The problem with third worldism is that it is kind of true, and that does present western leftists with something of a sick note — if there is zero revolutionary potential in the imperial core then why not just enjoy your treats until the global proletariat overthrow us? I struggle with this myself tbc
this post was submitted on 20 Dec 2025
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That's a problem of interpretation, not analysis. All accurate analysis is accurate concretely, not abstractly. It was true at the time it was articulated that there was no revolutionary potential and the reasons were specific and concrete. Those reasons still hold today, but hold less so than they did back then.
The interpretation is not, therefore, that we can just abandon the project but rather that the task of revolutionaries in the core is to analyze the core from the inside, understand how the conditions produce the resultant revolutionary potential, identify what conditions need to be met, and work towards bringing about those conditions.
Maoist Third Worldism promotes the idea that workers in the First World are also imperialists, or at least take advantage of the systems created by imperialism, and that there is no revolutionary potential in the First World.
There is also Third Worldism, which was a vague set of ideas and ideologies promoting that Third World countries (underdeveloped countries and newly independent countries) should not align themselves with either the United States or the Soviet Union. It is also mixed with ideas of Pan-Arabism, Pan-Latin Americanism, Pan-Africanism, and Pan-Asianism. In real life, most of these movements and governments ended up gaining the support of the Soviets, while accepting some money from the United States to develop their economies.
There was a resurgence of this in the late 1990s and 2000s in South America, with the election of Hugo Chávez in Venezuela and the eventual creation of the Union of South American Nations (Unasur) in 2008. Although this ideology is often referred to as Socialism in the 21st Century or Progressivism (which in the Global South means a vague alliance of liberals, leftists, nationalists, and some conservatives against neoliberalism and the Global North), they don't really accuse China of not being truly communist, but rather they often use China and Vietnam as good examples of socialist or leftist governments, while claiming that both the United States and the Soviet Union are bad examples to follow and that their ideologies don't work in the Global South.
the worlds framework made more sense 50 years ago and third-worldism was more coherent. if someone IDed themself to me as third-worldist today i'd need more information to know their deal.
:this: unironically.
Usually some kind of Maoist. I treat the white ones with a healthy dose of skepticism and distrust. Perfect example being folks like BadEmpanada. There are some extremely chauvinist people that claim that label.
Some people seem to treat it like a "cure" for being white (weird mindset to begin with) and just do vulgar hatred on kkkrakkker kkkountries without proper analysis. Others just treat it as having a very heavy focus on imperialism and colonialism as the primary issue of the communist movement of our time, which I think is correct and good.
Yeah the latter are cool.
The latter is what I have the most experience with fortunately
Third worldist whites pretty much think they’ve found a loophole to being a bigoted piece of shit to those around them
It's also a weird reversal of white saviorism
They love to fetishize peripheral revolutionaries coming to save/overthrow their government to a degree that absolves them of not doing the work themselves.
It's funny to say 
, but if someone really believes that that's going to happen, and that even if it did it would be a solution, then they're believing some very strange, incorrect, and counterproductive things.
I have been proven completely wrong and am now filling out my dual J. Posadas and L. Trotsky apology forms. 
Honestly just a new form of orientalist fetishism and similar in essence to being a sex tourist
It's definitely at least partially orientalism, but let's not exaggerate here. There's a serious coercive nature to sex tourism that shouldn't be minimized.
Edit: did you edit your comment? I didn't notice "in essence" the first time I read it before replying. It's possible I just missed it, apologies if so. I agree they can come from similar places, but I don't think it's fair to generalize that. Sex tourists are deeply malicious racist creeps trying to do an end-run around consent and get a spouse they have as much power over as possible (i.e. r*pists). Most of the vulgar "third worldists" are just deeply alienated (often young) people who aren't even interacting directly with the people they're fetishizing.
Yeah, I was exaggerating quite a lot there lol
Yeah, white people, especially from the global north, calling themselves Third Worldists tend to be weirdos.
Anyone remember Jason Unhrue? The communist Youtuber with no rizz, a bright red mohawk, and self published his writing as "The selected works of Jason Unhrue"? That guy was a Self described Maoist Third Worldist lol
It means whatever the last person told you it means. That's how simple it is. One may call themselves a Maoist third wordlist and crochet the flags of oppressed nations on their coats all they want. Capital has the ability to subsume all critique into itself. Even those who would critique capital end up reinforcing it instead...
Can you explain in more detail, please?
I don't really know how to simplify it more. If being anti-capitalist generates capital then capitalists will become anti-capitalist.
Judge by actions, not by appearance.
That's perfect, thank you! Like buying Che tees at the Gap.
Which makes me wonder: if a communist group makes their own screens, screen prints some to raise money for strike funds or a comrade who is out of work due to illness, or even cover organizing or organization expenses, can we call them capitalists? I'm also thinking about that website that sells red wear.
If you don't make profit from making t-shirts and screen prints you are not a capitalist, the moment you extract surplus value from making t-shirts and invest it towards making more that is capitalism.
"Yeah my comrade is is out of work due to illness and needs accommodations, but if we invest this money we have into making more t-shirts we can house more people later."
This is the struggle with corruption, is it always the wrong choice? Maybe not, but continue down this path and you will fail to do good for the sake of something great.
Gotcha, thank you. Like my fine line between deep respect and admiration for Comrades Traoré, Castro, Guevara, Lenin, Sankara, and others. I literally have to check myself from hero worshipping, when I realize it's creeping in.They are heros, but human, like us. With correct preparation, conditions, and support, anyone in these threads can be a role model -- and with too much ego and too little of the aforementioned conditions, an unintentional villain.
Thanks again!
It's a modified quote from Disco Elysium about recuperation and capitalist realism.
Lol i thought it was from Capitalist Realism.
Thanks, I've not seen it.
It's a really good game, highly recommend it. Don't pay for it, the studio that made it got taken over by its bourgeois investors.
I've read about it and I wouldn't really pay for anything, anyway. I doubt my lappie will handle it anyway,, but maybe I'll check out a stream or ask my kid about it.
It might work if you're willing to run it at a lower resolution. It's not an extremely visually demanding game.
I may try to see about it at some point. Thank you.
since others defined it better I'll just add my own (totally uneducated) opinion:
since only formerly "third world" nations have managed to survive into the modern era with socialist governments relatively intact I suppose it would be the leading Marxist thesis (?) right now
time will tell. I don't count anything out, though. revolutionary conditions are about to spread and intensify everywhere all at once and we'll be experiencing a sort of new global laboratory for applied Marxism, in both the core and periphery and colonial states. and i don't think even total AI hyper-surveilliance and push-button targeted drone assassinations are going to be able to clamp it down
i think the far right neo-fascist movements are blowing their loads early and are going to leave a vacuum that can only be filled with new, evolutionary models of socialism or absolute slop brained fringe shit like Yarvinist-adjacent nihlist crap that won't ever be adopted by the masses. you can't force your imperial core subjects into seige mentality to rally around the flag even you are also waging war directly on them as though they were no different then those in the colonies. the neo-fascists have been equally poisoned by liberalism so they are incapable of making any kind of call to collective action.
The original term had a real meaning:
- First world: Capitalist and part of NATO
- Second world: Soviet countries
- Third world: All other countries
So Sweden, Finland, and Ireland are all Third world because of their neutrality. The term has drifted to a meaningless term and usually just means 'poor' or 'evil' depend on context. I wish words still had meanings.
I have no idea what third-worldism is tho and I couldn't even begin to guess.
The term has drifted to a meaningless term and usually just means 'poor' or 'evil' depend on context. I wish words still had meanings.
It just refers to the global south now. Unless it's a racist saying it (many such cases), then it means what you're saying.
even back in the day, third-worldism was a political movement and not all the unaligned nations were -ist
Yeah even then there was a clear difference between say Sweden and Austria (de Facto first world), the Non-Aligned Movement (Yugoslavia, Libya, Ghana, India, Egypt under Nasser, Indonesia under Sukarno) and Maoist Third-Worldist Guerillas (across most of the world but with the Philippines, Peru and parts of India as well known centers).
That said evening calling yourself a Maoist had different meanings. It could mean a Maoist Third Worldist or just a communist party that aligned with the PRC in the Sino-Soviet Split.
Sorry, what does being a “third worldist” mean? Like they’re from a country thats been labelled “third world”?
My understanding of it was that third worldists believe world socialism will arise from the most oppressed portions of the imperial periphery because of the acute contradictions created by imperialism and colonialism but I wanted to ask to make sure it wasn't mistaken
That's correct AFAIK.
loosely, third-worldism was a left-wing political movement in unaligned nations during the cold war (US sphere / soviet sphere / neither) and there was a bunch of international diplomacy happening. OP is asking about the contemporary meaning and that's fuzzier since it doesn't exist as a movement the same way it used to.