devrimcilik

Devrimcilik, or revolutionism, is a political approach within socialist and communist currents that prioritizes revolutionary means to overthrow the existing social and political order and replace it with a socialist system. It contrasts with reformism, which seeks change through gradual, legal, or parliamentary processes. Devrimcilik encompasses a range of currents—Marxism-Leninism, Maoism, Trotskyism, and other anti-capitalist ideologies—that share the belief that systemic transformation cannot be achieved by reform alone.

In Turkey and other countries, devrimcilik has been used to describe movements and groups that advocate mass mobilization of workers, peasants, students, and other oppressed classes, and that reject participation in conventional party politics to pursue more radical change. Some tendencies have endorsed or engaged in clandestine or armed struggle as part of a broader strategy of overthrowing capitalist and state power; others emphasized political organization, worker and peasant alliances, and political education within a legal framework. The term therefore covers a historical spectrum rather than a single doctrine.

Common themes include a belief in the necessity of a vanguard or revolutionary leadership, the aim of replacing the state apparatus with what proponents term a workers' or socialist dictatorship, and international solidarity among anti-capitalist movements. Debates within devrimcilik often focus on questions of means (peaceful versus violent methods), the role and shape of party organization, and the relation to reformist social-democratic currents and to broader international socialist movements.