Definition of Root-and-branch men

For opposition to all forms of government, social hierarchy or authority, see Anarchism. For other meanings see also radical, extremism, far-right and far-left. Radicalism as a political movement should be distinguished from the modern American usage of radical merely to denote political extremes of right or left.

The term Radical (latin radix meaning root) was used from the late 18th century for proponents of the Radical Movement and has since been used as a label in political science for those favouring or trying to produce thoroughgoing political reforms which can include changes to the social order to a greater or lesser extent toward the left. Historically, early radical aims of liberty and electoral reform in Great Britain widened with the American Revolution and French Revolution so that some radicals sought republicanism, abolition of titles, redistribution of property and freedom of the press. In France in the nineteenth century, Radicalism was closely associated with Republicanism and anti-clericalism. Initially identifying itself as a far left party opposed to the liberal Orleanists, the Legitimists and the Bonapartists, the Republican, Radical and Radical‐Socialist Party progressively became the most important party of the Third Republic (1871 – 1940). Historical Radicalism became absorbed in the development of political liberalism, and in the later 19th century in both the United Kingdom and continental Europe the term Radical came to denote a progressive liberal ideology.