Urban radicalism alone cannot produce social revolution in agrarian societies

Evidence

Nevertheless, peasant revolts have been the crucial insurrectionary ingredient in virtually all actual (i.e., successful) social revolutions to date … Without peasant revolts urban radicalism in predominantly agrarian countries has not in the end been able to accomplish social-revolutionary transformations… they [English and German revolutions of 1848] failed as social revolutions in part for want of peasant insurrections against landed upper classes. (Skocpol 1979, 113) Nevertheless, peasant revolts have been the crucial insurrectionary ingredient in virtually all actual (i. — Gary Goertz, Social Science Concepts and Measurement, 1552

Categorization

• SHARE: A tidy counter to the reflexive assumption that revolutions are made in cities — worth sending to the friend who keeps citing 1848 as the model.