radicalism (historical)

The term "Radical" (from the Latin radix meaning root) during the late 18th-century identified proponents of the Radical Movement. Historically, Radicalism began in the United Kingdom with political support for a "radical reform" of the electoral system to widen the franchise. Some radicals sought republicanism, abolition of titles, redistribution of property and freedom of the press. In France in the nineteenth century, the Republican, Radical and Radical-Socialist Party, initially identifying itself as a far-left party opposed to more right-wing parties (such as the Orléanists, the Legitimists and the Bonapartists), eventually became the most important party of the Third Republic (1871–1940). As historical Radicalism became absorbed in the development of political liberalism, in the later 19th century in both the United Kingdom and in continental Europe the term "Radical" came to denote a progressive liberal ideology.