Maoism, also known as Mao Zedong Thought, is a variety of Marxism–Leninism that Mao Zedong developed while trying to realize a socialist revolution in the agricultural, pre-industrial society of the Republic of China and later the People's Republic of China. A difference between Maoism and traditional Marxism–Leninism is that a united front of progressive forces in class society would lead the revolutionary vanguard in pre-industrial societies rather than communist revolutionaries alone. This theory, in which revolutionary praxis is primary and ideological orthodoxy is secondary, represents urban Marxism–Leninism adapted to pre-industrial China. Later theoreticians expanded on the idea that Mao had adapted Marxism–Leninism to Chinese conditions, arguing that he had in fact updated it fundamentally and that Maoism could be applied universally throughout the world. This ideology is often referred to as Marxism–Leninism–Maoism to distinguish it from the original ideas of Mao.

माओवाद चरमपंथी अतिवादी माने जा रहे बुद्धिजीवी वर्ग का या उत्तेजित जनसमूह की सहज प्रतिक्रियावादी सिद्धांत है। माओवादी राजनैतिक रूप से सचेत सक्रिय और योजनाबद्ध काम करने वाले दल के रूप में काम करते है। उनका तथा मुख्यधारा के राजनैतिक दलों में यह प्रमुख भेद है कि जहाँ मुख्य धारा के दल वर्तमान व्यवस्था के भीतर ही काम करना चाहते है वही माओवादी समूचे तंत्र को हिंसक तरीके से उखाड़ के अपनी विचारधारा के अनुरूप नयी व्यवस्था को स्थापित करना चाहते हैं। वे माओ के इन दो प्रसिद्द सूत्रों पे काम करते हैं :