Compares Robert Palmer's interpretation of the French Revolution with the Marxist and revisionist views. Stresses Palmer's theory that the French Revolution belongs to the same spiritual family as the American. Reports that Palmer saw the French Revolution as the climactic event in a series of similar upheavals that integrated liberal democracy…

Maintains the contemporary political Soviet scene poses a major intellectual challenge to Western Sovietology. Analyzes reforms of the Gorbachev era and traces the development of change and the concepts of glasnost and perestroika. Discusses recent policies, problems, and strategies. Views revolution as a prolonged process. (NL)

Recommends that teachers present the years 1000 to 1750 as the "Traditional Europe" period, rather than as a combination of several periods. Identifies shared religious, intellectual, and artistic traditions; landed aristocracy; a peasant economic base; and an urban mercantile class as the era's distinctive characteristics. (DK)