par·tic·u·lar·ism
pər-ˈti-k(yə-)lə-ˌri-zəm 
pə-
also pär-
1
: exclusive or special devotion to a particular interest
2
: a political theory that each political group has a right to promote its own interests and especially independence without regard to the interests of larger groups
3
: a tendency to explain complex social phenomena in terms of a single causative factor
"
1
: of, relating to, or having the characteristics of particularism
particularist … tendencies persisted and seriously complicated national political life—
Renzo Sereno
Renzo Sereno2
: of, relating to, or being a society in which the family unit is individualized
Examples of particularism in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
Literary Hub, 23 July 2025
The stifling centripetal forces of globalism despise the defiant particularism of the Jewish nation and the modern Jewish state.
—Newsweek, 18 Mar. 2025
But as Superman went through various metamorphoses, and corporate overseers, his Jewish particularism ebbed and flowed, depending on who was writing, acting, or directing.
—Jay Michaelson, Rolling Stone, 28 June 2023
Those include the tensions between religious belief and the academic understanding of religion; Jewish particularism and universalism; and how to construe the relationship between antinomian religious movements and modernity.
—Susan Neiman, The New York Review of Books, 6 Apr. 2023
But French universalism has become its own very specific particularism.
—Rachel Donadio, The Atlantic, 22 Nov. 2021
Just as King has been shorn of his political radicalism—his democratic socialism, his anti-imperialism—his religious particularism is too often ignored.
—Matthew Sitman, The New Republic, 15 Apr. 2021
The conflict between universalism and particularism remains the defining test of today, as the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, or ISIS, destroys cities to forward its fundamentalist vision and nativist groups in Europe attack immigrants to serve their nationalist ones.
—Christian Madsbjerg, Foreign Affairs, 1 Jan. 2015
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Noun
Despite differences with the Bund, Jewish Communists and socialists in the US constructed an ethnic particularism that echoed some of the Bund’s own cultural politics.
—Literary Hub, 23 July 2025
The stifling centripetal forces of globalism despise the defiant particularism of the Jewish nation and the modern Jewish state.
—Newsweek, 18 Mar. 2025
But as Superman went through various metamorphoses, and corporate overseers, his Jewish particularism ebbed and flowed, depending on who was writing, acting, or directing.
—Jay Michaelson, Rolling Stone, 28 June 2023
Those include the tensions between religious belief and the academic understanding of religion; Jewish particularism and universalism; and how to construe the relationship between antinomian religious movements and modernity.
—Susan Neiman, The New York Review of Books, 6 Apr. 2023
But French universalism has become its own very specific particularism.
—Rachel Donadio, The Atlantic, 22 Nov. 2021
Just as King has been shorn of his political radicalism—his democratic socialism, his anti-imperialism—his religious particularism is too often ignored.
—Matthew Sitman, The New Republic, 15 Apr. 2021
The conflict between universalism and particularism remains the defining test of today, as the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, or ISIS, destroys cities to forward its fundamentalist vision and nativist groups in Europe attack immigrants to serve their nationalist ones.
—Christian Madsbjerg, Foreign Affairs, 1 Jan. 2015
Cite this Entry
“Particularism.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/particularism. Accessed 20 Jun. 2026.
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