Anatomy of Rebellion provides an understanding of four rebellions that will make clear the factors that are crucial in the development of other rebellions. Seeking a political pattern in the process of rebellion, Claude Welch, Jr., has investigated four large-scale rural uprisings that came close to becoming revolutions: the Taiping rebellion in China 1850-64, the Telengana uprising in India of 1946-51, the Mau Mau rebellion in Kenya of 1952-56, the Kwilu uprising in Zaire of 1963-65. Weaving the facts of these rebellions with theories about political violence, Welch follows the rebellions through the initial stages of discontent to the explosion of violence to the suppression of the uprisings. He then challenges explanations of political violence, both Marxist and non-Marxist, that other scholars have proposed. Rebellions have not been studied as thoroughly as the major successful revolutions, although the frequency of rebellions in the modern world is not likely to diminish. Rural dwellers' discontents are still clashing with central governments' ambitions; Anatomy of Rebellion clarifies how this volatile type of political violence occurs.

Rebellion, uprising, or insurrection is a refusal of obedience or order. It refers to the open resistance against the orders of an established authority. The term comes from the Latin verb rebello, "I renew war" + bello . The rebel is the individual that partakes in rebellion or rebellious activities, particularly when armed. Thus, the term rebellion also refers to the ensemble of rebels in a state of revolt.

Nicholas Higgins offers a new way of understanding the Zapatista conflict as a counteraction to the forces of modernity and globalisation that have rendered indigenous peoples virtually invisible throughout the world.