permanent revolution

plural permanent revolutions

1. MarxismcountableuncountableThe status of a revolutionary class where it continues to push for and achieve its interests despite the political dominance of those with opposing interests.
2. countableuncountablecommunismThe theory that socialism can be obtained without the country first experiencing a period of capitalism. The revolution must furthermore become an agent for other anticapitalist revolutions around the globe, in part to secure the revolution abroad.

   Trotsky was led by the events of 1905 to formulate his theory of permanent revolution more precisely, arguing that a Russian revolution must at once evolve into a socialist phase and that it could touch off a socialist upheaval in the West.

   1978 [1976], Leszek Kołakowski, translated by P[aul] S[teven] Falla, Main Currents of Marxism, volume II: The Golden Age, Oxford: Clarendon Press, translation of Główne nurty marksizmu: rozwój (in Polish), →ISBN, →OCLC, page 416

   Antonyms: stagism