Revolutions in the Balance of the Human Constants
Contents
Introduction
Revolution is one of the most important forms of rapid and profound change in political and social structures. Revolutions typically occur when part of a society considers the existing order inefficient, unjust, or illegitimate and proposes the necessity or possibility of creating a different order.
From the perspective of the Theory of Human Constants, revolution cannot be explained merely by a single cause such as poverty, despotism, economic crisis, or ideology. Revolution is the result of the interaction of a set of factors that can be examined within the framework of the four constants: survival, connection, meaning, and order.
1. Revolution as Change in Social Order
Revolution in its most fundamental sense is rapid and extensive change in part of the existing order.
This change might encompass political, economic, social, or cultural structure, or a combination of them.
Therefore, revolution is not merely change of government; it can be a redefinition of the relationship among government, society, institutions, values, and resources.
2. Revolution and Survival
Pressures related to survival can increase the conditions for social dissatisfaction.
Reduced security, widespread poverty, unemployment, resource scarcity, or a sense of insecurity about the future might weaken trust in the existing order.
However, economic hardship alone does not create revolution. The way such hardship is perceived, the possibility of social organization, and the existence of political and meaningful alternatives also matter.
3. Revolution and Connection
No extensive revolution can be imagined without forms of communication and social coordination.
Social networks, political communications, organizations, media, religious or cultural institutions, and informal connections can play roles in transmitting messages and coordinating actions.
The more extensive the communication network, the greater the possibility of transforming scattered dissatisfaction into collective action.
4. Connection and the Spread of Dissatisfaction
Individual dissatisfaction, as long as it remains at the individual level, does not necessarily have broad political consequences.
Communication among people can show them that their problems are shared.
As a result, connection can transform scattered dissatisfaction into a collective perception of a problem.
5. Meaning and Revolution
Revolutions typically require a framework of meaning.
People must be able to find explanations for these questions:
Why is the existing order inefficient?
What should change?
What characteristics should the desired society have?
What is worth sacrificing for and paying the costs for?
From this perspective, meaning can give direction to dissatisfaction and motivation to collective action.
6. Ideology and Shared Meaning
Ideologies can provide a set of answers about the past, present, and future.
They might define the enemy or main problem, sketch the desired situation, and provide justification for collective action.
However, within the framework of the Theory of Human Constants, ideology is only one of the possible forms of producing meaning and should not be equated with the constant of meaning itself.
7. Legitimacy and Revolution
Legitimacy concerns acceptance or acceptable justification of existing power and rules.
When the gap between formal power and social acceptance increases, the political order might face a crisis of legitimacy.
If this crisis accompanies weak connection, survival problems, and conflicts of meaning, the likelihood of fundamental changes increases.
8. Order and Revolution
Revolution is shaped against the existing order on one hand, and must be able to create a new order on the other.
These two phases are not the same.
A movement might succeed in disrupting the existing order, but encounter serious difficulties in creating alternative order.
Therefore, the success of revolution should not be measured only by the fall of the previous order.
9. Collapse of Order and Institutional Vacuum
When previous institutions are quickly weakened, a vacuum of power and management might be created.
In these circumstances, issues of security, provision of services, distribution of resources, and resolution of disputes become immediately important.
If new mechanisms cannot perform these tasks, revolution might enter a phase of instability.
10. Revolution and the Transfer of Imbalance
One of the important concepts of the Theory of Human Constants is the transfer of imbalance from one domain to another.
For example, economic crisis can lead to a crisis of trust.
Crisis of trust can reduce political legitimacy.
Reduction of legitimacy might intensify conflicts of meaning and ultimately weaken political order.
In such circumstances, an initial problem can become a set of related crises.
11. The Role of Social Networks
Social networks can increase the speed of information spread and collective coordination.
In different historical periods, these networks have taken different forms; from local and religious connections to newspapers, parties, and new media.
Therefore, communication technology changes the form of connection, but the fundamental need for human communication and coordination is a phenomenon older than any specific technologies.
12. Revolution and Technology
Technology can reduce the cost of communication and organization.
At the same time, governments can also use technology for surveillance, control of information, and crisis management.
Therefore, technology does not by itself determine whether revolution will succeed or fail; it changes the communicative and regulatory capacities of both sides.
13. Elites and Revolution
Revolutionary transformations are typically not only the result of the behavior of ordinary people.
Political, military, economic, intellectual, and religious elites can also play important roles.
Divisions among elites might reduce the existing order's capacity to respond to crisis and create more opportunity for opposing forces.
14. Government and Regulation Capacity
The government's ability to receive signals of crisis, reform policies, and respond to social demands is very important.
A government that can reform itself before crises accumulate might prevent the transformation of dissatisfaction into revolution.
From this perspective, regulation capacity is one of the important variables in analyzing revolution.
15. Late Regulation
Sometimes government undertakes reform only after crisis has crossed a threshold.
In this situation, reforms that could have been effective under normal conditions might no longer restore lost trust.
This phenomenon can be analyzed within the framework of concepts such as delay, accumulation of imbalance, and crossing of thresholds.
16. Revolution and Dynamic Balance
A stable society is not necessarily one without dissatisfaction.
A society can have differences, protest, and change and still maintain its stability; provided that its regulatory mechanisms can absorb and manage pressures.
In this sense, revolution might become more probable when the capacity for dynamic balance has been reduced.
17. Revolution and Change in the Meaning of Order
Revolutions sometimes do not only change political structure, but also transform a society's definition of desirable order.
What was previously considered order might be considered despotism or injustice after revolution.
Likewise, new order might initially be considered liberating and later by subsequent generations be considered in need of reform.
18. Revolution and the Reproduction of Order
One of the basic problems after revolution is transforming new ideals into stable institutions.
This process includes creating laws, organizations, economic rules, administrative systems, and mechanisms for resolving disputes.
In this phase, the main issue shifts from "changing order" to "building order."
19. Danger of Dominance of One Constant After Revolution
It is possible that after revolution one of the four constants dominates the others.
For example, excessive emphasis on order can limit freedom and flexibility.
Excessive emphasis on meaning can intensify identity conflicts.
Excessive emphasis on survival might make security dominant over other needs.
And weakness of connection can increase gaps among social groups.
Therefore, the end of the previous order does not necessarily lead to new balance.
20. Revolution and Social Cycles
Revolution can be part of a broader cycle:
Dissatisfaction → social mobilization → crisis of order → political change → creation of new order → consolidation → accumulation of new problems → reform or next crisis.
Of course this cycle is not the same in all societies, and different paths might be created at each stage.
21. Revolution and Path Dependence
Order after revolution does not begin from scratch.
Institutions, culture, population, historical memories, economic structure, and past experiences remain.
Therefore, the future path is partly affected by the legacy of the past.
This issue gives importance to the concept of path dependence for analyzing revolution.
22. Revolution and Social Learning
After experiencing revolution, a society gains new information and experience about power, cooperation, violence, institutions, and consequences of collective decisions.
This experience can lead to social learning.
But learning is not guaranteed; a society might repeat some past errors or interpret its historical experience in different ways.
23. Revolution as a Test of the Theory of Human Constants
Revolutions provide an appropriate area for empirical testing of the theory.
One can examine what changes in indicators of survival, connection, meaning, and order occurred before revolution.
One can also examine how the balance of these four domains changed after revolution and what relationship existed among these changes and subsequent stability or instability.
24. Comparison of Revolutions
Comparison of different revolutions can show whether a similar pattern is observed in them.
For example one can compare revolutions that:
- experienced severe economic crisis or did not;
- had extensive or limited social communications;
- had cohesive or multiple ideologies;
- had centralized and strong or weak governments;
- were able to create relatively stable new order after revolution or entered a prolonged period of instability.
Such comparison can bring the theory closer from the level of conceptual explanation to the level of testable hypotheses.
25. Revolution: Change or Readjustment?
From the perspective of the Theory of Human Constants, one can understand revolution not only as "change of government," but as an effort to readjust the relationships among survival, connection, meaning, and order.
If readjustment is successful, the new system might have greater capacity for responding to conditions.
If readjustment is incomplete, previous imbalances might be reproduced in new forms.
Conclusion
Revolutions are among the most complex forms of social change and cannot be reduced to a single cause. Crises of survival, communicative disruption, conflicts of meaning, and weakness or legitimacy crisis of order can in specific circumstances become connected to one another and reduce the regulation capacity of the social system.
In this framework, revolution is not the end of a process; it is the beginning of a difficult phase for creating new order. The fundamental question after revolution is whether the new system can establish dynamic balance among the four human constants.
From this perspective, successful revolution is not necessarily one that overthrows the previous order, but one that after change can readjust the capacities of survival, connection, meaning, and order in a more sustainable and adaptive way.
Key phrase: "In the Theory of Human Constants, revolution can be understood as a process of severe change in social order that typically forms as a result of accumulation and transfer of imbalance among survival, connection, meaning, and order; but the fate of revolution depends not only on its capacity to disrupt the previous order, but also on its capacity to create dynamic and regulable balance in the new order."