7 results for: autocracy

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This

au·toc·ra·cy

Audio Help [aw-tok-ruh-see] Pronunciation Key

–noun, plural -cies.

1.	government in which one person has uncontrolled or unlimited authority over others; the government or power of an absolute monarch.

2.	a nation, state, or community ruled by an autocrat.

3.	unlimited authority, power, or influence of one person in any group.

[Origin: 1645–55; < Gk autokráteia power over oneself, sole power, equiv. to autokrat(s) autocrat + -eia -ia; see -cracy

]

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.

Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
autocracy

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American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

au·toc·ra·cy Audio Help (ô-tŏk'rə-sē) Pronunciation Key
n. pl. au·toc·ra·cies

Government by a single person having unlimited power; despotism.
A country or state that is governed by a single person with unlimited power.

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The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This

autocracy
noun
1.	a political system governed by a single individual
2.	a political theory favoring unlimited authority by a single individual

Kernerman English Multilingual Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
autocracy [oːˈtokrəsi] noun

government by an autocrat

Arabic:	حُكم فَرْدي (مُطْلَق)
Chinese (Simplified):	独裁政府
Chinese (Traditional):	獨裁政府
Czech:	samovláda
Danish:	enevælde; diktatur
Dutch:	autocratie
Estonian:	isevalitsus
Finnish:	itsevaltius
French:	autocratie
German:	die Autokratie
Greek:	αυτοκρατορική εξουσία
Hungarian:	önkényuralom
Icelandic:	einveldi, alræði
Indonesian:	otokrasi
Italian:	autocrazia

Japanese:	独裁政治
Korean:	독재정부
Latvian:	autokrātija, patvaldība
Lithuanian:	autokratija, patvaldystė
Norwegian:	enevelde
Polish:	autokracja
Portuguese (Brazil):	autocracia
Portuguese (Portugal):	autocracia
Romanian:	autocraţie
Russian:	самодержавие
Slovak:	samovláda
Slovenian:	samodrštvo
Spanish:	autocracia
Swedish:	envälde
Turkish:	otokrosi, mutlakiyet

See also: autocrat, autocratic

American Heritage New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition - Cite This Source - Share This
autocracy [(aw-tok-ruh-see)]

A system of government in which supreme political power is held by one person. (Compare constitutional monarchy, democracy, and oligarchy.)

Note: Iraq under Saddam Hussein is an autocracy.

[Chapter:] World Politics

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Autocracy

Au*toc"ra*cy\, n.; pl. Autocracies. [Gr. ?: cf. F. autocratie. See Autocrat.]

1. Independent or self-derived power; absolute or controlling authority; supremacy.

The divine will moves, not by the external impulse or inclination of objects, but determines itself by an absolute autocracy. --South.

2. Supreme, uncontrolled, unlimited authority, or right of governing in a single person, as of an autocrat.

3. Political independence or absolute sovereignty (of a state); autonomy. --Barlow.

4. (Med.) The action of the vital principle, or of the instinctive powers, toward the preservation of the individual; also, the vital principle. [In this sense, written also autocrasy.] --Dunglison.

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