Intervention in Intrastate Wars The Military Planning Problem

and universally replicable, it makes no distinction between rebellions, secession movements, or revolutions. In contrast, political theory is context dependent and there is no guarantee that results can be replicated. Hence, the review of theories of revolutions should highlight both data related to an operational frame and elements of an operational approach. Writing in 1979, Skocpol identified four major families of social-scientific theories of revolution. In her estimation, none was adequate. The first family of theory reviewed was Marxist theory. Marx understood revolutions as class-based movements growing out of objective structural contradictions between the modes of production and class relations related to property ownership. To Marx revolutions were not isolated episodes of violence. The revolution results from class action led by a self-conscious, revolutionary class. Marxist analysis clearly influences all theories of revolution but specifically informs those who have written about the insurgencies in Malaya and Vietnam. Skocpol labels the second family of theory aggregate-psychological theory. Aggregatepsychological theories explain revolutions in terms of a people’s psychological motivations for engaging in political violence or joining oppositional movements. Ted Gurr’s book, Why Men Rebel, lies in the aggregate-psychological family. A third family consists of system/ value consensus theories. These theories posit that political violence results from the actions of ideological movements spawned by social disequilibrium. The fourth family embraces political-conflict theory. Political-conflict theory rejects Ted Gurr’s notion that revolutions arise from economic and political discontent. Rather political-conflict theory argues people cannot engage in political violence unless they are members of at least a minimally organized group with access to resources. Skocpol rejects all these approaches in part because they all argue that revolutions arise from welldefined purposes. All these theories suggest that social order rests on the consensus of the majority that their needs are being met. The concept that social and political order rely on