autocracy
noun
Simple meaning
A political system governed by a single individual.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
awtahkruhseeSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ɔˈtɑkɹəsi
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
A political system governed by a single individual
A political theory favoring unlimited authority by a single individual
uncountable
A form of government in which unlimited power is held by a single individual.
countable
An instance of this government.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: A political system governed by a single individual
Used this way, autocracy is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in government or politics contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Where it naturally appears
- Government/politics
Nearby words
- autarchy , rarer, so it draws attention
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.