With recent uprisings in Cairo and Tunis, we are reminded that the city has been the center of revolutionary action for hundreds of years, according to this piece from Edward L. Glaeser.
Writing for The New York Times, Glaeser argues that the fact that uprisings happen in cities is no accident.
"Cities aren't just places of economic productivity and cultural innovation. For millennia, they have also been the epicenters of dramatic political upheaval.
The Dutch revolt that led to Europe's first modern republic began in urban Flanders in 1566 with icon-bashing mobs. The American Revolution had roots in the rowdy crowds of Boston, with its tea party and its "Boston massacre," a street fight that left five colonists dead. Urban agitators toppled regimes in Paris in 1789 (and 1830 and 1848), Wuchang in 1911, St. Petersburg in 1917, Leipzig in 1989 and now Tunis in 2011."
Read the full story: It’s Always the Urban Pot That Boils Over
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