egalitarian
Americanadjective
noun
-
egalitarians
plural
adjective
noun
Usage
What does egalitarian mean? Egalitarianism is a social and political philosophy promoting the equal status of all people. Something in line with this principle is described as egalitarian. Someone who espouses this principle of equality can be called an egalitarian. How is egalitarian pronounced?[ ih-gal-i-tair-ee-uhn ]What are other forms of egalitarian?egalitarianismWhat are some other words related to egalitarian?
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of egalitarian
First recorded in 1880–85; alteration of equalitarian with French égal replacing equal
Compare meaning
How does egalitarian compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
An egalitarian is a person who believes in the equality of all people, and an egalitarian society gives everyone equal rights. This is a word that means something close to equality and has to do with fairness. If you believe that everyone deserves a chance to vote, go to school, get good jobs, and participate in society, then you are an egalitarian. When laws make life fairer, the law is getting more egalitarian. The opposite of an egalitarian system could be a fascist society or dictatorship. Monarchies are not egalitarian. When you see this word, think about equality and freedom.
Vocabulary lists containing egalitarian
Grade 10, List 3
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100 SAT Words Beginning with "E"
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Outliers
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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.
See Examples For:
The problem — and the beauty — of Social Security is that it was conceived as an egalitarian system.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 3, 2026
That means that the public must have egalitarian, accessible, and effective channels to influence the law and policy that interpret, reflect, and shape constitutional meaning.
From Slate ● Jul. 20, 2026
L.A. was where he had come of age, and it remained an indelible part of his life and psyche — not least in terms of its egalitarian spirit and its tendency toward the horizontal.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 12, 2026
Bonobos distributed their grooming time more evenly among group members, creating a more egalitarian social network.
From Science Daily ● May 31, 2026
Those complex political units are much better able to mount a sustained war of conquest than is an egalitarian band of hunters.
From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond
By categorizing people as lucky or unlucky, she argued, these egalitarians set up a moralizing hierarchy.
From The New Yorker ● Dec. 31, 2018
Thus, while secularizing leaders were generally on the left and saw themselves as egalitarians, they were often viewed by the traditionalist, religious masses as elitists.
From Washington Post ● Jun. 3, 2015
The chief complementarian champion, theologian Wayne Grudem, once criticized egalitarians for redefining submission “to mean something like ‘considerateness, thoughtfulness, an attitude of love toward one another, putting the other person’s interests above your own.”
From Time ● Aug. 21, 2011
No less hopeful are the egalitarians who believe the internet, and social media in particular, have flattened the old hierarchies that put purveyors of information at the top of the pyramid and consumers down below.
From The Guardian ● Feb. 22, 2011
There were even a few egalitarians who claimed for all classes a democratic régime.
From The Age of the Reformation by Preserved Smith
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.
