-cracy

1. a combining form occurring in loanwords from Greek ( aristocracy; democracy ); on this model used, with the meaning “rule,” “government,” “governing body,” to form abstract nouns from stems of other origin:

   mobocracy; bureaucracy.

-cracy

combining form

1. indicating a type of government or rule See also -crat

   mobocracy

   plutocracy

Word History and Origins

Origin of -cracy¹

< Middle French -cracie (now -cratie ) < Late Latin -cratia < Greek -kratia, equivalent to krát ( os ) rule, strength, might (akin to hard ) + -ia -y ³

Word History and Origins

Origin of -cracy¹

from Greek -kratia, from kratos power

Example Sentences

“Demo”cracy: We have the beta version.

From Washington Post

This promise is at the heart of the American identity: it is anchored by founding fathers Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson, scientists and inventors both, extolled by Alexis de Tocqueville in his 1835 masterwork Demo­cracy in America, embodied in the inventions of Thomas Edison, and codified in its modern form in Science, The Endless Frontier, Vannevar Bush’s famous 1945 science-policy report to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, which laid out the still-powerful argument for government sponsorship of basic science.

From Nature

The backers had a hard time understanding this; they continued to operate under the shared assumption that more demo­cracy, more engagement and more transparency lead inexorably to more success.

From New York Times

The protesters, mostly students but also some academics, are targeting a law passed by the Greek parliament last August that seeks to introduce more merito­cracy, dynamism and accountability to Greece’s rigid higher-education system.

From Nature

Words having the following terminations are usually accented on the antepenult, or third syllable from the end: cracy, ferous, fluent, flous, honal, gony, grapher, graphy, loger, logist, logy, loquy, machy, mathy, meter, metry, nomy, nomy, parous, pathy, phony, scopy, strophe, tomy, trophy, vomous, vorous.

From Project Gutenberg

Words That Use -cracy

What does -cracy mean?

The combining form -cracy is used like a suffix meaning “rule” or “government.” It is often used in technical terms, especially in sociology.

The form -cracy comes from Greek krátos, meaning “rule” and “strength.”

What are variants of -cracy?

While -cracy doesn’t have any variants, it is related to the form -crat, as in plutocrat. Want to know more? Read our Words That Use -crat article.

Examples of -cracy

An example of a familiar word that features -cracy is democracy, “government by the people.” Democracy comes from Greek dēmokratía, which uses the equivalent form of -cracy.

The demo- part of the word means “people,” from Greek dêmos, while the form -cracy means “government.” Democracy literally translates to “people’s government.”

What are some words that use the combining form -cracy?

• aristocracy (using the equivalent form of -cracy in Greek)
• bureaucracy
• gerontocracy
• kakistocracy
• meritocracy
• plutocracy (using the equivalent form of -cracy in Greek)
• technocracy
• theocracy

What are some other forms that -cracy may be commonly confused with?

• -archy
• -core

Break it down!

The combining form gyno- means “woman” or “female.” With this in mind, what kind of government is a gynocracy?