In political science, a reactionary can be defined as a person or entity holding political views that favour a return to a previous political state of society that they believe possessed characteristics that are negatively absent from the contemporary status quo of a society. As an adjective, the word reactionary describes points of view and policies meant to restore a past status quo.[1]
The word reactionary is often used in the context of the left–right political spectrum, and is one tradition in right-wing politics. In popular usage, it is commonly used to refer to a highly conservative position, one opposed to social or political progress.[2][3] However, according to political theorist Mark Lilla, a reactionary yearns to overturn a present condition of decadence and recover an idealized past. Such reactionary individuals and policies favour social transformation, in contrast to conservative individuals or policies that seek to preserve what exists in the present.[4]
Reactionary ideologies can also be radical, in the sense of political extremism, in service to re-establishing past conditions. In political discourse, being a reactionary is generally regarded as negative; the descriptor "political reactionary" has been adopted by the likes of the Austrian monarchist Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn,[5] the Scottish journalist Gerald Warner of Craigenmaddie,[6] the Colombian political theologian Nicolás Gómez Dávila, and the American historian John Lukacs.[
