Theme 2: Revolutions Eat Their Children

Almost every revolution in this unit failed to deliver on its initial promise. The French Revolution produced the Reign of Terror and then Napoleon. The Latin American revolutions left creole elites in power and indigenous people often worse off. Even the Haitian Revolution, the most radical, produced a militarized state struggling with economic isolation imposed by hostile slaveholding nations. Maria should be ready to discuss how revolutionary outcomes often diverge from revolutionary aspirations.