Revolutionary Origins of Political Regimes and Trajectories of Popular Mobilization

A recent debate in comparative regime analysis on the influence of political institutions on stability of authoritarian regimes provides a foundation for understanding different trajectories of popular mobilization under late Communism. The debate emerged in response to an overwhelming scholarly focus on various aspects of democratic consolidation at a time when democratic institutions in many new democracies eroded considerably and various authoritarian regimes survived and prospered. It explores the sources of durable authoritarianism and suggests that political institutions, especially ruling parties, strongly contribute to regime survival. The emerging literature builds upon earlier scholarly arguments and evidence that party-based non-democratic regimes are more resilient than either personalist or military regimes (Huntington Reference Huntington1968; Geddes Reference Geddes1999). Strong ruling parties provide the foundation for elite cohesion and for the exclusion and marginalization of opposition. They do so by providing institutional arenas and incentives that unite self-interested leaders and maintain their loyalty even during major crises (Brownlee Reference Brownlee2007; Svolik Reference Svolik2012).

However, some party-based authoritarian regimes are more durable than others. Regimes with origins in lengthy ideological armed struggle were among the most durable authoritarian regimes in the 20th century, apart from several oil-based monarchies in the Persian Gulf, and were also among regimes most resistant to democratization since the beginning of the “third wave.” Non-material sources of elite cohesion in party-based authoritarian regimes seem to be more effective in maintaining regime stability than patronage at times of major crises (Levitsky and Way Reference Levitsky and Way2012; Levitsky and Way Reference Levitsky and Way2013, 6). Revolutions produce strong ruling parties (Huntington Reference Huntington1968). They do so by building durable partisan identities and rigid partisan boundaries, militarized party structures, legitimate and authoritative leadership, and by enhancing the ruling party’s capacity for repression. Ruling parties are most stable when mixing the non-material sources of cohesion with patronage. In addition, revolutions destroy independent power centers. Revolutionary legacies, and their impact on regime durability, fade in “post-revolutionary” regimes, that is, once the revolutionary generation has retired and younger leaders and activists have taken their place (Levitsky and Way Reference Levitsky and Way2012, 870–872; Levitsky and Way Reference Levitsky and Way2013, 7–14).

There is some evidence about the link between the revolutionary legacies and regime durability from Communist states. Some Communist regimes originated from homegrown ideologically-driven and popularly-based insurrections, which were then followed up by consolidation in power and extensive political and social transformation (for example Russia, Yugoslavia, Albania, Vietnam, China, and Cuba). Using concepts from the relevant literature, these were examples of revolutions, i.e., revolutionary movements that managed to overthrow a state or political regime in an “irregular, extraconstitutional, and/or violent fashion” (Goodwin Reference Goodwin2001, 9). Or to be more precise, these were social (or great) revolutions, that is, rapid transformations not only of political institutions, but also of society’s class structures, which had occurred at least partly through class-based popular rebellions (Skocpol Reference Skocpol1979, 4). Other Communist regimes originated from external imposition, and not from indigenous popularly-based revolutionary movements (Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria). The Communists took over all levers of power and initiated political and social change principally because of support from the Soviet Union. After 1989, Communist regimes outside Europe—all with a revolutionary background—survived major external and internal shocks. In Europe, Communist regimes ended, with or without revolutionary origins.

While cases outside Europe are in line with this theory’s prediction, Communist regimes in Europe are a difficult testing ground for the theory. Firstly, most consequences of revolutionary legacies for regime durability emerged in Communist regimes without origins in an indigenous popularly-based armed struggle via ruthless top-down imposition backed up by an external hegemonic power—a sort of “revolution from above.” These regimes used Soviet military and political support, and individual experience of leading Communist cadres in armed struggle outside their countries, to harden partisan identities and build strong parties, with military-style discipline, and to enhance their repression capacity. They transformed their countries’ social, economic, and political landscape, aiming to eradicate independent power centers on the Soviet example. Secondly, the theory claims that revolutionary legacies fade in the post-revolutionary period as elite cohesion erodes, leadership loses legitimacy and authority, and repressive capacity declines. Revolutionary legacies could not prop up the Communists in the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia because their revolutionary generations had retired in the 1960s and by the early 1980s respectively, well before the end of Communism.

This theory considers popular unrest as a potential source of crises that test the resilience of authoritarian regimes but does not discuss how revolutionary legacies shape popular mobilization. Revolutionary regimes are hardly pluralistic and tolerant places that facilitate the emergence and expansion of popular protest, if we think of them exclusively in terms of hardened partisan identities and rigid partisan boundaries, militarized party structures and strong repressive capacity, and legitimate and authoritative leadership. In this kind of setting, popular mobilization might take the form of mobilization “from above,” aimed at various regime purposes, or of (violent or non-violent) confrontation with the regime. In the post-revolutionary period, one would expect that regime opponents exploit the decline of elite cohesion, leadership’s legitimacy, and coercive capacity to mobilize against the regime and, if successful, produce sharp boundaries between the regime and society. And yet, this outcome occurred in (non-revolutionary) Poland, but not in post-revolutionary Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union, and China.

This article suggests a different take on how revolutionary legacies influence trajectories of popular mobilization, and possibly also long-term regime outcomes, both while the revolutionary generation is in power and after. Revolutionary struggle facilitates the construction of broader public and patriotic identities that sustain authoritarian regimes at both elite and mass levels. This is because ideological revolutionary struggles largely overlap with broader patriotic causes, such as liberation wars or civil wars with major external involvement. Huntington suggested that while a liberation war might occur without a social revolution, a social revolution always went together with a patriotic (“nationalist”) revolution because the masses were mobilized into politics via appeals to nationalist sentiments. His focus was different though, principally on how nationalist appeals brought together specific social groups seen as essential for a social revolution, such as urban intelligentsia and peasants (Huntington Reference Huntington1968, 304).

A violent struggle against internal political competitors, amplified with a credible external threat, is likely to get an aura of patriotic struggle, if reasonably effective. The creation and transformation of political identities is therefore not limited to the building and hardening of partisan identities of elites, activists, and supporters of revolutionary movements. It also involves the formation of new or refashioning of dormant patriotic identities in the face of a major external threat. These revolutionary regimes therefore benefit from both the “standard” package of consequences of revolutions for elite cohesion and from patriotic legitimacy that emerges in liberation struggle, which boosts both elite unity and popular support. In these cases, it becomes difficult to disentangle elite and popular support for emerging regimes from their support for the states they preside over. Boundaries between partisan and patriotic identities become blurred, lending patriotic legitimacy to revolutionary regimes (and their political and associated social organizations), which further entrenches their elite unity and popular base. This kind of “genetic legitimacy” does not expire with the change of political generations. Older generations find it hard to distinguish between partisan and patriotic aspects of revolutionary struggle because both form a part of their personal experience, while younger generations are socialized into this state of mind at home, in schools, and through media.

There are various arguments in the literature on how wars shape patriotic/national identities. Wars unite disparate groups in the face of external threat; provide raw material for myths that in turn provide a sense of meaning and identity to populations; create we/they stereotypes that facilitate collective self-differentiation; produce social rituals that create a sense of commonality; and outcomes of war may produce public policies and behaviors that entrench national symbols and practices into everyday life (Hutchinson Reference Hutchinson2017, 52–65). These and related arguments are important but are beyond the scope of this article, which explores one particular outcome of protracted armed struggle—the (partial) merger of partisan and patriotic identities, the blurring of boundaries between regimes and states they run (including regime and state organizations) and its impact on trajectories of popular mobilization and potentially also on regime outcomes. A cultural content of patriotic appeals, their historical antecedents, and the very process by which the influence of war on patriotic/national identities unfold deserve a separate discussion.

Two caveats are important here. Firstly, nearly all non-democratic rulers tend to equate the regime with the state in order to exploit citizens’ patriotic sentiments so it is easy to confuse rhetoric for the real thing. However, many citizens accept these claims as largely credible in regimes with revolutionary origins, while most see them as authoritarian manipulation in non-revolutionary regimes. Secondly, there may be a wide variation across individuals and groups in terms of how they perceive these claims in revolutionary regimes. In any case, it is difficult to assess popular support for non-democratic regimes (“their legitimacy”) because competitive, free, and fair elections do not exist. Some clues exist though. Socio-economic, political, and/or international crises drain resources of regime incumbents and thus put major strains on non-democratic regimes. If elite unity and popular support (or the lack of widespread popular discontent) depends only on patronage, elite conflict and/or massive popular unrest is likely to undermine the regimes, unless there is major external support for regime survival. More importantly from the perspective of this article, the influence of revolutionary origins on popular protest is revealed in mobilizing structures, or formal and informal sites within which people mobilize and participate in protest; frames, or interpretive themes, that encourage people to participate in protest and to interpret grievances in ways that dignifies them and is meaningful for allies and opponents; and in forms or strategies of protest (Tarrow Reference Tarrow2011, 28–33).

It is logical to assume that the blurring of boundaries between a regime and state, i.e., a broad “genetic” legitimacy in regimes with revolutionary origins, leads popular challengers to use official institutions and organizations, in addition to relying on existing social networks. Most of them are likely to accept the institutions and organizations as essentially legitimate, despite failures with respect to specific policies and cadres, and mobilize within or on the margins of these institutions and deploy protest strategies that are at least partly compatible with authorized channels. They are likely to use the regime’s frames and rhetoric to demonstrate their continuing relevance, despite specific failures, and also to show how official policies and practices have come to differ from their programmatic statements. Within these limits, popular challengers may innovate on the margins of official institutions, frames, and repertoires of action, thus linking old with new popular struggles.

As a result, one should expect little ideological and organizational coherence in popular challenges in revolutionary (and post-revolutionary) regimes even at a time of high levels of mobilization. One potential outcome is demobilization amidst the mix of concessions and repression from the regime, which ensures regime survival. The other is major political change via the state cooptation of main demands and protest leaders, which ultimately results in regime transformation. In contrast, popular protests in non-revolutionary regimes are likely to produce new formal organizations because the official ones are widely perceived as illegitimate. Frames and symbolism surrounding massive popular protests are likely to be different from the official ones and based on the opposition to the regime. Therefore, ideological, symbolic, and organizational currents that crystallize behind massive popular protest in non-revolutionary regimes are likely to facilitate state-society polarization, regime delegitimation, and ultimately regime breakdown.

Revolutionary Regimes, Protest Cooptation, and Particularist Nationalism in Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union

The Communist regimes in Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union shared important features. They originated from indigenous ideological revolutionary movements that gained patriotic credentials when facing major external threats. Both emerged in highly ethnically and nationally diverse societies and built elaborate multinational institutions to deal with this diversity. A blend of partisan and patriotic identities, built in armed struggle and sustained via complex multinational federalism, sheltered the regimes against external and internal crises and strongly influenced popular mobilization under late Communism. The outcomes were the state cooptation of popular mobilization and particularist nationalism, which ultimately produced state breakup and the transformation of Communist into hybrid regimes in most successor states.

Externally-Imposed Regime, Popular Mobilization, and State-Society Polarization in Poland

In contrast to Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union, the Communist regime in Poland originated largely from the imposition by an external hegemonic power after World War II, which had devastated the country and destroyed the upper classes. In the interwar period, the Communist party had been weak, without strong leaders and popular support. Some Communists took part in fighting the German occupation, but the partisan resistance was dominated by the Home Army, closely connected to the London government. Simultaneously, Communists and leftists resident in the Soviet Union were organized to take over power after the war. Installed at the helm of a provisional coalition government by the Soviet Union, the Communists gradually took over all levers of power by suppressing their more popular political opponents and by distributing patronage (Prazmowska Reference Prazmowska2004), without a brief democratic period that other Central European states experienced after the war. The lack of a powerful revolutionary movement was partly compensated by the Stalinist “revolution from above,” which strengthened the party and hardened partisan identities but left coercive institutions in partial control by the Soviet Union. The creation of a centralized party-state and command economy did not proceed so far as in other parts of the Soviet bloc, leaving behind limited social pluralism, including some autonomy of the Catholic Church, private ownership of most arable land, and some private sector in retail trade and services.

The lack of patriotic legitimacy did not originate only from the regime’s non-revolutionary origins, but also from its imposition by a hegemonic power that had been Poland’s historical adversary. The territorial shift westward, the annihilation of Jews, and expulsions of Germans transformed Poland from an ethnically highly diverse country into a largely homogeneous one. While the loss of territory to the Soviet Union to the east was generously compensated by gains from Germany in the west and on the coast, the regime’s dependence on a historical foe was hardly popular, just like its suppression of a powerful popularly-based patriotic resistance movement and its political successors. Attempts by Władysław Gomulka and other “national” Communists from the partisan resistance to “domesticate” Communism in their struggle against the “Muscovites” failed to produce patriotic legitimacy, while the coercive industrialization drive proved only partly successful (Rothschild Reference Rothschild1993). As a result, repeated political crises that involved large popular mobilization—by workers in Poznan in 1956, students and intellectuals in 1968, and workers on the Baltic coast in 1970 and 1976—that were triggered by socio-economic and political causes undermined the regime and reinforced its reliance on its external sponsors.

De-Stalinization and its institutional, economic, and cultural fallouts opened more space for elite and popular dissidence in the context of limited social pluralism and of the regime’s weak popular legitimacy. The repression loosened up and universities, professional organizations, and media gained more autonomy, while generational change freshened up the regime organizations that operated in an institutional framework considerably more complex than in other parts of the Soviet bloc (Ekiert Reference Ekiert1996, 216–230). In August 1980, economic grievances triggered industrial workers’ protests on the Baltic coast, amplifying patriotic passions raised by a visit by Karol Wojtyla, a recently elected Pope John Paul II, a year before (Ash Reference Ash1999, 31–33). The protests expanded quickly across the country and turned into a broad social movement of industrial workers, intellectuals, students, and other groups. The cross-group cooperation originated from the experience of earlier failed protests by separate groups. Solidarity, the workers’ new organization, swiftly gained nearly 10 million members and was thus by far the largest and most influential popular mobilization in Eastern Europe under Communism. It confronted a weakened party-state through non-violence until the army, led by General Wojciech Jaruzelski, introduced martial law in December 1981.

The workers’ demands were economic and social, such as those related to the sharp increase of basic goods’ prices, but also political. They demanded the right to organize independent trade unions and used the sit-in strike and the interfactory strike committee as protest strategies that had emerged in the 1970–1971 protests (Laba Reference Laba1991, 82). Solidarity aimed at regime delegitimation via self-organization of society and did not question the Communist party’s rule and Poland’s place in the Soviet bloc, which reflected its “self-limiting revolution.” The choice of non-violence also reflected tragic consequences of violence during World War II and the pragmatic position of the Catholic Church (Staniszkis Reference Staniszkis1984; Smolar Reference Smolar, Roberts and Ash2009, 128–130). Once Solidarity’s independence had been officially sanctioned, other groups created their own independent organizations, including students, artisans, and farmers, while existing organizations affiliated with the Catholic Church grew rapidly. In turn, these developments triggered reforms of the official organizations, including the Communist party, youth organizations, and professional associations. Overall, Poland became the only Communist state that formally (though temporarily) recognized independent political organizations, with extraordinary levels of popular support for the opposition, with experienced grassroots leaders and was supported by the intellectuals and the Church (Ekiert and Kubik Reference Ekiert and Kubik1999, 38–40).

Solidarity focused on individual and socio-economic rights, but also built upon national and patriotic values and traditions, which underlined the lack of the regime’s patriotic legitimacy. Its counter-hegemonic frames and symbolism reflected a widening gap between the party-state and society. One view is that they originated from the discourse of the intellectual opposition in the previous decade and some features of the Catholic Church’s social and ethical doctrine (Kubik Reference Kubik1994); another is that they were rooted in the demands of industrial workers on the Baltic coast in 1970 and in the commemoration of their comrades-victims of the regime’s ruthless repression via “sacred politics” (Laba Reference Laba1991). Ultimately, the main outcome of the rise of Solidarity was polarization between the party-state and society. The December 1981 crackdown pushed Solidarity underground for several years but did not facilitate the regime’s legitimacy and left it reliant on the Soviet Union. Once Gorbachev’s reforms lifted the barriers to political change across the Soviet bloc, it returned triumphantly to the political stage and gently pushed the Communists away from power, via roundtable negotiations and partially democratic elections, which signaled the end of Communism in Eastern Europe.

Revolutionary Regime, Integration, and Protest Containment in Contemporary China

The Communist regime emerged from protracted armed struggle of the revolutionary movement that mixed ideological and patriotic themes. The imperial regime, an autocratic, centralized and semi-bureaucratic administration in an agrarian society that had been under the strain of foreign intervention and regional centrifugal forces for decades, collapsed in 1911. The events resulted in the declaration of a republic but also in an enduring dissolution of a unified national administration (Skocpol Reference Skocpol1979, 67–80, 237–242). Regional military-based regimes competed with each other and with creeping foreign advances, which culminated in the Japanese invasion in the 1930s. The Kuomintang and the Communist party, nationalist and Communist revolutionary movements, respectively, that originated from attempts to overcome the internal disunity and fend off foreign intervention, occasionally cooperated to further these goals (1924–1927, 1937–1940), but for the most part fought each other in a civil war (Wilbur Reference Wilbur1985; Snow Reference Snow1968). Failing to mobilize the urban population and driven out to the countryside by their former larger partners in 1927, the Communists concentrated on guerrilla war and rural mobilization, promoting policies that benefited peasants, including land reform, and getting directly involved in the organization of village life. After major successes in fighting Japanese occupation and the building of a strong base in the peasantry in the north in the first half of the 1940s, the party effectively waged armed struggle against the Kuomintang and took over central power in 1949 (Fairbank and Goldman Reference Fairbank and Goldman2006, 301–337).

Since the early 1930s, the Communist party had endorsed self-determination to attract minorities, whose national homelands occupied vast peripheral (including strategic border) areas despite their small relative numbers (less than 10%). In practice, however, it insisted on China’s territorial integrity, which appealed to the Han majority. Taking into account the Kuomintang’s assimilationist program, ethnic minorities supported (or at least did not oppose) the Communist party during the civil war (Connor Reference Connor1984, 72–92). The Communists could credibly claim that the Kuomintang’s failed to preserve the country’s unity against both competing warlords and foreign invasion. Their nationalist appeals—and their nationalist rivals’ failure to effectively fight Japanese occupation and their reliance on US forces after Japan’s defeat—attracted the educated, while the support of peasants originated from the mix of socio-economic and nationalist appeals (for their relative importance see Johnson Reference Johnson1962; Selden Reference Selden1995; Bianco Reference Bianco1971).

The party built a centralized party-state down to the villages but, after abortive attempts to construct a Soviet-style command economy in an overwhelmingly agrarian society, switched to decentralization and agriculture via relentless mobilization from above and collectivization. Revolutionary struggle produced strong partisan identities, hardened in large scale violence, strengthened and militarized the party organization, produced strong party control over the army, and was led by charismatic leadership under Mao Zedong. Regarding ethnic minorities, the Communists settled for integration, following forceful reunification of seceding minority areas, and strongly promoted a single common public (Chinese) identity in a unitary state. The gradual extension of collective rights and regional autonomy to minorities was downplayed by highly limited powers of the autonomous units and major dilution of their titular groups by gerrymandering and Han migration (Connor Reference Connor1984, 233–235, 322–329).

The strong popular base enabled the regime to weather out several major crises, including conflict with the United States over Korea (1950–1953) and split with the Soviet Union, its main external sponsor (1960). It recovered successfully after major self-inflicted socio-economic and political disasters of the Great Leap Forward (1958–1959) and the Cultural Revolution (1966–1969). The two episodes of radicalism from above—which aimed at the acceleration of economic development and transition to Communism via massive mobilization of popular efforts and contempt for institutions, intellectuals, and technical knowledge—resulted in economic collapse, famine and malnutrition, political chaos, and the sharp decline in the quality of leadership.

Since the late 1970s, reforms under Deng Xiaoping pushed the country in a different direction via a retreat from collectivization; growing private initiative in agriculture, commerce, and manufacturing; opening to the world; and collective leadership. A transition to a market economy, based on exports, accelerated at a time when Communism disappeared from Europe, produced fast and sustained economic growth. Communist ideology was downplayed and supplemented by patriotism/nationalism. A decentralized capitalist economy produced greater institutional complexity and change in state-society relations, namely a shift from the cellular political and economic organization, based on a unit system model, to broadly-based government-citizen relations, in the context of a still centralized party-state (Chen Reference Chen2012, 59–65). After Deng’s death in 1997, China completed a long transition to post-revolutionary leadership.

These developments set the stage for an unprecedented rise of popular protests. According to official statistics, there were about 8,700 protest events (protests, demonstrations, group complaints, marches, and sit-ins) in 1993, but over 87,000 annually by 2005 (O’Brien and Stern Reference O’Brien, Stern and O’Brien2008, 12). Popular protests surged in both rural and urban areas, ranging from small events to large protest marches and demonstrations. Rural protests originated from farmers’ discontent over illegal taxes and fees, the corruption of local officials, land disputes and irregularities in village elections. Urban protests involved workers’ strikes and other protests over higher pay, industrial relations, and the loss of jobs. Citizens protested over the supply of utilities, environmental issues, house demolition, and official corruption, while pensioners protested over welfare and students over various causes. Important precedents under and after Mao had included some spontaneous protests of industrial workers in response to nationalization of industrial firms in 1956–1957 and during a “wind of economism” in 1966–1967; Democracy Wall protests in 1978–1979; labor protests in 1980; student protests in the winter of 1986–1987; and the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989 (Perry Reference Perry and Fewsmith2010).

Since the early 1990s, protesters have largely relied on communal networks, such as the workplace, neighborhood or dormitory, and informal organization limited to the local context and loosely organized (pensioner and peasant associations). They have deliberately avoided creating formal organizations (Chen Reference Chen2012, 9). The popular protests reveal the logic of “playing by the rules.” They are permeated with the official rhetoric and symbols, often wrapped up in the official legalistic speak, to protect their groups’ interests while demonstrating loyalty to the party-state. The vast majority of protesters use official channels for collective petitions, appeals, and delegations (collective visits). While the protests remained a challenge to authorities, since demands might go up the hierarchy quickly, goals and targets remained limited to greater inclusion and recognition by the party-state (Perry Reference Perry and O’Brien2008; Perry Reference Perry and Fewsmith2010). Such “rightful resistance” operates on the boundaries of the formal channels, strictly adheres to established values, exploits divisions within the party-state, and is contingent on broader public support (O’Brien and Li Reference O’Brien and Li2006, 2–3). The focus on the official channels does not exclude deliberate disruptive tactics, such as marches, street demonstrations, sit-ins in public places and at government offices, traffic blockades, even violence, with the aim to attract the attention of authorities and the media (Chen Reference Chen2012).

The “protest opportunism” aims not only at achieving short-term goals but also at long-term bargaining with the authorities. Protest groups ultimately become pressure groups in local politics and their interests and opinions are taken into account in policy-making and implementation (Chen Reference Chen2012, 5). The official response to popular challenges was historically and ideologically sensitive to workers, students, and grassroots claimants, while discouraging ideological dissidence and unofficial demands toward “special autonomous regions,” such as Tibet or Xinjiang. Attempts to link protests of workers, students, and other groups also faced repression (Cunningham and Wasserstrom Reference Cunningham and Wasserstrom2011). Within these limits, local popular protests of various rural and urban groups flourished. Some authors saw in contemporary popular protests in China a “rising rights consciousness” and incipient civil society that signaled future struggles with the party-state (O’Brien and Li Reference O’Brien and Li2006, 116–129); others pointed to the blurring of lines between the party-state and society, as well as to contentious participation that compensated for the lack of institutional participation in a flexible authoritarian regime. The parallel high levels of popular protest and effective protest containment, with highly selective repression, ensured not only authoritarian survival but also continuing popular legitimacy of such “contentious authoritarianism” (Perry Reference Perry and O’Brien2008, 206–207; 2010; Chen Reference Chen2012, 5–6).