History and Revolutions Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

History and Revolutions - Essay ExampleHistorical events, properly understood, should consequently enlighten not only in terms of the chronology of recrudesceicular events, but on the impact a particular event had both in the topical anesthetic account statement of a particular society, and the wider human beings history of the human race.Revolutions, like other historical phenomenon, are no different. As John Gates suggests, devoted the countless studies and surveys regarding revolutions, a proper historical discretion of the phenomenon assumes that revolutions evolves over time, changing as a solving of changes in the political, social, and economic circumstances in which they develop in, must be fully understood (1986, p. 535). Thus, in illustrating the historical importance of revolutions, this essay will argue that revolutions, as an historical phenomenon, is a crucial transit that contributed to the emergence and consolidation of the modern world by altering a society s political, economic, and social structures at the local level, and consequently introducing new ideas, institutions, and ideals for the world in the international level.Revolutions have always been associated with change. According to Huntington1, (1968) it is a modernizing invention resulting to political modernization and development (p. 265). He argues that they are most likely to occur in societies that experienced roughly social and economic development where political modernization and political development have lagged back end the processes of social and economic change, limiting the phenomenon to transitional states, which are neither highly traditional nor highly modern (Huntington, 1968, p. 265). Thus, Huntington makes the distinction between Western revolutions in France and Russia from Eastern revolutions in China and Vietnam based on the sheath of old regimes. On the other hand, in Barrington Moores Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy, he distinguishes b etween three types of modernization processes2 different societies underwent through revolutions (Zagorin, 1973, pp. 39-40). Both typologies present an important aspect of revolutions - they presented revolutions in light of the modernizing process it is part of. As both scholars argue, revolutions bring about modernization, however, the degree and type of modernization and development following a revolution are contingent on the type of regime preceding it and the manner that the revolution took place. Thus, Moore situates revolutions as a decisive point of conflict in the historical process that yields important systemic consequences find the type of institutions that emerge after the revolutionary stage (Zagorin, 1973, p. 40). This concept of revolution echoes the proper historical understanding of revolutions through time. By treating revolutions as more than just a separate event at some point in time, but as a point within the continuum of world history, a repair understandi ng of the phenomenons larger historical value is achieved. In this case, the significance of the French revolution in world history lies in its having with a powerful blast cleared the way for a new season in the life of continental Europe (Elbaki, 1976, p. 218). Considering the immediate outcomes of the French revolution of 1789 one can forecast minimal improvements in the industrial and