Dictionary

anti-civil en · ADJ

Etymology

From anti- + civil.

Meanings

1. (rare) Uncivil(ised) and in opposition to civil society; opposed to or lacking the features of civil society (for example, opposing or simply lacking civil liberties).
   • 1905-1909, Matthew Arnold, Essays … to see the Antonines as they really were;—one may concede that the point of view from which Christianity appeared something anti-civil and anti-social, …
   • Jews were not stigmatized simply because they were held to be anti-Christian, but because their Jewish qualities were constructed as dangerous for civil society itself. [...] What was insisted on, above all, was the allegedly anti-civil clannishness of Jews... 2006, Jeffrey C. Alexander, The Civil Sphere:
   • In the Leviathan, Hobbes could only represent the pre-civil as the anti-civil, as that which lacked in every respect what was considered important in civil society. 2000, Leonhard Praeg, African Philosophy and the Quest for Autonomy: a philosophical investigation:
   • [...] then the latter, by definition, can't be civil. They might even be anti-civil or a-civil. They must be incompatible with civilization. But this is simply not the case. As was shown, [...] 1971, Gottfried Dietze, In Defense of Property:

Forms

Relateds

anticivic