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autocracy

American  
[aw-tok-ruh-see] / ɔˈtɒk rə si /

noun

plural

autocracies

  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.

autocracy British  
/ ɔːˈtɒkrəsɪ /

noun

  1. government by an individual with unrestricted authority

  2. the unrestricted authority of such an individual

  3. a country, society, etc, ruled by an autocrat

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
autocracy Cultural  

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

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Iraq under Saddam Hussein is an autocracy.

Etymology

Origin of autocracy

First recorded in 1645–55; from Greek autokráteia “power over oneself, sole power,” from autokrat(ḗs) autocrat + -eia -ia

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Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

For the Athenians, demokratia, literally “people power,” meant endlessly striving to find ways of harnessing the tendency of leaders toward autocracy.

From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 8, 2026

The Gbagbos protested against Houphouët-Boigny's autocracy, which lasted for 33 years, calling for multi-party democracy.

From BBC • Sep. 12, 2025

Now the formally restless Susan Choi turns to social realism in her beguiling if baggy “Flashlight,“ mapping a family’s journey among political autocracy and personal pain, from Midwestern cornfields to the Pacific Rim.

From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 2, 2025

The death of most European monarchies after World War I did not signal the demise of lawless autocracy so much as its translation into the new form of nonhereditary dictatorships, Adolf Hitler’s first among them.

From Slate • Feb. 21, 2025

Although his reign may have begun idealistically, Cahokia quickly became an autocracy; in an Ozymandiac extension of his ego, the supreme leader set in motion the construction projects.

From "1491" by Charles C. Mann

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.