noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   Rule of a group of people by their own leaders as opposed to rule imposed by a foreign government or people. uncountable

   "Britain resumed direct control of North Ireland after just nine weeks of self-rule."

2. 2
   government of a political unit by its own people wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

self-governmentnationalityself-determination

Example

More examples

"Britain resumed direct control of North Ireland after just nine weeks of self-rule."

Etymology

From self- + rule.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.