Definition of plutocracy in English:

nounplutocracies

• 1Government by the wealthy.

  ‘the attack on the Bank of England was a gesture against the very symbol of plutocracy’

  More example sentences

  • ‘It would replace democracy with plutocracy, letting the wealthy and big business make laws in their own interests.’
  • ‘The danger is that plutocracy will prevail over democracy, that the free market will rule over the free citizen.’
  • ‘Anti-immigrant hatred, urban violence, democracy subverted by plutocracy - these are not, the film shows, new developments.’
  • ‘In a word, aristocracy was displaced by plutocracy.’
  • ‘What we're effectively seeing is the displacement of democratic representative government with something approaching plutocracy.’

  1. 1.1A country or society governed by the wealthy.
     ‘no one can accept public policies which turn a democracy into a plutocracy’
     More example sentences

     • ‘Today, more than ever, it resembles a plutocracy, a society governed by a handful of enormously wealthy individuals.’
     • ‘The country today is a plutocracy, a society run in the interests of billionaires and millionaires.’
     • ‘It is a plutocracy, not a democracy.’
     • ‘Dark times are ahead because there is no republic anymore only a plutocracy.’
     • ‘Under the guise of democracy, the island is a plutocracy - a political system governed by the wealthy people.’
     • ‘It appears we either have been transmuted to an obvious plutocracy - or worse, a fascist dictatorship.’
     • ‘They pointed out that a country ruled by the very wealthy is actually a plutocracy, not a democracy.’
     • ‘Since most people don't want to admit out loud that they live in a plutocracy, successful politicians have, until now, worked hard to keep up an illusion.’
     • ‘No one, whatever their conception of justice, can accept public policies which turn a democracy into a plutocracy.’
     • ‘We are on the way to becoming a plutocracy.’
     • ‘Indeed, it does appear they are increasingly living in a plutocracy, and this is a factor that simply cannot be overlooked in the discussion of class polarization.’
     • ‘Since when did the US become an official plutocracy?’
  2. 1.2An elite or ruling class of people whose power derives from their wealth.
     ‘officials were drawn from the new plutocracy’
     More example sentences

     • ‘Right now we have a small elite plutocracy and a whole lot of peasants - no wonder the current system is rotting from the inside. No free society can exist without a strong middle class.’
     • ‘In the end, the financial plutocracy handpicked the president.’
     • ‘A century ago the city was a playground for the New York plutocracy.’
     • ‘And as skeptical as I am of majority opinion right now, it's better than the unbridled greed of the plutocracy we've got at present.’
     • ‘Politicians rail against the plutocracy and the baleful influence of ‘the top 1 percent.’’
     • ‘The plutocracy presently in charge of these matters must become alert to the needs of all.’
     • ‘Such policies threaten the interest of the plutocracy that runs this county and controls both the Democrats and Republicans.’
     • ‘The new plutocracy wanted a recognizable artistic language that would ease their cultural insecurities and establish their legitimacy.’
     • ‘As you've pointed out in many of your articles, the revolution against the capitalist plutocracy is largely a war of words and ideas at this point.’
     • ‘The outcome of this inevitable economic process was not government of, for and by the people, but of, for and by the new capitalist plutocracy.’
     • ‘Class privilege has reached the point where the entire society is ruled by a plutocracy.’
     • ‘For in reality France under Louis XVI was governed not by the nobility, but by a plutocracy in which the majority of nobles had no share.’
     • ‘In these various ways, a new plutocracy was emerging in western Europe during the late nineteenth century, composed of aristocratic and bourgeois elements, which compromised the original liberal ideal.’
     • ‘We need to change our government in a revolutionary way, and overthrow the plutocracy (which is firmly rooted in this mentality) that controls our government.’
     • ‘The existing two-party system, whose personnel are utterly dependent on the financial support of the plutocracy, is thoroughly unrepresentative of the general population.’
     • ‘Class privilege has reached the point where the entire society is ruled by a plutocracy.’
     • ‘The country is now ruled by a plutocracy.’