This innovative volume undertakes a theoretically informed investigation of the links between revolutions, totalitarianism and democracy though comparison of primarily European Countries in the search for a more widely applicable understanding of democracy. It will explore the relationship between history and democracy and the implications for the understanding of democracy today. The principal case studies are of France, Germany and Russia, and are chosen to illustrate three kinds of state--revolutionary, democratic and totalitarian--and are contrasted in detail in this context.