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Armchair revolutionary (or armchair activist and armchair socialist) is a description, often pejorative, of a speaker or writer who professes radical aims without taking any action to realize them, as if pontificating "from the comfort of the armchair".
In 1937, Nikolai Berdyaev wrote: "After years of living in Western Europe, Plekhanov became entirely a Western and of a very rationalist sort, fairly cultured, although his culture was not of the highest kind; more of an armchair revolutionary than a practical one. He could be a leader of a Marxist school of thought, but he could not be a leader of a revolution; that was made clear at the time of the revolution". [1] : 94
Columnist Julie Burchill highlighted the relative level of energy exhibited in this lede: "During a long hard winter, nothing warms the cold blood of the Western armchair revolutionary more than the sight of a bunch of attractive dark-skinned people out on the streets having a right old revolution". [2]
Left Communists have frequently been called this by the more Marxist-Leninist wings of Marxist movements. Amadeo Bordiga, a notable Italian left communist, particularly has been ascribed this title due to his frequent critique of the Soviet economic model. [3]
The Guardian used the cliche in this headline: "We’re a nation of armchair activists—and that's OK, says Bridget Christie". [4]
William Graham titled his travel book Latin America: Notes from an Armchair Revolutionary. [5]
In December 2014, The BMJ published a study, possibly satirical in intent and described as "lighthearted" in NHS Choices , with the purported purpose of determining how political affiliation correlates with literal physical activity levels. The study's stated conclusion was that literal "armchair socialists" as a class do not exist as holders of political views toward either end of the spectrum (left or right) tend to be more physically active than political centrists. [6] [7]
Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy as a whole or certain social hierarchies. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in society whom its adherents perceive as disadvantaged relative to others as well as a belief that there are unjustified inequalities that need to be reduced or abolished through radical means that change the nature of the society they are implemented in. According to emeritus professor of economics Barry Clark, supporters of left-wing politics "claim that human development flourishes when individuals engage in cooperative, mutually respectful relations that can thrive only when excessive differences in status, power, and wealth are eliminated."
Nikolai Alexandrovich Berdyaev was a Russian philosopher, theologian, and Christian existentialist who emphasized the existential spiritual significance of human freedom and the human person. Alternative historical spellings of his surname in English include "Berdiaev" and "Berdiaeff", and of his given name "Nicolas" and "Nicholas".
Socialism in New Zealand had little traction in early colonial New Zealand but developed as a political movement around the beginning of the 20th century. Much of socialism's early growth was found in the labour movement.
The New Communist movement (NCM) was a diverse left-wing political movement during the 1970s and 1980s in the United States. The NCM were a movement of the New Left that represented a diverse grouping of Marxist–Leninists and Maoists inspired by Cuban, Chinese, and Vietnamese revolutions. This movement emphasized opposition to racism and sexism, solidarity with oppressed peoples of the third-world, and the establishment of socialism by popular revolution. The movement, according to historian and NCM activist Max Elbaum, had an estimated 10,000 cadre members at its peak influence.
Yekaterina Dmitriyevna Kuskova was a Russian Empire economist, journalist, and politician involved in founding both the Russian Social-Democratic Workers' Party (RSDRP) and the liberal Constitutional Democratic Party. She was an advocate of social reformism and opposed the Bolsheviks.
Legal Marxism was a Russian Marxist movement based on a particular interpretation of Marxist theory whose proponents were active in socialist circles between 1894 and 1901. The movement's primary theoreticians were Pyotr Struve, Nikolai Berdyaev, Sergei Bulgakov, Mikhail Tugan-Baranovsky and Semyon Frank. The name was derived from the fact that its supporters promoted their ideas in legal publications.
Blanquism refers to a conception of revolution generally attributed to Louis Auguste Blanqui (1805–1881) that holds that socialist revolution should be carried out by a relatively small group of highly organised and secretive conspirators. Having seized power, the revolutionaries would then use the power of the state to introduce socialism. It is considered a particular sort of "putschism"—that is, the view that political revolution should take the form of a putsch or coup d'état.
Tom Bramble is a socialist activist, author and retired academic based in Queensland, Australia. He taught Industrial Relations at the University of Queensland for many years and has authored numerous books and articles on the Australian labour movement. He is a member of Socialist Alternative.
Marxism is a method of socioeconomic analysis that originates in the works of 19th century German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Marxism analyzes and critiques the development of class society and especially of capitalism as well as the role of class struggles in systemic, economic, social and political change. It frames capitalism through a paradigm of exploitation and analyzes class relations and social conflict using a materialist interpretation of historical development – materialist in the sense that the politics and ideas of an epoch are determined by the way in which material production is carried on.
A revolutionary is a person who either participates in, or advocates for, a revolution. The term revolutionary can also be used as an adjective to describe something producing a major and sudden impact on society.
The International Marxist Group (IMG) was a Trotskyist group in Britain between 1968 and 1982. It was the British Section of the Fourth International. It had around 1,000 members and supporters in the late 1970s. In 1980, it had 682 members; by 1982, when it changed its name to the Socialist League, membership had fallen to 534.
The Revolutionary Communist Party, USA is a new communist party in the United States founded in 1975 and led by its chairman, Bob Avakian. The party organizes for a revolution to overthrow the system of capitalism and replace it with a socialist state, with the final aim of world communism. The RCP is frequently described as a cult around Avakian.
The Socialist Revolutionary Party, was a major political party in late Imperial Russia, during both phases of the Russian Revolution, and in early Soviet Russia.
Workers' Power is a Trotskyist group which forms the British section of the League for the Fifth International. The group publishes the newspaper Workers Power and distributes the English-language journal Fifth International.
Revolutionary socialism is a political philosophy, doctrine, and tradition within socialism that stresses the idea that a social revolution is necessary to bring about structural changes in society. More specifically, it is the view that revolution is a necessary precondition for transitioning from a capitalist to a socialist mode of production. Revolution is not necessarily defined as a violent insurrection; it is defined as a seizure of political power by mass movements of the working class so that the state is directly controlled or abolished by the working class as opposed to the capitalist class and its interests.
The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party or the Russian Social Democratic Party, was a socialist political party founded in 1898 in Minsk.
Proletarian internationalism, sometimes referred to as international socialism, is the perception of all proletarian revolutions as being part of a single global class struggle rather than separate localized events. It is based on the theory that capitalism is a world-system and therefore the working classes of all nations must act in concert if they are to replace it with communism.
A proletarian revolution or proletariat revolution is a social revolution in which the working class attempts to overthrow the bourgeoisie and change the previous political system. Proletarian revolutions are generally advocated by socialists, communists and anarchists.
Far-left politics in the United Kingdom have existed since at least the 1840s, with the formation of various organisations following ideologies such as Marxism, revolutionary socialism, communism, anarchism and syndicalism.
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