What is (and isn't) radical?

The word radical gets tossed around in political circles a lot these days, often in critique of people or ideas with whom the speaker disagrees. In this context, very few people would like to be considered radical, simply because in this context, to be seen as radical means to be dismissed as ridiculous; impractical.

At the same time, we’re extremely casual about radicalism in other contexts. Plug “radical [almost any noun you can think of]” into a search engine and you’ll get results ranging from radical sports to radical health, radical customer service to radical happiness. Marie Kondo’s now-famous tips for decluttering have been characterized—to profitable acclaim —as “radical tidying” and even “radical minimalism.” In marketing, radical merely means extreme, and more often than not…not really. The spoiler? When someone these days says, “Here’s a radical idea,” it rarely is.

One recent study suggests that people who hold extreme political views are cognitively hard-wired to be more confident in their opinions, less open to the idea of being wrong, and physically less capable of changing their minds.

Meanwhile, one Radical Urbanist editor suggests that we’re all more radical lately, and that American culture as a whole has become “more open to extremes”—not only to extreme policies but also to “radical critiques and solutions to long-standing social issues.”

Given that radical has become so laden—so simultaneously slanderous yet weirdly magnetic—it’s worth revisiting the word itself: What is radical, and what is not? And as we’re exploring how power works, how does radicalness (or lack thereof) intersect with structures of power?

Radical is critical.

Oppositional is radical’s primary stance: the bottom line is that if it’s not criticizing an aspect of the status quo, it’s not technically radical. Radical conservatism is a deliberate oxymoron.

Radical is core.

Radical doesn’t tinker from within. It’s not interested in incremental edits. Something radical, by definition, goes to the root of a system; identifies a problem; and then either destroys it and starts from scratch, overturns it greatly enough that it becomes fundamentally different, or leaves it all behind. (Note: Radical and eradicate share the same root: that is, “root.” See also, radish, spring’s iconic root vegetable.) In other words: If it’s subtle, minor, or generally reformative rather than transformative, it’s not radical.

Radical is counter-culture.

It should come as no surprise if, when you hear the word radical, you envision a specific era or “type.” Although the word radical has been hurled, throughout history, at legions of people who stand out or disagree with the hurler, the truer meaning is applied to anyone who don’t simply disagree with you, but with an entire system: with what is considered the norm. Radical is “extreme” only to those who consider the status quo normal and acceptable. Once, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was called radical. Abolitionists were radicals.

Radical is contextual.

If the definition of radical depends on what’s “normal,” what’s radical here may not be radical there. What was radical then might not be radical now. It all depends on what’s in place. To some, a suggestion for radical change may seem outlandish and extreme, while others see the same change as merely the next natural step. Radicalism can be destructive or creative, positive or negative; it’s not inherently anything but a call for fundamental change.

Radical is changeable.

If “history is the test” and history is indeed “written by the winners,” then right or wrong, the radicals who “win” lose their title as radicals—becoming instead “heroes” and “pioneers,” while the radicals who “lose” are demonized or forgotten. Former radical outliers become normative insiders, making way for other radicals to come around. This process is, sometimes, how change happens—and there is an argument to be made for the essential necessity of radicals as “the missing political link between the past and the future.”

For more short articles around the 2019 theme Power, explore Inside Power.