Revolutions and World Order

What the paper says

This forum assesses the impact of forms of ‘unruly politics’, especially revolutions, on the modern world order. It is oriented around the 2025 Fred Halliday lecture, delivered by George Lawson at the London School of Economics in May 2025, which has been lightly edited for this forum. In his lecture, Lawson argues that the contemporary era of ‘polycrisis’ is also one of ‘polyprotest’ – multiple, interlinked forms of turbulence are being accompanied by, and to some extent caused by, a range of ‘unruly’ movements. Lawson maps and assesses the three main forms that contemporary ‘unruly’ movements take – ‘people power’, ‘restoration revolution’ and ‘decentralised vanguardism’ – and makes the case for their ongoing significance to contemporary world politics. The responses by Jasmine Gani, Maria Tanyag and Benjamin Abrams engage, challenge and extend Lawson’s claims, paying attention to the politics of both naming and engaging in revolutionary events (Gani), the relationship between women, gender and revolution (Tanyag) and the importance of differentiating types of revolutionary change (Abrams). An introduction by Toby Dodge sets out the terms of debate for the forum, with particular reference to Fred Halliday’s corpus of work, while a response by Lawson sets out strategies by which to extend who counts as a ‘revolutionary voice’ and how to listen more attentively to ‘revolutionary silences’. Taken as a whole, the forum makes clear the centrality of revolution in particular, and ‘unruly politics’ more generally, to debates about world order, past and present.