The swiftest wave of regime contention occurred in 1848: Within one month, the spark lit in Paris set much of Central and Eastern Europe ablaze (see recently Traugott 2010: 131–42). What propelled this wildfire? This chapter first assesses arguments derived from extant approaches, which highlight the role of networks, nationalism, international influence and prestige, and rational learning, respectively. As the mass of primary evidence about these dramatic events shows, none of these explanations is very convincing; while some can account for one aspect of the 1848 riptide or another, none of them manages to explain the coincidence of high speed and low success and the process of participants’ decision-making.

My theory, which combines cognitive micro-foundations with organizational macro-structures, offers a more persuasive account. People’s decisions on whether to risk emulating the French precedent diverged clearly from standard rationality and rested instead on the inferential mechanisms of bounded rationality. Rather than seeking solid information as a basis for their high-stakes choices, many people acted on the first scrap of news that became available; even unfounded rumors greatly affected the turn of events, as both enthusiastic students (Boerner 1920: 8, 84, 116, 122, 126–27, 149; Schurz 1988: 103, 112, 132) and military commanders report (Prittwitz 1985: 34, 49, 52, 60, 120, 127, 287; Hohenlohe-Ingelfingen 1897: 17, 22, 25–26, 43). People eagerly jumped to the conclusion that they could replicate the Parisian success and did not assess in any depth whether French lessons really applied to their own polity. Therefore, they rushed toward challenging their own authorities, even in unpromising settings that differed starkly from France due to their socioeconomic and political backwardness. As a result of this precipitation, many of these rebellions ended in failure.