federalism
noun
Simple meaning
A system of national government in which power is divided between a central authority and a number of regions with delimited self-governing authority.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
fehderuhlihzuhmSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈfɛdɚəlɪzəm
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 system of national government in which power is divided between a central authority and a number of regions with delimited self-governing authority.
The belief that such a system is superior to other forms of government.
theology
Covenantalism.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C1 · Advanced (estimated)
- Frequency
- Uncommon
- Formality
- Technical
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
This meaning: A system of national government in which power is divided between a central authority and a number of regions with delimited self-governing authority.
Used this way, federalism 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
- Official and authoritative
- Usage feel
- Formal and precise
Where it naturally appears
- Government/politics
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Word family
Words built from the same root.
A member of a former political party in the United States that favored a strong centralized federal government.
By federal government.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
- federaladjective
- sovereigntynoun
- autonomynoun
- constitutionnoun
- monarchynoun
- centralizedadjective
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Words can change meaning depending on context.
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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.