Contingencies and the Alternatives of 1989: Toward a Theory and Practice of Negotiating Revolution
Contingencies and the Alternatives of 1989: Toward a Theory and Practice of Negotiating Revolution

Summary/Abstract: In the search to find the meaning of 1989, we social scientists typically look for grand social forces and imposing logics of necessity. As time wears on, we are less likely to opine as twenty-first century Hegelians, claiming to access the direction of history with our own particular insight. Nevertheless, certain philosophies of history smuggle themselves into our empirical fashions regardless of our intentions. These philosophies are embedded in the intellectual traditions that dominate our thinking and impose questions on our analysis. And these philosophies, I would propose, distract us from the contemporary significance of 1989 to be found in both negotiation and contingency, most apparent in the Polish Round Table Talks of 1989. [...]

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