English

Adjective

reactionary ‎(comparative more reactionary, superlative most reactionary)

1. Politically favoring a return to a supposed golden age of the past.
   • 2011 September 29, Corey Robin, The Reactionary Mind: Conservatism from Edmund Burke to Sarah Palin, New York: Oxford University Press, ISBN 9780199793747, OL 25101368M, page 25:

     There's a fairly simple reason for the embrace of radicalism on the right, and it has to do with the reactionary imperative that lies at the core of conservative doctrine. […] If he is to preserve what he values, the conservative must declare war against the culture as it is.

2. (chemistry) Of, pertaining to, participating in or inducing a chemical reaction.
   • 2013, Brandon Smith, Are Individuals The Property Of The Collective?

     Psychiatry extends the theory into biology in the belief that all human behavior is nothing more than a series of reactionary chemical processes in the brain that determine pre-coded genetic responses built up from the conditioning of one’s environment.

Antonyms

• nonreactionary

Translations

Noun

reactionary ‎(plural reactionaries)

1. One who is opposed to change.
2. One who is very conservative.

Translations