Octavio Paz: Revolt

The youth movement and the struggles of the ethnic minorities are not really revolutionary. They are rebellions.

In our time, we must make a distinction between rebellion from within and revolt from without.

Rebellion from within is a sign of health—a society that examines itself, denies, and absorbs its negations in a functioning society. Revolt from without results a contradiction that thus far has proved insuperable. It is Contradiction itself, the other face of reality.

Though it has lessened the tensions between the classes, industrial society has failed to do away with the contradiction that has typified it from the beginning. It has merely exteriorized it.

The contradiction today is not within industrial society but in its relations with the world outside it—not the proletariat but the “underdeveloped” countries.

And it is not a revolution—it is a revolt.