This course offers an advanced introduction to modern revolutions —from the American and French revolutions of the 18th century to the anti-colonial independence struggles of the postwar period – from the perspective of political theories that inspired them. We will consider the causes and meanings of modern revolutions, as well as the ideas and practices that each revolution unleashed. We will discuss revolutions in England, America, France, Haiti, Russia, China, Algeria, Cuba, Iran, Egypt, and beyond. We will read works by Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Abbé Sieyès, Maximillian Robespierre, G.W.F. Hegel, Karl Marx, V.I. Lenin, Leon Trotsky, Mao Zedong, Frantz Fanon, Che Guevara, Stokely Carmichael, Herbert Marcuse, Shulamith Firestone, Monique Wittig, Ali Shari’ati, Asef Bayat, and others.