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What is your definition of revolution and how do we measure its success or failure?

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A revolution is a profound transformation that can be political, social, economic, or intellectual, fundamentally altering society. Success is measured by whether the change is sustained and beneficial, as seen in the American Revolution's establishment of a sovereign nation. However, revolutions often face challenges like violence, dissent, and unintended consequences, such as the French Revolution's descent into chaos. Ultimately, success varies for different groups, highlighting the complexity of revolutionary outcomes.

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Revolutions refer to moments of profound transformation and upheaval. Be aware that from a historical perspective, these aren't minor transformations—these are epoch making ones.

The great political revolutions were the French and Russian/Bolshevik Revolutions, which both entailed the radical dismantling and restructuring of the entire political and social structures. In addition, Revolutions are not limited solely to politics. One can point towards the Neolithic Revolution, which refers to the discovery of agriculture and the transition from a hunter-gathering to a sedentary lifestyle (without which the entire course of history as we know it becomes impossible). One can also point towards the Industrial Revolution or, more recently, the Information Revolution—consider how radically the internet and the Personal Computer has transformed culture and society. That is what a Revolution is: a transformation that is so profound, it is as if we have shifted from one epoch into another.

As far as success and failure goes, I'd say one of the major questions is whether that transformation itself can be successfully sustained, or whether it ends in a reversal. Additionally, one might well ask whether this transformation itself is actually a positive one and whether the gains are worth what society has sacrificed in the process. In the case of the great political revolutions, we often see a great deal of violence (as seen in the history of both the French Revolution and the Bolshevik Revolution), with oppression and bloodshed carried out in its name.

That in itself is one of the great challenges of leading a Political Revolution—can you achieve a Revolution without seeing it devolve into bloodshed and chaos? Whenever there is this kind of dramatic transformation and social upheaval, there will inevitably be dissenters and Reactionaries, which has historically led to the use of Terror and the outbreak of Civil War. Similarly, the question emerges: how does one secure the Revolution, not only from devolving into a dictatorship and/or Reign of Terror, but also from being overturned? Finally, one might also want to factor in the rest of the world: how is your post-Revolutionary polity perceived in foreign countries, and to what degree are you still even recognized as a legitimate government?

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My definition of a revolution is that it is an upheaval of the norm with an aim to improve the status of the current situation. Revolutions have occurred since the beginning of time and they all have one common theme: change. It is important to note that change seen by a revolution can be positive or negative.

To measure a revolution's success, we must analyze the country before and after the change. Did it improve in the previous areas of concern? For instance, the American Revolution's goal was to break ties with Great Britain and build a nation based on individual freedom. This revolution was successful based on the individual rights given to the citizens of the new country and the creation of a sovereign nation.

The challenges during a revolution can be vast. To start, a revolution is essentially an attack on the current regime. The leader and those that follow will face attacks, sometimes in the literal sense. Military conflicts can lead to violence and even death. Finally, it can be difficult to keep a large amount of people together on the same goal. It is important to keep the revolution within the confines of the original purpose, which is to improve the current situation.

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A "revolution" is a radical and thorough change. Within this definition, many different types of revolution are possible. Political revolutions usually entail the ascent of one form of government to the exclusion of another. The American Revolution, for example, can be identified as a political revolution because the thirteen American colonies replaced the British colonial government with a government of their own. Some revolutions are social and economic. The Industrial Revolution involved the emergence of factory-based manufacturing as the dominant means of production. This involved an astonishing array of changes in the ways people worked, consumed, got paid, and lived. Other revolutions are intellectual in nature. The so-called Scientific Revolution describes a transformation in the way people thought and imagined the world—a more empirical, secular way rooted in observation and experimentation. There are as many ways to measure the success or failure of a revolution as there are revolutions themselves. The American Revolution earned political independence for white men, but did not advance the cause of women. It also left the institution of slavery untouched. Add in the fact that the Revolution was disastrous for Native Americans, and we can see that while for some people the Revolution was a success, for others it was a bitter failure. We might say that this is one of the challenges in leading a revolution—not only are there numerous "winners" and "losers," but revolutions are notoriously difficult to control. They tend to move in directions their instigators did not anticipate. The French Revolution, for example, was initiated by bourgeois liberals and reformers, but it quickly descended into violence when their proposals for change were not sufficient for many more radical Frenchmen.

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