REVOLUTIONS AND CONSTITUTIONS

How can bloody revolutions be avoided? Revolutions and Constitutions proposes that the best means of avoiding revolutions is to provide good governance. Constitutions reshape or restrain the forces that would tear the fabric of society apart. The work combines historical analysis with normative political theory to explore the relationship between governance and political violence.

Volume One examines terrorism as an act of violence in pursuit of a political aim. What do terrorists want, and what happens when they get it? This volume introduces the Revolutionary Terrorism Value Chain, which asserts that those who resort to terrorism to gain power continue to use terror to maintain power and extend the influence of the state.

Volume Two investigates the fraught role of outside intervention in internal conflicts, tracing how foreign powers have alternately fueled and suppressed revolutionary movements throughout history.

Volume Three surveys the long arc of republican government, from ancient Greek experiments in self-rule to modern constitutional orders, arguing that constitutional government can preclude the chaos of political violence and that good governance, not repression, offers the surest path away from the abyss. Volume Three concludes with a reflection on the sometimes conflicting allegiances that Christians owe to temporal and spiritual authorities, a tension that has shaped political thought from Augustine to the present day.

Written for scholars and general readers alike, this interdisciplinary work offers a significant contribution to debates in political theory, foreign policy, and comparative constitutionalism.