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Yeah, I think it's safe to limit it to the popular conception: there has never been a "popular" or "workers" revolution, no decisive break with the past that enforces a modern-style explicitly written constitution, that affected mainland Britain. Outside that there have been revolutions, in the Empire and especially in Ireland - once a key part of the United Kingdom that sent MPs to Westminster!

The Civil War and "Glorious Revolution" don't really fit a modern revolutionary politics mode. Fundamentally they're part of the older Reformation politico-religious conflict. Also they were elite-driven rather than popular. The "glorious revolution" was really collusion with allowing the country to be invaded by the Dutch on the condition that they didn't touch the existing power structure.

Or at least, not in England. The violence of "King Billy" against Ireland is still celebrated by the Orange Order. You could argue that this has continued to be an issue until the Good Friday Agreement, and that the PIRA campaign was ultimately a successful revolution. Crucially it did win constitutional change - with external guarantors, for the civil and human rights of the Catholic population of Northern Ireland.

Mainland UK has been effective at deploying armed forces to prevent any revolutionary moments, such as https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_George_Square : tanks on the streets of Glasgow.

> there has never been a "popular" or "workers" revolution, no decisive break with the past that enforces a modern-style explicitly written constitution, that affected mainland Britain

Doesn't Magna Carta count?

I know it was lead by "lords" who owned land, and thus might not count as "popular". It's aims certainly had parallels with more modern revolution: power-sharing between state and subjects; legal defence against tyranny etc

(Perhaps it's mentioned in the OP. I didn't read it 'cos HN comments draw me in first)

I would argue Magna Carta does indeed count, despite it being by Lords. It had very lasting impacts, despite the original Magna Carta not being respected by King John. If you look at monarchy rule after that, it was forever changed and practically in decline

Then you are you redefining "revolution" to mean only the "socialist-marx-like" kind of revolution.

Yes exactly. And those are less 'popular' than they seem. VI Lenin was not a prole nor were most of the Bolsheviks.

Historical communist revolutions (Russia, China) are pretty openly 'elite' led: by their respective communist parties. By comparison the civil war is a lot more 'popular' because it is much more of a mass movement against Stuart personal rule.

No - I agree with upthread that the Irish war of independence, Kenya insurgency, etc count as revolutionary moments. They're just not revolutions that reached the capital. I think you could even count Ian Smith's extremely rightwing UDI of Rhodesia as "revolutionary".

I am somewhat arbitrarily ruling out anything that might count as a palace coup. Revolutions led by or installing someone who is a blood relative of the deposed monarch probably don't count as "popular" either (e.g. "Glorious Revolution").

>there has never been a "popular" or "workers" revolution that affected mainland Britain. >Also they were elite-driven rather than popular

All revolutions were elite driven, starting by the French revolution.

The Russian revolution for example had less than 2% industrial workers on it(because Russia was not industrialized yet). It was actually a coup d'Etat given by a german double spy and agent(Lenin) and paid by the German Government in order to stop the East front on the first world war(Treaty of Brest-Litovsk).

It should never be forgotten that Lenin was sent by the Germans with money and Parvus were given millions of marks in order to support the bolsheviks when things went sour for the Germans.

Neither Lenin or Trosky had worked or lived on their own before they led the revolution. They had basically rich parents that supported them without working.

Parvus lived like a satrap.

The coup d'Etat was basically given against the Mensheviks(the moderate socialist) that were the legitimate representation of Russian people, after real elections. Lenin basically killed them all and became a dictator as he knew the output of the elections.

The Lenin Government had basically no workers on it, but "intellectuals", basically good writers with 0 contact with reality. They self described as the representation of the workers, but there were no actual workers on it. Real workers from England and Germany reminded Lenin that on several Workers' Congresses.

The first thing Lenin did was to exterminate the real workers that Russia had, the farmers, and after his terrible economic decisions made millions starve to death(more than in WWI), he actually fought revolutions against him with iron fist, led by the same Soviets that reveled against the Thar in WWI.

Russia went near the 200 Million people, now they are 144. In the middle there is Lenin and Stalin Communism making tens of millions starve by sheer incompetence of the system.

It was only after Stalin took the power that real workers came into power, and that was because Stalin exterminated all the intellectuals so they could not compete with him.

> The Civil War and "Glorious Revolution" don't really fit a modern revolutionary politics mode. Fundamentally they're part of the older Reformation politico-religious conflict. Also they were elite-driven rather than popular.

On one level, this is true but, as I learned from reading Murray Bookchin’s excellent The Third Revolution - Volume 1, the Civil War story is more nuanced than that. During the English Civil War(s), there were a number of factions on the republican side: the Levellers and Diggers were the more radical, with popular and progressive goals such as universal suffrage, land reform (agrarian socialism), equality, freedom of religion, etc. while the Grandees were the officer class of the New Model Army whose interests were those of the parliamentarian elites who wanted to maintain – and extend – their traditional power as feudal lords.

The book covers the political struggle over the future of Britain without a ruling monarch (see the Putney Debates¹). Unfortunately, the Grandees were the ultimate winners of this struggle within the New Model Army. They maintained their position of privilege while the more radical factions were sidelined. And history remembers the victors.

¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Putney_Debates

> there has never been a "popular" or "workers" revolution

That would be the Peasants Revolt mentioned above, but it failed.

Really nice post, thanks for brining the idea that the revolution doesn't necessarily have to have happened in what we now consider to be that entity. It's often a challenge to put aside our modern biases when looking back, and it really help appreciate how different the past was.

In the mid 1800's there was a period of "quiet revolution" with a number of reform bills, and less quiet riots. Before 1832 a very small number of people, just the upper class were part of the democratic system. After 1884 almost all men over 21 were allowed to vote. A number of other electoral weirdness was removed. This period had a similar effect on a persons rights to the big revolution in France, whilst maintaining the power structure. I guess if you move with the times and give up some power, you can keep on top still.

I would also argue (pedantically perhaps) about calling a 67 million population country small, this is the 21st most populous country in the world out of 235, so in the top 10% of countries by size (almost 1% of world population). Calling this small doesn't really leave anywhere to go for smaller countries. I would suggest having Huge (1Bn+), Large (1Bn - 100mil), Medium (100mil-10mil), Small (10mil - 1mil), Tiny (less than 1mil).

Don’t forget that Ireland was part of the UK until their revolution 100 years ago, though the British tended to treat it as a colony rather than one of the home nations.

> the American colonies were part of Britain

This doesn't sound right because Britain is the name of the island. The American colonies were part of the British Empire I guess.

To be pedantic the country was called the Kingdom of Great Britain from 1707 to 1801. And the American colonies were part of it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Great_Britain

Were they? I thought they were separate entities under the same crown. The way that the Channel Islands and Isle of Man are not part of the UK today. They had their own legislatures, and their own bodies of law, separate from that made by Westminster.

Wasn't there some big hooha about "no taxation without representation"?

Channel Islands and Isle of Man are just about completely independent from the UK apart from their external relations/defence - own laws/taxes etc. and no tax is paid to/from the UK.

The name of the island is, in fact, "Great Britain". "Britain" is a very widely understood name for the country more formally known as "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland".

To be fair, I think the question is asked for whether today's cultural/national entity of Britain ever had a revolutionary monent. Not societies that were ruled by the British.

Those distinctions can become vague in the case of the American Revolution, I agree.

Also, Ireland. Nominally 1916, though in some sense it lasted forever.

Oh come, we don’t know that yet

How about the Managa Carta in 1215?