I’ve been watching fairly intently the recent protests in Egypt. It seemed (for me) that the earlier uprising in Tunisia was out of the blue. Granted, I don’t exactly pay very close attention to domestic issues inside other countries…

Regardless, I find revolution to be an interesting topic. Given that the U.S. was borne from revolution, its citizens tend to take an extreme interest in similar events around the world. We all decry autocratic regimes and call for revolt at the first sounds of corruption or grievance, and then love to point out conspiracies by those in power at the first sounds of revolution. It’s all great fun.

I find it rather interesting that both ongoing events got started with self-immolation. Part of my interest stems from a desire to understand how revolutions can not only get started in this day and age, but keep going. I think of all the things going against the demonstrators and it seems that with the evolution of our technology, it becomes increasingly difficult to be successful:

1. The guys in power have got bigger, more advanced guns,
2. They have better means and techniques of population control,
3. They have the failings of previous autocracies to study,
4. They control the internet and the media.

I think about these things, and then wonder if the reason they succeed is similar to why an internet forum gets popular. I’ve found that there is a certain saturation point, where statistics seems to take over, and the population becomes self-sustaining. For instance, on a forum it tends to be around 100-115 daily users. Past this point, you will no longer need to post (as an admin) in order to keep the conversations going. When a revolution is occurring, I always wonder what happens when people need to sleep. Perhaps it works in the same way as an internet forum–the population of the demonstrations reaches a certain statistical point where they become self-sustaining.

Then, I wonder if there were external factors which aided these revolutionaries. For instance, it’s quite evident (although not strictly causal) that Tunisia’s uprising had something to do with the timing of Egypt’s revolt. Of course, it is also possible (some would call it an American’s conceit), that Obama’s Cairo speech may have planted some seeds into the mideast populations. It could be simply a lifting of the common enemy that some in the middle east no doubt saw of President Bush after he departed office. Perhaps all of these things are unrelated to current events.

As a fan of democracy, I don’t want to see what happened in Iran happen in either Egypt or Tunisia. Perhaps it’s because of my pampered state here in the U.S. that I’ve never seen nor known true feelings of revolution. I can’t really say that what these revolutionaries are doing is “right” or “wrong”, but I desire a more democratic world, and it’s never too late to start.