Revolutions of 1848 Revolutions of 1848 The Revolutions of 1848, known in some countries as the Spring of Nations, People's Spring, Springtime of the Peoples, or the Year of Revolution, were a series of political upheavals throughout Europe in 1848. It remains the most widespread revolutionary wave in European history. The revolutions were essentially democratic and liberal in nature, with the aim of removing the old monarchical structures and creating independent nation states. The revolutions spread across Europe after an initial revolution began in France in February. Over 50 countries were affected, but with no significant coordination or cooperation among their respective revolutionaries.
States and Social Revolutions States and Social Revolutions States and Social Revolutions: A Comparative Analysis of France, Russia and China is a 1979 book by political scientist and sociologist Theda Skocpol, published by Cambridge University Press, which explains the causes of revolutions through the structural functionalism sociological paradigm comparative historical analysis of the French Revolution of 1789 through the early 19th century, the Russian Revolution of 1917 through the 1930s and the Chinese Revolution of 1911 through the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s. Skocpol argues that these three cases, despite being spread over a century and a half, are similar in the sense that