Revolutionary

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A revolutionary, when used as a noun, is a person who either actively engages in some kind of revolution, or advocates the revolution, with recognition from some government or party which is effectively carrying out a revolution of the same category ^[1]. The term is usually applied to political revolutionaries or social revolutionaries, and less frequently used to revolutionary scientists, inventors, and artists. In the political context, the term "revolutionary" is often used in contrast to the term reformist. While a revolutionary is someone who supports abrupt change, a reformist is someone who supports more gradual change. When used as an adjective, revolutionary refers to something that has a major, sudden impact on society or on some aspect of human endeavor. Political revolutionaries may be classified in two ways:

1. According to the goals of the revolution they propose. Usually, these goals are part of a certain ideology. In theory, each ideology could generate its own brand of revolutionaries. In practice, most political revolutionaries have been either liberals, nationalists, socialists, communists, fascists or anarchists.
2. According to the methods they propose to use. This divides revolutionaries in two broad groups: Those who advocate a violent revolution, and those who are pacifists. Amongst the best known examples of these two types of revolutionaries are Che Guevara and Mahatma Gandhi, respectively ^[2].

Mikhail Bakunin and Sergey Nechayev explained in their "Catechism of a Revolutionary" ^[3]:

The Revolutionary is a doomed man. He has no private interests, no affairs, sentiments, ties, property nor even a name of his own. His entire being is devoured by one purpose, one thought, one passion - the revolution. Heart and soul, not merely by word but by deed, he has severed every link with the social order and with the entire civilized world; with the laws, good manners, conventions, and morality of that world. He is its merciless enemy and continues to inhabit it with only one purpose - to destroy it.

[edit] Footnotes

[edit] References

• Davies, James Chowning (1997). When Men Revolt and Why. Transaction Books. ISBN 156000939x. 

[edit] See also

• American Revolutionary War
• Communist revolution
• Counter-revolution
• Cuban Revolution
• French Revolution
• Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps
• Orange Revolution
• Paradigm shift
• Professional revolutionaries
• Radicalism (historical)
• Radicalization
• Revolution
• Revolutionary movement
• Revolution (political group)
• Russian Revolution
• Revolutionary socialism
• Velvet Revolution