coercive
Americanadjective
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Etymology
Origin of coercive
Explanation
If you use coercive measures to get people to join your club, it means that you intimidate or force people to make them feel like they have to join. If you use threats to get what you want from other people, your methods can be described as coercive. It can take nothing more than a strong sense of authority to come across as coercive, or the intimidation can take the form of physical threats. When you're coercive, you're demanding obedience without much concern for what the people you coerce need or want. The Latin root is coercere, which means "to control or restrain."
Vocabulary lists containing coercive
Grendel
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Content Summary 1.3: Origins of Complex Urban Societies in the Ancient World
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Content Summary 3.7: Postclassical Americas
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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.
Princess Latifa mounted a bid for freedom in 2018 from what at the time she claimed was her family's coercive control.
From BBC • Jun. 4, 2026
"This means that cases may only be escalated to emergency response mechanisms once risk has clearly intensified, rather than at earlier stages of stalking or coercive control."
From BBC • May 22, 2026
But with the waiver set to end on Saturday, Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar criticised "unilateral coercive measures", without naming any country.
From Barron's • May 15, 2026
That’s all because we say that most of the interesting stuff is done by volunteerism and entrepreneurship and will, zestful building, not by the coercive powers of the state.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 7, 2026
We had heated discussions about whether we ought to have relied on coercive measures.
From "Long Walk to Freedom" by Nelson Mandela
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.
