Word.ws English Dictionary

civil societies

civil societies is the plural of civil society.

Meaning of civil society

Noun

civil society (countable and uncountable, plural civil societies)

  1. All of the institutions, voluntary organizations and corporate bodies that are less than the state but greater than the family.
  2. Those things expected of a democratic society, such as free speech and human rights.
  3. Organized, internally peaceful human society; civilization.
    • The only Way whereby any one divests himself of his natural Liberty, and puts on the Bonds of civil Society, is by agreeing with other Men to join and unite into a Community, for their comfortable, safe, and peaceable living one amongst another, in a secure Enjoyment of their Properties, and a...1689, John Locke, Two Treatises of Government; republished as The Works of John Locke Esq., volume 2, 1727, page 185
    Antonyms:
    state of nature

Questions about civil societies

What is civil societies the plural of?
Civil societies is the plural of civil society.

Words near civil societies in the dictionary

  1. civil rights movements
  2. civil servant
  3. civil servants
  4. civil service
  5. civil services
  6. civil societies
  7. civil society
  8. civil status
  9. civil statuses
  10. civil suit
  11. civil suits

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: civil societies (page history and authors); civil society (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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Cite this entry: “civil societies.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/civil_societies. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.