carrot and stick
carrot and stick noun: the simultaneous rewarding of good behavior and punishing of bad behavior.
Noun
carrot and stick (plural carrots and sticks)
- The simultaneous rewarding of good behavior and punishing of bad behavior.
- It was this carrot and stick discipline to which Mr. John Mill was subjected, and which he accepted dutifully as flowing from that perfect wisdom of which up to this time his father had been the representative.1876, Lord Blachford, “The Reality of Duty, as Illustrated by the Autobiography of Mr. John Stuart Mill”, in The Contemporary Review, page 523
- There was no similar carrot and stick for use against the French land armaments.1928, Joseph Montague with George Young, Freedom of the Seas, page 159
carrot and stick meaning in Arabic, Persian and Vietnamese
carrot and stick in Arabic
- simultaneous rewards for good behavior and punishments for bad behavior
- الْعَصَا وَٱلْجَزَرَة al-ʕaṣā wa-l-jazara
carrot and stick in Persian
- simultaneous rewards for good behavior and punishments for bad behavior
- هویج و چماق havij o čomâq
carrot and stick in Vietnamese
- simultaneous rewards for good behavior and punishments for bad behavior
- cây gậy và củ cà rốt
Forms of carrot and stick
| plural | carrots and sticks |
|---|---|
| alternative form | stick and carrot |
Origin of carrot and stick
From combining two ways to motivate a beast of burden, with the lure of a carrot placed just out of reach, and the threat of a stick behind.
Questions about carrot and stick
- What does carrot and stick mean?
- Carrot and stick means the simultaneous rewarding of good behavior and punishing of bad behavior.
- What is carrot and stick in Arabic?
- Carrot and stick in Arabic is الْعَصَا وَٱلْجَزَرَة (al-ʕaṣā wa-l-jazara). See Carrot and stick meaning in Arabic.
- What part of speech is carrot and stick?
- Carrot and stick is a noun.
- What is the plural of carrot and stick?
- The plural of carrot and stick is carrots and sticks.
Words near carrot and stick in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: carrot and stick (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-carrot and stick.ogg.
Cite this entry: “carrot and stick.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/carrot_and_stick. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.