Particularism

Origin

From particular + -ism, after French particularisme.

Full definition of particularism

Noun

1. (theology) The principle that only certain people are chosen by God for salvation.
2. An exclusive focus on a particular group, area, sect etc.
3. (politics) The principle that individual states, races of a federation etc. may act independently of a central authority.
• 2011, Norman Davies, Vanished Kingdoms, Penguin 2012, p. 221:Despite the dominance of Castile and the stream of centralizing measures flowing from the new capital in Madrid, Aragonese particularism continued to make itself felt right up to the early eighteenth century.