. pp. 73-82
September 13-15: Rational Choice and Revolution
Samuel Popkin, The Rational Peasant (Univ. of California Press, 1978), chaps. 1, 6
Kimmel, Revolution, pages 189-206
September 18-22: Marx and Moore
Kimmel, Revolution, chapters 2, 5
Karl Marx, "The Communist Manifesto" in Robert Tucker, ed., The Marx-Engels Reader
Barrington Moore, Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy (Beacon, 1966), chapt. 3
September 25-29: The Mexican Revolution
John Tutino, From Insurrection to Revolution in Mexico (Princeton University Press, 1986), chapt. 9
Walter Goldfrank, "The Mexican Revolution," in Goldstone, Revolutions
Enrique Krauze, Mexico: Biography of Power, chapt. 11
Hans Werner Tobler, "Peasants and the Shaping of the Revolutionary State," in Friedrich Katz, ed., Riot, Rebellion, and Revolution (Princeton University Press, 1988)
October 2-4: Tilly and Skocpol
Kimmel, Revolution, chapter 6
Tilly, "Does Modernization Breed Revolution?"
Theda Skocpol and Ellen Kay Trimberger, "Revolutions: A Structural Analysis," in Goldstone, Revolutions
Skocpol, "France, Russia, China: A Structural Analysis of Social Revolutions," in Goldstone, Revolutions
October 6: First Essay Due
October 6-13: The Russian Revolution
DeFronzo, Revolutions and Revolutionary Movements, pp. 29-52; 65-67
Sheila Fitzpatrick, The Russian Revolution, chapts. 1-2
Lenin, "What Is to Be Done?," [excerpt], in Bruce Mazlish, et. al, Revolution: A Reader (Macmillan, 1971) pp. 161-168
Rosa Luxemburg, "Leninism or Marxism," in The Russian Revolution and Leninism and Marxism
Sheila Robowtham, Women, Resistance, and Revolution (Pantheon, 1972), chapt. 6
October 13: Paper topic and preliminary bibliography due
[Fall break]
October 23: Revolution in the Third World
Kimmel, Revolution, chapter 4
Valerie Bunce, "Socialism and Underdevelopment," in Sabrina Ramet, ed., Adaptation and Transformation in Communist and Post-Communist Systems (Boulder: Westview Press, 1992)
Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth, pp. 35-95 [skim]
October 25-27: Vietnam
DeFronzo, Revolutions and Revolutionary Movements, pp. 73-104; 119-163
October 30: Cuba
DeFronzo, Revolutions and Revolutionary Movements, chapt. 5 [167-201]
John Lee Anderson, Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life (Grove Press, 1997), chapt. 14
November 1-6: Central America
DeFronzo, Revolutions and Revolutionary Movements, chapt. 6
Christopher McAuley, "Race and the Process of the American Revolutions," in John Foran, ed., Theorizing Revolutions (Routledge, 1997)
Liisa North, "Bitter Grounds: Roots of Revolt in El Salvador", in Goldstone, Revolutions
T. David Mason, "Women's Participation in Central American Revolutions: A Theoretical Perspective," Comparative Political Studies 1992
I, Rigoberta Menchu (Verso, 1984) chapts. I, IV, VI, VIII, XII-XIII, XV-XIX; XXXIII [skim]
UN Commission for Historical Clarification, "Guatemala: Memory of Silence," Conclusion, Part 1 [16 pp.] [can be found at http://hrdata.aaas.org/ceh/report/english/conc1.html]
November 8: Culture Between Structure and Action
John Gaventa, Power and Powerlessness, chapter 1
Rick Fantasia and Eric Hirsch, "Culture in Rebellion: The Appropriation and Transformation of the Veil in the Algerian Revolution," in H. Johnston and B. Klandermans, eds., Social Movements and Culture, vol. 4.
DeFronzo, Revolutions and Revolutionary Movements, chapt. 7
November 10: Second Essay Due
November 10-15: A Structure/Culture Synthesis
Gaventa, Power and Powerlessness, chapts. 2-6; 8-10
November 17: 1968
Immanuel Wallerstein, "1968, Revolution in the World-System" in Geopolitics and Geoculture
Chris Harman, The Fire Last Time: 1968 and After, prologue, pp. 38-54; 84-120
"The Appeal from the Sorbonne," in The New Left Reader
November 20: Violence and Non-Violence in Revolution
Gene Sharp, Ghandi's Political Significance, pp. xii-xv; 1-20
Susan Ferriss and Ricardo Sandoval, The Fight in the Fields: Cesar Chavez and the Farmworkers Movement (Harcourt Brace, 1997), chapter 5.
DeFronzo, Revolutions and Revolutionary Movements, chapt. 8
Robin Morgan, The Demon Lover, pp. 23-50
November 22: Do Revolutions Make a Difference?
Valentine Moghadam, "Gender and Revolutions", in Theorizing Revolutions
Susan Eckstein, "The Impact of Revolution on Social Welfare in Latin America," in Jack Goldstone, ed., Revolutions
November 27-December 1: Post-Communist Revolutions
David Ost, Solidarity and the Politics of Anti-Politics (Temple University Press, 1990) preface; chaps. 1,5;
The Kuron Open Letter, The Gdansk Agreement, the Solidarity Program, in Gale Stokes, ed., From Stalinism to Pluralism [skim]
Jack Goldstone, "Theories of Revolution and the Revolutions of 1989 in the USSR and Eastern Europe, in A. Groth, ed., Revolution and Political Change (Dartmouth, 1996)
Stephen Crowley, "Coal Miners, Cultural Frameworks, and the Transformation of the Soviet Political Economy," Post-Soviet Affairs, vol. 13, no. 2 (April-June 1997)
Stephen White and Olga Kryshtanovakaya, "Russia: Elite Continuity and Change," in Mattei Dogan and John Hingley, eds., Elites, Crises, and the Origins of Regimes (Rowman & Littlefield, 1998)
December 4: Globalization and Revolution
Charles Tilly, "Globalization Threatens Labor's Rights," International Labor and Working Class History (spring 1995)
December 6: Case Study Paper Due
December 6-8: the Zapatista Rebellion
Jorge Castaneda, Utopia Unarmed: The Latin American Left After the Cold War, chapter 8 [237-266]
Elaine Katzenberger, ed., First World, Ha Ha: The Zapatista Challenge (City Lights, 1995) pp. 1-3; 57-72
Michael Shifter, "Columbia on the Brink," Foreign Affairs, July/August 1999
December 11-13: What Future for Revolution?
December 17: Take-home Final Exam due
BASIC INSTRUCTIONS FOR USING ALTA VISTA FORUM
Alta Vista Forum can be found at www.oberlin.edu/avf98/aca-1/dispatch.cgi; or you can link to it from Oberlin Online Þ Arts & Sciences. It is easy to use because it follows the conventions of common web browsers. Here are some basic instructions.
THE FIRST TIME YOU USE AV FORUM:
Be sure to register. Click on "register now" at the opening screen. N.b.: Use as your login name your first name followed without a space by your last name, BOTH CAPITALIZED (e.g., SteveCrowley). No cool or uncool nicknames, please. This is VERY IMPORTANT, as it will allow me as well as your classmates to identify your replies; it will also enable me to tabulate them at the end of the semester when I am working out your grade. Then choose a password that either is the same as your e-mail password or something else that you will not forget.
TO ENTER YOUR OWN COMMENTS (known as "replies") ON THE FORUM:
1. Log in by clicking the button on the opening screen. Use your login name and your password.
2. Click to our forum.
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4. In the upper right hand corner, there is a pull-down menu marked "Entry Tools Menu". Pull it down to "Reply".
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6. To modify your reply after you have entered it, just find it on the topic page for the day, click on its title, and pull down the "Entry Tools Menu" to "Modify". When done modifying, click "OK" again.
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TO VIEW OTHERS' REPLIES:
Get into the Forum, and follow steps 1-3.
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