ABSTRACT
Scan the news and it is evident that ‘‘revolution’’ remains a rough and ready
descriptor for any number of instances in our (post)modern world. This
seems particularly true of what even in this age of ‘‘globalization’’ might be
construed as the periphery, those places at a remove, literal or otherwise,
from the metropole, itself no longer so easily identifiable. The surprising
persistence of ‘‘revolution’’ no doubt reflects the impressive array of factors,
aspects, elements, and relationships of varying degrees, intensities, and
durations which the term evokes. This is not to ignore that ‘‘traditional’’ conceptions of revolution remain
alive, where the ultimate goal is state power for the purpose of fundamen-
tally transforming society; at this time of writing Nepal seems the most
obvious instance, perhaps followed by the Philippines. But the past two
decades have presented us with more nuanced cases: the complexities of the
1989-1991 Eastern European transitions, the saga of Chiapas since 1994,
the ill-defined struggles in Colombia, as well as the various shades of what
have come to be construed as ‘‘Islamic’’ revolutions. Whatever else they may be, revolutions are fundamentally about people:
created by people, led by people, fought and died for by people, consciously
and intentionally constructed by people. This is not to deny the power of
actually existing social, political, and economic structures; of ideologies; of
the international situation; of milieu defining meta-narratives such as the
Enlightenment, global(ized) capitalism and its co-relations (colonialism,
imperialism, modernization, development, dependency, globalization); of
tropes such as modernism or progress; or perhaps even the grand sweep of History. Yet, if the question is why revolutions happen here and not there,
now and not then, and among these people and not those, we must focus on
people and their worlds.
