Counterrevolutionary

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A counterrevolutionary is anyone who opposes a revolution, particularly those who act after a revolution to try to overturn or reverse it, in full or in part.

Monarchists and supporters of the Ancien Régime following the French Revolution were counterrevolutionaries, and so were the monarchies that put down the various Revolutions of 1848.

In France before World War I, people who "opposed democratic ideas, parliamentary government, trade-unions, or socialism" were often considered counterrevolutionary by their opponents. The White Army and its supporters who tried to defeat the Bolsheviks after the October Revolution, as well as the German Freikorps who crushed the German revolution of 1919, were also counterrevolutionaries.

More recently, the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion into Cuba was conducted by counterrevolutionaries who hoped to overthrow the revolutionary government of Fidel Castro. In the 1980s, the United States sponsored Contra-Revolución rebels fighting to overthrow the revolutionary Sandinista government in Nicaragua. In fact, the Contras received their name precisely because they were counterrevolutionaries.

Some counterrevolutionaries are former revolutionaries who supported the initial overthrow of the previous regime, but came to differ with those who ultimately came to power after the revolution. For example, some of the Contras originally fought with the Sandinistas to overthrow Anastasio Somoza, and some of those who oppose Castro also opposed Batista.

The word is often used interchangeably with reactionary; however, some reactionaries (like the Nazis and Italian fascists) used the term counterrevolutionary to describe their opponents - even if those opponents were advocates of a Marxist revolution. Similarly, the clerics who took power following the Iranian Revolution would describe all those who opposed them as counterrevolutionary, even though some were Communists. The term, therefore, should be understood in a relative sense politically, rather than as an absolute concept.

See also

• revolutionary syndicalism
• Anti-Soviet agitation and Article 58 (RSFSR Penal Code)
• Recontra, the Contras who did not accept the new government after the ejection of revolutionary Sandinists.

References

(1) Liberalism and the Challenge of Fascism, Social Forces in England and France (1815-1870), Prof. J. Salwyn Schapiro, McGraw-Hill Book Co., Inc., NY, l949. pg 364.de:Konterrevolution ja:反革命 nn:Kontrarevolusjon sv:Kontrarevolution