Crane Brinton’s theory

So after finishing frankenstuffie, it is time to start the next project. This project will have many blogposts, and this is just the first one. It is called Metaphor Machines. Don’t worry, I didn’t know what that meant either, until it was explained. Here’s a quick summary. We will be learning about revolutions in the past. We are put into groups, and each group focuses onto a particular revolution. My group is doing the Easter Rising. Afterwards, we are going to build a steampunk style Rube Goldberg machine. This machine will be a metaphor for the revolution. For example, if a marble falls, that could be a metaphor for the revolution starting instantly. Each group makes one machine, and although we haven’t started making them yet, i already know this will be fun.

Now that you have the basics of what this project is, we can get to the point of this first post. The first thing we learned about in this project is a man named Crane Brinton. He created a theory that all of the revolutions follow. He stated that revolutions are like fevers, they start our moderate, and then get very bad, then, the government returned to a state similar to before, but still altered. He created 4 stages, the 4 stages of a revolution. This theory is solely based on revolutions before 1945, and mainly based off the American Revolution, French Revolution, and other major ones. Here are the 4 stages.

Stage 1: Incubation stage
Economic Crisis
Sense of Government Injustice
Weak Rulers and Half-Hearted Reform
Intellectual Opposition
Class Division and Antagonism
Military Victory

Stage 2: Moderate Stage
Compromise and Reform
Rule of the Moderates

Stage 3: Crisis Stage
Increasing Violence
Radical Revolution

Stage 4: Recovery Stage
Returns To Moderate State
War or Peace

Now that you know the stages, we can jump into the question. We were given the task of creating an inquiry question about Crane Brinton and his theory. My question was ‘Did post 1945 revolutions also follow his theory?’ To fins the answer to my question, I researched 2 revolutions that happened after 1945, the Cuban Revolution Of 1953 and the Chinese Revolution Of 1949.

The first revolution was the Chinese revolution. Now I’m not going to tell you about he entire war, so here is another summary. This revolution was the culmination of the Chinese Communist Party’s drive to power its founding in 1921. It resulted in the communist’s victory and takeover of China. Also, the Government of the Republic Of China relocated to Taiwan. This revolution was considered to mostly follow Crane Brinton’s theory.

The second and final revolution we are going to talk about is the Cuban Revolution. Here is yet again, another summary. Fulgencio Batista served his first term as president of Cuba from 1049 to 1944. He quickly went from president to dictator. He failed to fix Cuba’s 2 biggest problems, high rate of unemployment and dirty water. The public got mad, and a revolution rapidly started. This revolution does not fit Crane Brinton’s theory, because there was no moderate stage. Also, essentially, this was a war, because there were no negotiations that were made.

In conclusion, after 1945, there were some revolutions that followed his theory, and there were some that didn’t. Not all of them followed his stages anymore, however, they are still considered revolutions.