Gordon Wood makes the argument in The Radicalism of the American Revolution that the American Revolution socially radicalized America, and had the Revolution not taken place, the social changes in which he points out within the book would most likely have not taken place when they did.
             To construct his argument, Wood attempts to give us a picture of society before the Revolution. Wood explains that societywas held together by intricate networks of personal loyalties, obligations, and quasi-dependencies? (57). American society had created a sort of paternalistic system where everyone relied on each other (particularly in the matter of money). There was very little industrialization in America at this time, and so 'much of the economy was organized into webs of private relationships? (64). The status of one's self became extremely important because of these private relationships, and as a result the 'stability of the political system?depended on the social authority of political leaders being visible and incontestable? (86). Wood explains how thishierarchical society? looks towards republicanism, but credits the Revolution for[surfacing] the republican tendencies of American life? (169) and calls it afull-scale assault on dependency? (179). He continues his book in explaining the social changes the Revolution caused, and says that after the Revolution,what remained of the traditional social hierarchy virtually collapsed? (305). He concludes at the end of the book that the founding fatherswere unsettled and fearful not because the American Revolution failed but because it had succeeded? (368), and this fact itself, as Wood points out, makes the Revolution radical in that the sudden social changes it caused on such a large scale were unexpected.
             Wood presents a very intriguing argument in that the Revolution itself is radical. Yet the question can be raised?did the Revolution really cause the social changes that Wood discusses...